MOA guns

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Supposedly, but what exactly does being capable of shooting MOA groups at 100 yards mean? Does shooting one MOA group out of 100 make it a MOA rifle? Does it have to shoot 100% MOA all the time?

What the average shmoe means when he says he has a 1 MOA rifle or a 1/2 or 1/4 MOA rifle is that he spent a lot of money on it and he’s shot a couple of decent groups with it and ignored all the bad ones.
 
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I looked it up and it’s actually 1.047” at 100 yards.

You can easily extrapolate it for different distances too. 1/2” at 50 yards, 2” at 200 yards, etc…

The thing is it’s much easier to shoot MOA at closer ranges. A shooter/rifle that can do MOA groups at 50 yards is good, but nothing particularly remarkable. One that can do the same thing at 400 yards is very remarkable.
 
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Sawney Bean said:
I looked it up and it’s actually 1.047” at 100 yards.

You can easily extrapolate it for different distances too. 1/2” at 50 yards, 2” at 200 yards, etc…

The thing is it’s much easier to shoot MOA at closer ranges. A shooter/rifle that can do MOA groups at 50 yards is good, but nothing particularly remarkable. One that can do the same thing at 400 yards is very remarkable.
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Please explain. Why do you say that? I mean it's just math, with the exception of the chaos introduced by wind or shooter error, it should be infallible. If you can swim in the shallow end you can swim in the deep end? 🤷‍♂️
For the record, I'm not arguing with you, just trying to understand. 😊
 
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RIshooter said:
Please explain. Why do you say that? I mean it's just math, with the exception of the chaos introduced by wind or shooter error, it should be infallible. If you can swim in the shallow end you can swim in the deep end? 🤷‍♂️
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Any deviation in the bullets/pellets flight gets magnified with distance. Say your pellet was just the tiniest bit unstable out of the muzzle, well at 50 yards that might be unnoticeable, but at 100 yards it might cause your groups to really open up. Same thing with wind or velocity differences. A little gust of wind that hits your pellet at 40 yards probably won’t be noticeable at 50 but it absolutely will at 200 yards.

The other thing about wind is that it’s the wind up close that matters the most.
 
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Sawney Bean said:
Any deviation in the bullets/pellets flight gets magnified with distance. Say your pellet was just the tiniest bit unstable out of the muzzle, well at 50 yards that might be unnoticeable, but at 100 yards it might cause your groups to really open up. Same thing with wind or velocity differences. A little gust of wind that hits your pellet at 40 yards probably won’t be noticeable at 50 but it absolutely will at 200 yards.

The other thing about wind is that it’s the wind up close that matters the most.
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The first part of what you said makes perfect sense, thank you for that.
The wind being more influential up close is something I wouldn't expect. You'd think that the slower the projectile moves, the more it would be affected by wind, therefore the wind closer to the target would have a greater effect. Interesting.
Actually, if you look back at what you wrote, it kind of confirms my theory. I'm not sure why you added the statement about wind at close range having greater effect. ✌️😬
 
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RIshooter said:
The first part of what you said makes perfect sense, thank you for that.
The wind being more influential up close is something I wouldn't expect. You'd think that the slower the projectile moves, the more it would be affected by wind, therefore the wind closer to the target would have a greater effect. Interesting.
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The wind up close has a longer time to blow your pellet off course, because it’s acting on it in the beginning of its flight path. Think of it as a force accelerating the pellet off course and the pellet will continue going off course for the remainder of its journey. If the wind can accelerate the pellet to say 1 fps in its direction of travel then that would be well over 1 foot off target 300 yards later if the pellet were initially traveling at 900 fps, (remember the pellet will decelerate the entire time).
 
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Sawney Bean said:
The wind up close has a longer time to blow your pellet off course, because it’s acting on it in the beginning of its flight path. Think of it as a force accelerating the pellet off course and the pellet will continue going off course for the remainder of its journey. If the wind can accelerate the pellet to say 1 fps in its direction of travel then that would be well over 1 foot off target 300 yards later if the pellet were initially traveling at 900 fps, (remember the pellet will decelerate the entire time).
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Thank you. That makes sense. 👍
 
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Vetmx said:
A lot of guns are capable of shooting a MOA group at 100. They are not MOA guns. They are just capable of giving you something to post a pic of on the internet. A true or mostly true MOA gun is a chore. It and what its shooter goes through to achieve it should be held in high regard.
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Can you please give some examples of "what shooter goes through"? I'm still fairly new to the hobby and trying to learn. ✌️😊
 
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Weighing and sorting pellets. Sizing pellets and slugs. Making changes inside the barrel to accommodate a certain projectile. Testing several different regulator hammer spring settings at each velocity. You can shoot 900fps at four different reg settings depending on how far below the plateau speed you want to go. One of them might be more accurate than the other. It can seem endless because it is. Then you can start testing the things we screw on our guns to keep them quiet. Your gun might shoot better with brand X than brand Y. There’s more but I’m tired of typing.
 
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Vetmx said:
Weighing and sorting pellets. Sizing pellets and slugs. Making changes inside the barrel to accommodate a certain projectile. Testing several different regulator hammer spring settings at each velocity. You can shoot 900fps at four different reg settings depending on how far below the plateau speed you want to go. One of them might be more accurate than the other. It can seem endless because it is. Then you can start testing the things we screw on our guns to keep them quiet. Your gun might shoot better with brand X than brand Y. There’s more but I’m tired of typing.
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Cool man, thanks for taking the time to explain.
 
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Vetmx said:
A lot of guns are capable of shooting a MOA group at 100. They are not MOA guns. They are just capable of giving you something to post a pic of on the internet. A true or mostly true MOA gun is a chore. It and what its shooter goes through to achieve it should be held in high regard.
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SO true.

The "blind squirrel get the nut occasionally" saying, or just simple probability account for it too......guy shoots A LOT of 100 yard groups, simple statistics concepts can demonstrate that occasionally there might be a < moa group in there. We see the < 100yards moa group, but not the other 20 (or more) groups it took to get the good one. Needing lots and lots of sighters to get an MOA group is part of this same principal.

You use "true moa." I like to specify that a gun AVERAGES < MOA. Same concept. And @ 100 yards, rare as hens teeth, at least when reality it taken into account.
 
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