Larry Vickers TV show "TacTV" did a show on the 300 blk

[Tothemax!]

I watched 3/4 of show before my dvr cut out. From what I watched it seemed like they were not happy with the ballistics of the 300. The last shot I watched them do was at 200 yards. I guess I didn't know the drop was so profound at that distance.

[trook]

Yeah, I was very disappointed with the episode. As others have said..... how in the world can you accurately compare the trajectory at 100-200yds when the point of impact at 25yds is 3-4 inches low????? C'mon, man!! That is target shooting 101 stuff...

[jwb47]

I suppose i am just a hateful old bastard but unless somebody is feeding me , paying my bills or handing out happy endings I could really care less who they are , what they think or what they do . I like my 300 black out and know what it will do and its limits , it does exactly what I want it to do. the same goes for all my other different calibers of weapons I buy them for a purpose that suits me and really dont need others validation before or after a purchase.
one more thing I dont think there is a cinder block hunting season in missouri. can you cook them on a smoker?

[20X11]

I suppose i am just a hateful old bastard but unless somebody is feeding me , paying my bills or handing out happy endings I could really care less who they are , what they think or what they do . I like my 300 black out and know what it will do and its limits , it does exactly what I want it to do. the same goes for all my other different calibers of weapons I buy them for a purpose that suits me and really dont need others validation before or after a purchase.

I agree...love my 300blk...wouldn"t trade it for anything

one more thing I dont think there is a cinder block hunting season in missouri. can you cook them on a smoker?

Yeah you can, but they taste like crap and are hard to chew...

[Savage260]

This is the key to their really stupid "results." Looking at some of the forum discussions about this show proves that a lot of people don't understand how being sighted high at 25 yards will help bullet drop at 200 yards, and sighting low at 25 yards will give you an extreme drop off at 200 yards.

I guess I am one of those people, can you help me out with this? If I sight in at 25yds and am 3 inches low and have, lets say 8 inches of drop, how is it possible that sighting in 3 inches high "help" my drop at 200yds??? Will I not still have the exact same 8 inches of drop at 200? I am not much of a math guy and not overly bright all around, but this seems pretty simple. What am I missing? I would think it would "look" better, since the POA is the bull or X ring or what have you, but I would still have the same amount of drop, correct?

[Hooz]

From a good post on another forum...

2350fps. 110 Barnes .289BC. 2.5" sight hight. Zero at 100 yards. At 25 Yards the bullet is 1.22" LOW. At 100 yards it is zero. At 200 yards it is 5.73" LOW.

2350fps. 110 Barnes .289BC. 2.5" sight hight. Zero at 175 yards. At 25 yards the bullet is .73" LOW. At 100 yards it is 1.94" high. At 200 yards it is 1.84" LOW.

A 1/2" change at POI at 25 yards moves the POI 3.9" at 200 yards.

...the only issue I have with the TacTV episode was that all three guns were set to different POA/POIs. The 5.56 was shooting pretty much dead-on at 25 yards, the 7.62x39 was shooting 1.5-2" low at the same distance and the 300BLK was hitting 2-3" low. If he wanted an accurate "drop comparison", he should've set the zero on all of them to 100 yards and gone from there.

He also had different aiming points for each gun at each range to try to compensate for the different POIs.

I do know the limitations of the 300BLK, but I think that if you're going to present an "objective test", you need to make sure the playing field is level. All-in-all, I was disappointed with the show. I kind of expected better from LAV.

[300Blk]

The Barnes can be loaded to 2400 fps and still be at or below 55,000 psi in a 16 inch barrel.

I don't recommend 100 yard zero. 200 is better.

[Hooz]

Okay. I got curious after watching the show and reading all the debate, so I ran some numbers myself. I went to Hornady's website and pulled-up a representative factory load for each caliber that they tested on TacTV. I used a 55gr 5.56 NATO round, a 110gr 300 Whisper round (Hornady doesn't load 300 BLK proper, but Whisper is close enough for what I'm doing) and a 123gr 7.62x39 round.

Using the information on the Hornady website, I plugged all the numbers in to a ballistic calculator to calculate the drop for each round from 0-300 yards, sighted-in at 100 yards with a 2.5" sight height.

I also used the same numbers to calculate a the Maximum Point Blank Range (MPBR) and appropriate sight-in distance for each round on an 8" target. For those not familiar with MPBR, using an 8" target, the MPBR is the distance to which the bullet never passes more than 4" above or below the point-of-aim. If the MPBR is 250 yards, that means you can hold dead-on from 0 to 250 yards and (theoretically) never have a shot outside of your 8" circle.

Here is what I came up with for each of the three rounds...

Hornady 110gr V-Max (300 Whisper, 16" Barrel)
2375fps - 110gr - .290 BC - 100 yard zero - 2.5" sight height
MPBR (8" Target) - 258 yards - Sight-in 3.62" high @ 100 yards

Hornady 55gr GMX (5.56 NATO Superformance, 20" barrel)
3130fps - 55gr - .270 BC - 100 yard zero - 2.5" sight height
MPBR (8" Target) - 327 yards - Sight-in 2.86" high @ 100 yards

Hornady 123gr SST (7.62x39mm Steel Case, 20" barrel)
2350fps - 123gr - .295 BC - 100 yard zero - 2.5" sight height
MPBR (8" Target) - 256 yards - Sight-in 3.63" high at 100 yards

I have seen people asking how the sight-in ("zero") distance relates to "bullet drop", so I charted it all out as a sort of visual aid. On the graph below, you'll see each round's trajectory plotted with a standard 100 yard sight-in distance. I also plotted each round with the sight-in distance needed to achieve its MPBR on our proverbial 8" target.



Click here to see the actual numbers I used for this chart.

[darr3239]

Yep, I was a little disappointed with the show. There was no mention of ammo used, and they never tried suppressed, even after stating the 300 BLK was designed from the get go for that application. Everyone knows it is not a long range cartridge, but I do get the three gun comparison though.

It appeared the only real reason they had a show on 300 BLK, was due to their biggest sponsor just releasing a rifle in that caliber. If it would have come about because Larry was interested in the caliber on his own, then I'm sure the episode would have been more in depth. Maybe he's not a fan of the round? We would know for sure, I'm thinking, if it didn't involve sponsorship.

It's a shame, being a 300 BLK owner, that when a show finally highlights it, it's a let down. There are other gun shows to watch, if you want basic info. and no meat.

[Hooz]

Because I am bored at work and I have a touch of OCD, I played with the ballistics a bit more to see if I could figure out why LV's bullet drop was so out of whack from what I see with my 300 BLK guns.

In the show, when he "sighted-in" the 300 BLK it was hitting 2-2.5" low at whatever distance he was shooting. Now, I'm not sure, but I'm going to assume he was sighting-in at 25 yards. Figuring a sight height on an AR around 2.5", and the 300 BLK shooting 2.5" low at 25 yards, I took the same Hornady Whisper load that I used above and ran it back through the calculator.

Here are three different trajectories. The first "Theoretical Trajectory" was based on what LV shot on the show, the second trajectory is figured with a 100 yard zero and the last is shown with the 222 yard zero listed in my last chart (to achieve MPBR on an 8" target).



As you can see, the "Theoretical Trajectory" matches up pretty well with what LV experienced on the show. It also explains why his numbers are so different than mine, as I use a 100 yard zero (50 yards for subs).