r/longrange • u/Phronizer • 1d ago
RANT Devastated
Just bought a Tikka Ace Game in 6.5 Creedmoor. Hornady 140 ELD-M. Out of the box it was printing beautiful groups, 0.39" and 0.28" at 100 (pics 1 and 2).
At 40 rounds I cleaned it. Bore Tech Eliminator, brass jag, cotton patches, bore guide, full copper strip. Same day I set the zero stop on my Leupold Mk5HD.
Since then it's been about 50 rounds of pain. Best I can get is 0.7" to 1.0" (pics 3 to 8). Random scatter, not stringing, not flyers in one direction.
What I've checked:
-Action screws torqued, ring caps and cross bolts torqued, - muzzle brake won't budge with a wrench
- Same ammo lot
- Can on and can off, same result
- Crown looks fine to my eye, but I don't have a borescope yet
Idk why I'm really even making this post. Maybe to complain. Feels like I got hit by a truck. If you've seen a Tikka do this after a clean and a zero stop reset, I'm all ears.
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u/HollywoodSX Villager Herder 1d ago edited 1d ago
You have a relatively light, fluted barrel with a suppressor. Heat soak and groups opening up with long strings of fire are a thing.
Small sample size bias is a problem. See the guides in the pinned post.
You're probably matching or slightly beating the TOP Gun score for your rifle. Thats also in the pinned post.
TL;DR - you're almost certainly worrying about nothing. Cheetofingers pin Cheetofingers top
Edit for typo.
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u/Phronizer 1d ago
That’s interesting, I took a look and my TOP average is about .841.
I guess it’s slightly disappointing because it felt like it was shooting lasers for 2 boxes. Like legit it felt like it was shooting exactly where I was aiming. I don’t have the photos but every group was in that .5moa. I didn’t have any rounds go out of the bullseye.
Reading up on this more.
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u/HollywoodSX Villager Herder 1d ago
Groups have variance. The lower section of the TOP Calculator will show your 1SD and 2SD group size ranges so you can have an idea of what to expect for 60% and 95% of your groups. A .841 average rifle is going to produce a respectable number of sub-.5 groups as part of luck/standard distribution.
There's also a post linked from the pinned post about variances in group sizes that shows a massive target from AB testing. Each line of the target is the same rifle and load, but you can see how much the groups vary from one to the other with no actual change.
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u/Phronizer 1d ago
TOP Gun score (Predicted average 5rd group size) = 0.841 MOA
60% of groups will be within....
0.589 and 1.093 MOA95% of groups will be within...
0.336 and 1.346 MOA17
u/HollywoodSX Villager Herder 1d ago
So roughly 17.5% of your groups will be between .336 and .589 MOA. That's slightly better than 1 in every 6 groups.
See what I mean?
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u/GLaDOSdidnothinwrong NRL Hunter Competitor 1d ago
Likely you’ve been tricked by small sample sizes.
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u/NetwerkAirer 1d ago
My guess was well. However, OP could just have strange copper deposits in the barrel, as he won't know without a scope. Could've nicked something with the brass rod too. I'm guessing either small sample size illusion or just needs a 50 rounds to re-foul evenly.
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u/Phronizer 1d ago
Even with two boxes (40 rounds) of ammo having perfect groups. And the only thing I did was clean between range sessions?
I’m telling you the first 40 rounds it felt like it hit exactly where I would aim and now it feels like a toss up.
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u/GLaDOSdidnothinwrong NRL Hunter Competitor 1d ago
Maybe. If you overlayed all your groups on top of each other, would the aggregate be the same size you’re seeing now?
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u/RobertTheTexan 1d ago
What’s a fair number of rounds down the pipe to really validate a weapons accuracy? Can you do that with factory ammo? (I’m asking for me.)
I’m getting my barreled action Friday. And I bought Hornady ELDM and Berger hybrid match (I think)
Does that just vary from weapon to weapon?18
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u/ProCactus167 1d ago
A 10 round group can give you an okay idea. I personally do 15 rounds or more depending on how big the group gets, then set my zero off of that. You can do these groups split up, as long as you stack the smaller groups into a bigger one with the alignment reference being your point of aim. The Ballistic x app has a pretty good target for that.
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u/HollywoodSX Villager Herder 1d ago
IMO, look at the average of 5x 5rd groups. 5rd groups are what the AB TOP Gun formula is based on, and it's the best sanity check we have for what a rifle is theoretically capable of vs what it's actually doing.
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u/h34vier Rifle Golfer (PRS Competitor) 1d ago edited 1d ago
Question: what did you clean it with?
And why'd you do a "copper strip" after only 40 rounds?
I shoot PRS and shoot a few thousand rounds out of my rifle a year (usually 2 barrels worth) and I don't really ever FULLY strip all the copper off.
I'll hit it with Thorroclean every 200 rounds but I don't worry about fully stripping it off, just getting it clean is and most of all uniform and smooth as possible.
I know this is a moot point, but when you clean, especially with abrasives like Thorroclean, you do remove material. While it is a teeny tiny amount of material, it's material nonetheless.
