Post by encore50a on May 30, 2014 12:47:30 GMT -5
Yesterday was perfect for shooting, just a little warm at 65°. I'd changed bases from that 20moa that was giving me problems and back to Leupold mounts and rings. Loaded everything up, made sure I had (I thought) everything and drove to the range. Immediately when pulling to the benches, I noticed what I thought was another shooter. Hard to tell with the thick cloud of mosquitos swarming him. Right in the sunshine. Horrible! I almost turned around and left after realizing I didn't have any bug spray. He was taking a break and I rolled down the window and asked if I could hang a couple targets. He replied, "Go ahead. I need to get out of these skeeters for a minute anyway. Hey, do you have any bug spray?"
I went to the 200yd backstop and hung a target, then hung on at 400yds. Back at the bench, I got everything out and up on the bench. He hadn't seen that I had a muzzleloader but, he himself was shooting one of the original CF Contenders. I go loaded up in between trying to spit out mosquitos. Good thing I had on a long sleeve shirt! The 200yd target had been used someplace before, so I had covered the holes with orange dots. Time to set the zero, then the turret for the different load, 95grs WEIGHT of BH, 300gr SST, instead of the 100gr weighed charge. Three shots and walked a couple of them right in there.
When I said a cloud of mosquitos, I mean one so thick you couldn't hardly see through them, let alone concentrate on a target. I had them flying between my eyes and shooting glasses. After setting the zero and the turret, I almost called it a day but, the old boy next to me was dealing with them, so I decided to set the turret to 4 and find out how far off the turret with that charge may be. I sent them but, it was all I could do to get the trigger pulled. Between the bites and those flying inside my shooting glasses, I shouldn't have even been there. Not a group like before but, it appears to be about 1.5moa off high. I had no choice but to quit shooting, as did the old boy next to me. I'll reduce the charge by 3 grains for the next session, when I WILL have bug spray and the Thermacell.
We both hurried to get targets and packed up and left. The old boy couldn't believe I was shooting a muzzleloader that far. However, for an old boy, he sure "dotted the I" with that Contender. I witnessed him shoot a 200 yard 1.5" group!!!