Explain "minute of" term?

The article you referenced covered the true term, minute of angle, & it's an angular measurement. A full circle is 360 degrees, each degree is made up of sixty minutes (& each minute is made up of sixty seconds, but that precision is beyond long guns and handguns). The shooter is at the center of the circle, and at 100 yards a angular shift of one-minute-of-a-degree is about 1" on the target, thus that is a minute-of-angle in shooting terms. (I'm an engineer, & I've always thought it would be more accurately called a minute-of-degree)

All the other "minute-of" phrases are humorous ways of saying accurate enough. Minute-of-bad-guy just means I can hit the bad guy, etc.
 
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I thought it meant 1/60 of a bad guy. Same as everything "awesome", this sort of new expressions are bit odd to me.

-TL
 
"Good enough to hit (fill in the blank):D

Example:
A self defense snubby pistol is "Minute of (alleged) perp".
As in it will hit a man sized target at short range.
 
as noted above, MOA, minute of angle, translates to just over 1" at 100 yards (1/2" at 50 yards, and so on).

if your target is larger and closer, then you might say 'minute of bad guy', or about 8" at 25 yards or less.
 
I use minute of deer for my hunting rounds....in my case that means 1" to 1 1/2" @100 yards keeps me good. But I mostly bow and handgun hunt anymore.
 
You see lots of discussion with rifle shooters bragging about their rifles shooting 1 MOA (minute of Angle) or even better. A .5 MOA or even groups as small as .2 or something in the .1's is not unheard of.

When someone says their rifle is minute of deer etc, they are just saying they have no idea exactly how accurate their rifle is, but it is good enough to hit a deer. And to be honest, that is good enough for most people.
 
Every internet rifle is MOA and that poor accuracy limits the exceptional skill of the rifleman that owns it... If a rifle goes outside of that one inch circle.... Well, either it's a lemon, or you've shot out the barrel. :D
 
When someone is saying "minute of bad guy" or "deer," what do they really mean? Well, the intent is to get a hit and stop them.

In the first regard it should stop the attack, in the second it would keep the game from escaping to suffer. Each situation, although it looks different, has the same goal, to stop. The results after that can certainly be different but share a lot of ethical ground.

So, how big is a bad guy or deer in terms of minute of angle? Well, measuring what is consider the "Center of Mass," or basically the torso as the largest contiguous area, it's generally accepted as about 18" square. It can be said the COM of a bad guy or deer is 18 MOA.

The typical rifle is 1-2 MOA. Handguns can be shot to 2-5 MOA. The skill level of the shooter is what is in question, and from that we get an idea about what people really think.

Most assume a handgun cannot be shot accurately out to 100m - and yet the weapon capable of 2MOA is aiming at a 18MOA target. What do most handgun shooters use for sights? Open fast express sights for close range. Taking the Tuller distance as one measure, that's 21 feet. Not the best sights for 100m, and those who hunt with handguns tend to prefer ones with a tighter sight picture.

That principle is "Aim small shoot small."

One of the advantages of a rifle is that it has a stock to locate the rear of the weapon and reduce sight movement. That is why they are easier to shoot long distances more accurately. It doesn't mean pistol shooters can't, tho, as many videos on line show them hitting steel targets past 400m.

What we can learn from that is to see stocks as simply an aid in aiming the gun more accurately for the less skilled shooter. Which is why we issue rifles to our armed forces instead of pistols - more accurate at a lesser skill level means less training and less cost. A newer younger shooter can hit the enemy soldier at 100m a lot more often with a rifle than a pistol.

The funny part is that is about as far as soldiers do try to shoot in combat. Usually about 125m for aimed fire according to decades of military research. Beyond that the risk of getting hit by a round never intentionally aimed goes up quickly.

The average human trained to shoot won't try to hit an 18MOA target much past 125m. Even when he's got a weapon capable of 2MOA.

Despite all the internet bragging, when the bullets start flying both ways, we collectively don't think we're all that good.
 
I haven't met anyone who can shoot a handgun with 2 MOA.
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Depends on what you define as a handgun. I've got a Remington XP100R in .260 that will do better than 2 MOA all day long (as long as the shooter is doing his part).
 
Depends on what you define as a handgun. I've got a Remington XP100R in .260 that will do better than 2 MOA all day long (as long as the shooter is doing his part).
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As will my T/C Contender in .30-30.
 
Stevie-Ray said:
As will my T/C Contender in .30-30.
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That's 2" group, say 10 rounds, out 100 yards, and doing it any time. It is amazingly impressive. I can hardly do it with my rifle.

On my best day, with my best pistol and best hand loads, taking all the time I have, I may be able to do 2" out 25 yards. But that's 8 MOA. Man, I suck. Well, I do that bullseye style with open sight. Optics may help but not much.

-TL
 
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Agreed a handgun with scope and even bipod legs on it is a lot different than, say, a SIG P938.

But it goes back to aim small hit small.

Put open express sights on a rifle and it's not real good at 400m. But when its an African double used on large game under 50m in heavy brush, they get the job done.

Plenty of handgun hunters using revolvers with scopes go after deer every year. http://www.grandviewoutdoors.com/articles/handguns-for-deer#sthash.aMhqlpdN.dpbs

"Handguns" aren't always close range self defense weapons. I'm building an AR pistol to hunt whitetail in dense cover. We flagged three last year under 30m. That's the ones we saw. On the other hand there are some open spaces that would need to reach out at least 100m.

Someone's definition of a pistol doesn't necessarily mean they are limited to that alone. The Remington XP100 in rifle calibers came on the market since 1963. Ruger just introduced a pistol 10/22 with bipod.

They may not have a rear stock but other aiming enhancements make up for it. Skill is an individual thing, if someone never tries they certainly won't get better.
 
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