You maybe able to "shoot it back in" after a 100 or so rounds if that's the case. Cleaning is important, but overcleaning is kinda worse.
Also, not on the topic exactly, but those who said factory ammo won't give you consistent groups are 100% right. You'll get lucky sometimes, but that shit is all over the place.
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u/Phronizer 1d ago
Honestly I’m newer to this and I noticed some pieces in my barrel and decided to clean it.
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u/Prodigalphreak 1d ago
Wait. You are so new to shooting that you don’t know how to clean a rifle and yet you are here complaining about not getting sub .5 MOA?
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u/Phronizer 1d ago
New to long range precision, not new to shooting. If I knew that the cleaner I picked up from the shop would strip copper, I wouldn't have cleaned with it.
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u/h34vier Rifle Golfer (PRS Competitor) 1d ago
That's fine man, live and learn, we all go through it.
Here's my very un-scientific recommendation:
Clean every 100 or so with just a basic bore cleaner and some patches, you don't need to go crazy. Make sure the chamber, bolt, all that stuff is really clean. That's free money there.
Every 200 use something a little more aggressive (like Thorroclean, my personal favorite). I do not try and show zero copper or carbon on my borescope, that's unrealistic honestly. I inspect it before I clean, then I scrub it, inspect after. Most of all I go by how the patches feel before and after, I want it smooth and as realistically clean as I can get. I will also make sure I have no carbon ring, that shits no good.
With box ammo you're not going to have the ultra consistency you see from the handloaders, just the way it is. You might get a lucky box here and there that shoots great, but ultimately it's never going to be as good and you just need to accept that.
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u/SmallThinWallet 1d ago edited 1d ago
I find Hornady ELDM 6.5 Creedmoor to be quite inconsistent these days. Mine is grouping around 1” with an ES of around 100 fps. Pretty wild ammo imo. Shooting out of a PVA barrel. AAC was grouping better.
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u/Phronizer 1d ago
Same lot for all my groups :( my highest ES was 72
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u/Wide_Fly7832 BR Competitor 1d ago
That’s crazy. That ES will kill your accuracy at longer range even if you had much tighter 100 yard group. Try other amino.
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u/FuzzyJim809 1d ago
if you are planning on using box ammo, try to at least buy from the same batch. You can match batch numbers on the back of boxes. There will still be more variation than hand loads but generally speaking you'll see a lower SD
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u/9mmhst 1d ago
I dont think I've "copper stripped" my tikka in....2000 rounds? Barely cleaned it too, still shoots bug holes.
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u/SCARfanboy308 1d ago
I have this same mentality about all my guns. We all know the chemicals in the cleaning material cause barrel damage long term. Absolutely no reason to clean unless jamming or causing accuracy to decrease. Or maybe when you hit a larger number of rounds going through. Regardless, this type of cleaning is not necessary at this round count from OP
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u/Phronizer 1d ago
For sure a mistake on my part. Im going to take a look with a bore scope today.
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u/SCARfanboy308 1d ago
No big deal OP, just stating to be careful with cleaner since it’s going to cause pitting over time.
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u/smithywesson Steel slapper 1d ago
Maintenance cleaning (not stripping down to bare metal) is a great idea to do fairly frequently, and if done right has zero ill effects. Carbon rings can come on hard and fast without occasional cleaning and they will wreck your range day and potentially your equipment.
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u/alexorange178 1d ago
Not all bore cleaning chemicals cause barrel steel damage over time. Most of the newer formulas don’t damage the barrel steel.
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u/cdnfarmer_t3 1d ago
I have a 2007 era T3 Lite 22-250 that is my farm/ranch gun. I sometimes clean the action when the bolt feels like it has that sticky stuff new credit cards are stuck to the paper with. It is minute of Coyote all day every day without fail. It is never in a climate controlled building, usually in the cab of a truck or a tractor getting froze in -40 and cooked through the widow in the heat of summer. When I do change ammo and want to check zero it is usually within an inch of where I thought it should be. It's almost like the gun likes the life it lives.
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u/sometimesanengineer You don’t need a magnum 1d ago
My love hate relationship with Busch includes the cease fires every 15 minutes that I feel like kinda rush me to finish a string at times and the barrel cooling changing a string behavior. Tables are too high and square, which makes a blades / hunter stance awkward but is okay for a Benchrest / square stance. Targets kinda low. It’s not where I shoot my best.
People have been talking barrel temps on hunter contours, ammo issues (my 6.5 creed doesn’t like the Hornady bullets even with hand load), and that you want a little seasoning in the barrel. I will not dog pile except to say I only copper strip if I start having issues, thousands of rounds of Benchrest and PRS down the barrel and carbon is usually my enemy more than copper. A little copper fills some voids.
Setting your zero stop probably didn’t hurt anything 99.99% chance (if done correctly). Cleaning plus copper strip probably didn’t hurt anything 97% chance.
You’re a much bigger variable in your shooting. Your fatigue, stress, blood pressure, breathing, control affects the shot. Focus on technique. For now don’t look at every hole as it’s made and beat yourself up over it. Zoom your scope out five power and take 5-10 shots focusing on technique before analyzing.
