jimmyb Cug

Anyone else wanting to pipe in on why a rifle would shoot 1in groups at 100 and then start shooting 14in groups at 100 after having the barrel cleaned with copper solvent feel free.

J,

My email is down. I don't know why. I can get emails I just can't send them. I will need to get you pics of the 6.5x47. I’ll try to send all the pics at the same time. This post is to answer your question.

Accuracy in your 223:

I’m assuming you are using factory mil spec ammo. If this isn’t the case, there are a number of hand loading technique issues that we can talk about. 1in at 100 is what you would expect from most guns with factory ammo. Since that is what it was doing before, we’ll go with that being the standard level of accuracy for this gun. There are some things you can do that improve beach performance etc. but you were already having reasonable success and it seems the accuracy problem is a recent development.

Cleaning out the copper fouling will change the point of impact of most guns, but it should not change your group size by much. Normally it will decrease not increase the group. Normally what you did might change the point of impact at 100 yards by ½ to maybe 1and ½ inches from what it was before. If you had the gun printing groups right dead on the bull, it might shift that group slightly. It should not open your group up by 14 inches. Something else is wrong.

Possibility #1.

You already mentioned that your scope may be damaged. I agree this is a very real possibility. If the crosshairs are moving, it would account for the group size you now have. This could be caused by the scope not being on the gun securely or by the scope being damaged.

Possibility #2

You may have damaged the barrel or its crown somehow.

Possibility #3

Your gunstock is not securely attached to the action, or you have inadvertently screwed up the bedding making the barrel shift from one shot to the next.

Possibility #4

I had a Savage, still have it, it’s for sale BTW in 300 WSM, that had this problem. Sometimes the factory does a poor job with the torque of the barrel when they screw it into the action. What happens is over time (sometimes it is a very short amount of time) the barrel begins to work lose. This causes the group to open up. The factory repaired it for me at no cost. All that has to be done is to have the barrel reset and torqued down properly.