Cause of fliers

There is just so much that can affect the shot which some have already been mentioned. I've learned from years of reloading and shooting the number one cause of a flyer for me is more times than not ... ME! When shooting a group it is so very important to try and become repeatable with every squeeze of the trigger. That means taking everything into account with every shot, everytime! For me, thats easier said than done. :) Mike
 
If the fliers are mostly high right or left I wouldn't think it would be cocentricity unless you accidentally position the run out the same way each time.
Maybe your load is at the edge of the barrel sweet spot as far as velocity goes and when you have a round that runs a little faster than the others it throws the shot.
That's the fun in reloading , I get a little depressed when I find what a gun likes to shoot, it takes the fun out of chasing group sizes:)
 
Holy Crap!!! I can't believe some of the responses I read in this thread! Some of y'all must have too much free time on your hands. "Banana effect"? WOW!

It's you... No offense, but there's a 99.9% probability that it's just something inconsistent in your shooting. Nothing to be ashamed of. It happens to ALL of us.
 
Hey guys, I was looking for a quick easy cure, or at least a suggestion about how to make my rifle behave better, and then you tell me about all this concentricity stuff and anti social bullets, and to top it off, now some of you are blaming me. Geez :D
 
Holy Crap!!! I can't believe some of the responses I read in this thread! Some of y'all must have too much free time on your hands. "Banana effect"? WOW!

It's you... No offense, but there's a 99.9% probability that it's just something inconsistent in your shooting. Nothing to be ashamed of. It happens to ALL of us.
Click to expand...

For some people (me) putting multiple bullets on top of each other at extreme ranges gives us such a sense of satisfaction and pride that we have read many books and watched many videos about adavanced handloading techniques, and spent many thousands of dollars on equipment and tools and quality firearms and scopes and spend every free moment laying prone in mud and trying to control the heartbeat in the crosshairs and.....

It really is a sickness I guess:D

It really is a sickness:D
 
As to the "BANANA EFFECT" Here is clip on it's been around long time

It may or may not be; according to case measurements I've made. If one
uses the `proper' amount of `proper' case lube, the case head won't be
bent out-of-square as it's pulled out of the die. With too little case
lube, the force needed to pull the case from the die will bend the head
as the shell holder bears only on about half the rim.

It's possible for some cases to be banana-shaped and still have a square
case head to bear against the bolt face. But if the bolt face isn't
perfectly at right angles to the chamber axis, the case head will have
its out-of-square angle on a different axis each time the case is resized
and chambered.

I remember back in the good old day when we square case heads to the case body just for that little extra or you could index the case.

If the OP want to find out if it's his reloads all he has to do is mark the cases that are the flyers reload them go back to the range and shoot couple groups using them. I know seating depth hasn't come up how close are bullet to the lands

As to the wind flags that's not fool proof test unless you learn how to shoot to the flags. I find it odd that flyers are only high right/left 1/2" to 3/4" myself I don't think it's the wind.
 
It's not just wind you have to pay attention to, changing light conditions can also change your point of impact, especially with open or aperature sights. When the light dims, your pupils dilate and your focus is more blurry. A blurry front sight looks bigger and so you hold lower. Also, if you use a 6 o'clock hold on a bullseye, the out of focus bullseye looks bigger and causes you to hold still lower.
 
B.L.E. I was shooting thru a hi magnification scope at mid day so I don't think light was the issue. Also very little wind, although as Tim S pointed out, just because there is not wind at the firing line does not mean there is none at various points down range.

Based on everyone's input, I am pretty sure it is either me, the rifle, the scope, the stock, or the ammo causing the fliers :D
 
Now, mrawesome22, you have me worried about you: "...spend every free moment laying prone in mud..." Losing out in a pig-wrestling contest is one thing, but in shooting? Heck, that would make anybody have a flier! :D

All in all, my opinion--if there is any merit at all to it--is that it's more likely the shooter than anything else. Given that even the perfectionists with the best equipment and procedures have fliers, what else would it likely be?

