Great Day at the range

[markg]

What a wonderful day to be at the range. The weather in Southern Alberta was beautiful; warm and suprisingly no wind. I went to the range to sight in my trusty Sako 85 .204. I had taken the scope off of it and was using it on another rifle. Coyote season is just around the corner so it was time to put my favorite rile back in action!

Today was not just about sighting in my scope, I also wanted to get some reloading data recorded. I was excited to try out my new toy, I purchased a Labradar Chronograph. It worked very well and I hope to post a full review.

My first group was great, just a bit over 1/2" It was pretty much spot on right / left but it was about 2 MOA high. I brought the point of impact down exactly 2 MOA and the scope did exactly what I told it to do. My second group was right on in the bull and again around 1/2 MOA. I was tickled pink.

The shooting results were great now it was time to see how my new Labradar Chrono was working. It was able to to record 4 of my 5 shots (I didnt turn it on for the first group). I wasn't sure that It would even work on .204 calibre rounds due to the small size of the projectile and the high velocity but work it did. The results made me just as happy as my shooting, The Average Velocity was 3916 fps with a high of 3918 and a low of 3912 with an extreme spread of of 6 and a standard devation of 3.2!!!!! This is the best test results I have ever had for ammunition I've made.

So with this information in hand I decided to plug the numbers into the Vortex Long Range Ballistics Calculator and get a shooting solution for 400 yrds. It came back with with 4.4 MOA of adjustment wind was almost dead calm so I used my reticle and held over 1 MOA. I pulled the trigger and was rewarded with a beautiful "ping" sound" I could have danced a jig, first shot and it was dead on. I shot 4 more and each was rewarded with a lovely ping! I walked down to my gong to see how it looked and low and behold all five shots were grouped nicely together, probably around 4 or 5 inches or about 1 MOA.

What a fantastic Day!

[Deer Hunter]

Nice shooting mark
Sakos are generally very accurate
Here's a 4 shot 300 yrd group I shot with factory fiocchi 50gr vmax 223 rem
Fixed 12 power leupold holding on the lower duplex post



Did you buy the lab radar from Hirsch?

[markg]

That is a heck of a group from that distance.

[260 Rem]

Got to love it when a plan comes together.

[AlbertaAl]

Excellent shooting !
What powder provided such a low SD ?

[SylverCANADA]

Wow! Beautiful group

[Hunt4Ever]

Originally Posted by AlbertaAl

Excellent shooting !
What powder provided such a low SD ?

Very nice, what's the load info?

[markg]

Originally Posted by AlbertaAl

Excellent shooting !
What powder provided such a low SD ?

I was using 27 grs of benchmark, Primers are CCI BR2 and brass was hornady factory once shot, bullet is 32gr Sierra Blitzking.

I have had some troubles with other cartridges finding the "perfect" load. My 204 loads just seem to come together really easy and really nicely, I think this was only the 3rd load I tried before settling on it back in the spring. Maybe I just got lucky.

I wish it was a bit faster (4000 fps +) but beggars cant be choosers.