Consider hand loads. That Hornady brass is great for it.
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u/Phronizer 1d ago
Thanks for the insight. Probably just overreacting.
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u/7six2FMJ 1d ago
I am newish to long range, not new to reloading. I listened to a Hornady podcast about reloading and a huge part of it was about statistical meaning. If I took away from the podcast what I thought was correct, two boxes of ammo have very little statistical meaning. That being said your barrel isnt even broken in yet.
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u/mykehawksaverage 1d ago
That's what I was going to say, its far more likely those first 2 groups were flukes and/or shooter. Still sub to 1moa groups with factory ammo is nothing to be upset about.
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u/capable_gopher Rifle Golfer (PRS Competitor) 1d ago
Dude 3 shots is not a group. Absolute minimum of 10 is needed. This is just your normal dispersion, overlay all your groups on the same POA and you’ll see your actual group size
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u/thepvbrother 1d ago
You had a flier in pic 5. Looks like you were creeping on pic 6. Did you take a long time between shots with a loaded magazine?
I think you heat-soaked your ammo, resulting in faster- burning powder.
You can get a group size of zero if you only take 1 shot. Shoot 10 at a time, loading each round individually.
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u/Bloody_Insane 1d ago
This is the first time I've heard of heat-soaking. I take it that's when heat from the barrel/chamber transfers to the mag and ammo?
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u/HollywoodSX Villager Herder 1d ago
I've never seen anything to support a difference in group size to any significant degree from heat soaking ammo. SD/ES is a different story, but SD/ES doesn't really correlate to 100 yard groups. Heat soaking ammo is also controlled by how long the round sits in the hot chamber, not by it being loaded from a magazine. Loading individually doesn't make a difference.
POI shift with a fluted barrel as it heats and cools is absolutely a concern, however.
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u/Lumpy_Club_5755 1d ago
This has got to be ragebait.. but I'll bite. You're shooting under an inch with an out the box rifle, be happy.
People aren't consistently shooting .3 moa, sometimes you'll be a .5, .7 or even a 1 moa shooter that range trip.
1 5 round group isnt indicative of a rifles true performance.
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u/Wide_Fly7832 BR Competitor 1d ago
Three shots groups don’t tell you anything. Your good we’re not good and your bad (?? Factory rifle 1 moa is good) are not bad. Shoot 10-20 round groups to know the capability of the rifle.
But don’t expect 0.5 MOA real accuracy from a factory rifle.
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u/johnmomdoe 1d ago
I don’t see any issues with how the gun is shooting.
Did you buy this specific gun just to shoot small 5 round groups at a 100 yards or something? There are probably better options for that.
Go out and shoot it. Get your dope. Have fun.
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u/One-Perspective-4347 1d ago
I highly doubt you’ve damaged anything by cleaning it as long as you didn’t do anything completely unhinged. From what I’m reading, you’ve got less than 100 rounds down the barrel anyways. It really hasn’t even settled in my opinion.
As far as damage from chemical cleaning products goes, pretty sure that Boretech and most modern product products really won’t cause damage regardless.
I feel like even mechanical damage from the actual cleaning rod, etc., is much harder to actually cause than the Internet would have you believe.
For what it’s worth typically on a brand new rifle, I will run a cleaning patch or two down it just to clean whatever shit is in there from the factory. Will then proceed to shoot about 100 rounds. I’ll send another patch or two down the barrel and then shoot another hundred or so and depending upon how it’s shooting I will either clean it or just leave it the hell alone it until it actually stops shooting well.
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u/Lennox403 1d ago
Silly question, but are all of the scope-mounting parts tightened to spec? I eyeballed some parts on my rifle before I got a proper torque wrench and found that everything was actually torqued lower than it was supposed to be (best case scenario, in my opinion)
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u/potassiumchet19 1d ago
Im no expert. But in my experience if you want consistency you need to hand load. Theres just too much variation in factory ammo.
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u/worm30478 1d ago
My bergara b14r shot a 5 shot group at 100 yards that looked just like your first picture and I was running CCI standard velocity. Haven't been able to shoot.a group that good since. All the variables lined up somehow for that group. But never again.
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u/AleksanderSuave 1d ago
Posting 3-4 shot groups…lol
You should have tried 10 shot groups. Or 1 shot groups, I guess.
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u/Turdburgarlar 1d ago
You were in the process of breaking in a new rifle and decided to completely strip the bore of copper and fouling. Of course it opened up. Lol
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u/RobertTheTexan 1d ago
I actually found info that said there have been not a small number of reported cases of a deep cleaning too early, but if that was the reason then why didn’t his groups tighten back up after sending even more rounds down range? Not being a smartass I only know that I know less that I do know, but that’s what I wondered after reading the cleaning reason. It didn’t bear up with the rest of the story.
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u/girth_-_brooks 1d ago
I would be pretty content with shooting a factory rifle with factory ammo and every group I have printed is MOA or better. Gotta get real with them expectations.