I have this opinion in part because I've fairly often had groups with no fliers, and with the same rifle at another time, had fliers. I just figure I was having a bad day. Kind of a Zen thing: Some days, I can't miss. Some days, I couldn't hit a bull in the butt with a bass fiddle.
 
Cmon Art, you guys are getting me so paranoid about my shooting I probably won't even be on paper next time I shoot. :D
 
2 other questions for you Art

1. how do you zero a bass fiddle

2 how do you staple a bull's butt to a target board"

Just curious.:D I'm thinking that since I am a rancher (see where my questions came from) I could stay on paper by going to the barn and hanging the target on the inside wall.:rolleyes:
 
the heartbeat in the crosshairs
Click to expand...
And this is one of those times that once seen, can't be unseen... it is a line that once crossed...

I too am one of these folks, although it is more akin to "snow wrestling" for me Art!, that likes a group of bullets to make a little tiny hole at longer distances.

Yup, have someone else give it a go with your set up and see what you see. Before you start playing with "stuff", see if it is the "stuff".

And remember that at any real distance, any little variation in anything (load, bullet weight/shape/depth, velocity, trigger pull, breathing, heartbeat, wind, exactly where you place your eye, trigger finger, shoulder to stock... and yes even those pesky flies!*) can easily move your POI. And for me that is all a part of the fun of it all!

And then again, could it be... primer related? Flash holes uniform? What about how the powder is sitting in the case?

It is 2012, you could always consider the Mayan Calendar; planetary alignment? neutrinos?

Let us know what you find out!

*A smaller yet similar version of "The Butterfly Effect" known to afflict rifle shooters from time to time... for no apparent reason...
 
One experienced bench rest shooter told me that he actually likes a small bit of wind because it blows the mirage away.
Apparently, when the sun heats the ground and the air right above it, a bubble of warm air can lay on the ground for a while before it breaks loose and rises up into the air as a thermal. This bubble of warm air surrounded by cool air acts sort of like a lens or prizm and makes the target look like it is somewhere different than where it actually is, just like a stick looks bent when you stick it in water.

If you could actually see these warm air bubbles developing and breaking loose and rising, they would closely resemble the stuff in those "lava lamps" everybody had back when our hair and sideburns were long and we wore bell bottom pants.
 
It'll drive you crazy if you let it.

Here's a group my son shot today while we were doing evaluations of some loads. One flier turned what was a very nice 1/2 inch group into a simply nice one-inch group. Ten rounds, nine of them in one hole, the other up by itself. Damn!

Just to be fair, he called that flier. "I pulled that one, Pop, sorry."

308%2B03.jpg


I think he did okay.
 
Flyers,,Are just there to mess up a otherwise perfect group...:D No reasons for them, they just happen to mess with your mind.
 
"It'll drive you crazy if you let it."

That's no drive; it's a short putt.

Mayan calendar? Don't sweat it. The reason it ends in 2012 is that they ran out of room on the stone.

I figure that called fliers are freebies. True fliers are the ones that wander off and you don't realize it at the instant the gun fires. Called fliers really make me mad at myself for messing up. At least it's not as bad as messing up in a dang race car. :)

Way back when, I read most everything Phil Sharpe wrote about shooting and reloading. I read Mann's "The Bullet's Flight From Powder To Target"; he'd built a 100-yard enclosed tunnel to test his shooting and try to analyze the reason for fliers. I think that was back around 1900, give or take.

Nope. I still don't know why.
 
A lot of reasons offered re the cause of fliers, but no definitive answer. The potential causes all make sense so the problem is how to match a specific cause to a specific bullet just before we fire it.

OK so this gets into stuff like the Nicholas Cage movie where he could see about 2 minutes into the future. I can see into the future too, often days or even weeks into it, the problem is it never happens the way I saw it.:confused:

So I still cannot adjust my POA to compensate for the flier I am about to launch.:D
 
Seems like you have covered all areas without bedding the action. there is a thread on rimfirecentral about leather bedding. look for thread ( am I crazy ) It is very interesting.I would give it a try before any other perminant bed job. It's not only for rimfire. Good Luck Chris
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top