Any big bore over .308 cal shooting bench rest beyond 300 yards?

I wonder what the ELR and extreme ELR bench rest shooters are shooting beyond 300 yards. In particular, bigger than .308 cal.
I'm thinking of building a XELR big bore bench rest gun for 400 to 800 yards. I have already seen up to .308 cal shooting 500 yards, but have not heard of really big bore guns larger than .308

There must be a reason why really big bore at ELR are rare birds?

If you can keep your comments and suggestions "on topic", I would like to hear from you.

Rod in San Francisco
 
BC/ Sectional Density is really looked at .... Semi sub .30 cal w/ long bullets on tighter twist barrels appear to be more desirable.
7mm ( .284 ) & .257 calibers do really well making paper holes at distance .... Making a struck target wiggle for score is a different story and trends towards larger & heavier calibers.
 
The reason we do not see as much of them I think is because of Loopy trajectories and being able to judge distance correctly with them. When you look at a slow motion video of a object being hit by a airgun projectile, at long distance, and from the side, you see how much angle the projectile comes down at the object. Kinda why some say lobbing a projectile at the target.


Makes high bc and stable projectile important when it comes to long distance.

Allen
 
I think it makes more sense to find a projectile that has a high BC, is super stable at long distances, and at speeds from 1000 to 1050 down to 500 fps or whatever it hits the target at.

Then build a airgun for it.

So if you can find the ideal magic slug. You have to find the gun or make one that will push the slug the way u want it to.



Allen
 
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Hi Coffeepan,
Great intel. After watching his vids, I'm very interested in the modifying a .457 Texan.
Thanks for chiming in.
Rod
Hi Coffeepan,
Great intel. After watching his vids, I'm very interested in the modifying a .457 Texan.
Thanks for chiming in.
Rod
Anybody know if "Carl" is an AGN member? I would like to pick his brain!
Anybody know if "Carl" is an AGN member? I would like to pick his brain!
 
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I have a western rattler 357 i shoot out to 400 pretty easily.

I shot out to 600 yards with a 357 texan last week. The only real difficulty is wind.

I shoot at a steel head and torso thats 13 inches wide by 20 inches tall. At 400 yards its pretty much an 100% hit rate if you know your wind call.

Here is the best 3 shot group ive ever shot at 400 yards which i managed to get last week with my stock airforce texan .357

On average i can get handsized groups at 400 with both the rattler and the texan.


Edit: i guess i should add that i have a coldshot moab on the texan, its tethered with a huma inline regulator set to 2750 psi and im shooting 174gr raptors from higharc hunter.

20231019_171727.jpg
 
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I have a western rattler 357 i shoot out to 400 pretty easily.

I shot out to 600 yards with a 357 texan last week. The only real difficulty is wind.

I shoot at a steel head and torso thats 13 inches wide by 20 inches tall. At 400 yards its pretty much an 100% hit rate if you know your wind call.

Here is the best 3 shot group ive ever shot at 400 yards which i managed to get last week with my stock airforce texan .357

On average i can get handsized groups at 400 with both the rattler and the texan.


Edit: i guess i should add that i have a coldshot moab on the texan, its tethered with a huma inline regulator set to 2750 psi and im shooting 174gr raptors from higharc hunter.

View attachment 399067
Your groups are impressing coming from a stock .357 Texan.

This is great intel and gives me hope for a really big bore for long distance.
I have the same Cold Shot and use a Regman 2 regulator for tethering.

Thanks for chiming in.

Rod in San Francisco
 
Anybody know if "Carl" is an AGN member? I would like to pick his brain!


At least Carl was at GTA but I think he got bored then like many others and left. Some folks here surely remember Carl.

And as you can see in the video, he was quite old then, so it may be very possible that he has already retired from shooting.
All the best if he reads this, I exchanged a few messages with him about casting bullets and molds.
 
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At least Carl was at GTA but I think he got bored then like many others and left. Some folks here surely remember Carl.

And as you can see in the video, he was quite old then, so it may be very possible that he has already retired from shooting.
All the best if he reads this, I exchanged a few messages with him about casting bullets and molds.
I would be interested in buying one of his .457 Texan if he ever was interested in selling., even if his vids are 7 years old.
 
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I would be interested in buying one of his .457 Texan if he ever was interested in selling., even if his vids are 7 years old.
On one of his vids in the comments .. he mentioned to have it all for sale.. since no longer have the drive..or feel he has achieved what he wanted.. so maybe is all gone buy now..or you could have the chance of purchase it.. since in his comments he was not going to deal with lowballers maybe there's still a chance..
 
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all the above comments are very true.. I've been interested in the Quigly bucket challenge and there's lots of guessing about the actual distance in the movie..
now all the videos I have watched they were using supposedly stock airforce texan 45 with the long barrel, some use the cold shot scope jack and some even used the digital absolute readout.. basically a digital dial indicator on the scope jack.. a few are using the raven scope jack for the crossbow but although it has markings and detents so you can get exactly the same settings, I wonder what it is made of because I got the feeling it was plastic, I'm just not a plastic fan.. it's good for some things but not all things..
also everyone I saw was teathered and some were shooting over 1999 yards..
but I have a good question for you all.. I'm old and get sore way to easy.. all my PCP are 22 caliber but if like to try a larger caliber.. I have a gamo varmint shotgun 22 spring gun and after 19 rounds I am sore and it's not fun.. but it also has a attached for shooting pellets and does well at 59 yards.. sorry that was probably a little off topic..
so I was thinking about the umarex gauntlet 30 caliber as my budget is limited.. but well I wish someone could tell me what caliber might be too much recoil.. thanks to the person above I gather the 59 caliber Texans are going to be too much for me.. but I also was wondering about 398,357&45..
I don't need a really heavy slug just something accurate for a long distance.. my 22 PCP shoots well at 169 yards and then it turns into a scatter gun at 170.. I shot a rimfire to compare conditions and I was fine at 1/4 mile and well I just prefer airguns but I'm interested in long distance.. so I am assuming that it lost stability and probably tumbled..
Mark
 
all the above comments are very true.. I've been interested in the Quigly bucket challenge and there's lots of guessing about the actual distance in the movie..
now all the videos I have watched they were using supposedly stock airforce texan 45 with the long barrel, some use the cold shot scope jack and some even used the digital absolute readout.. basically a digital dial indicator on the scope jack.. a few are using the raven scope jack for the crossbow but although it has markings and detents so you can get exactly the same settings, I wonder what it is made of because I got the feeling it was plastic, I'm just not a plastic fan.. it's good for some things but not all things..
also everyone I saw was teathered and some were shooting over 1999 yards..
but I have a good question for you all.. I'm old and get sore way to easy.. all my PCP are 22 caliber but if like to try a larger caliber.. I have a gamo varmint shotgun 22 spring gun and after 19 rounds I am sore and it's not fun.. but it also has a attached for shooting pellets and does well at 59 yards.. sorry that was probably a little off topic..
so I was thinking about the umarex gauntlet 30 caliber as my budget is limited.. but well I wish someone could tell me what caliber might be too much recoil.. thanks to the person above I gather the 59 caliber Texans are going to be too much for me.. but I also was wondering about 398,357&45..
I don't need a really heavy slug just something accurate for a long distance.. my 22 PCP shoots well at 169 yards and then it turns into a scatter gun at 170.. I shot a rimfire to compare conditions and I was fine at 1/4 mile and well I just prefer airguns but I'm interested in long distance.. so I am assuming that it lost stability and probably tumbled..
Mark
I have a gauntlet .30.
the version that i have is still the bolt action instead of the new side lever version. The bolt requires some effort to pull back, if i was worried about my shoulder id go for the sidelever version. It has trouble chambering slugs without having to beat them into the barrel. However 64 gr dbhp slugs from griffin ammo slide in smoothe and are also the largest slugs that fit in the mag. I have gotten good groups out to 300-400 yards with it but the power drop when compared to something like a texan that can fire heavier slugs with a much higher bc at higher velocities becomes very noticeable. For me spotting the splash from misses became difficult and shifting winds threw the shots around a bit.

But if you're looking for an accurate entry level slug gun thats sub moa at 100 and CAN be accurate out further in the right conditions then a gauntlet is a good choice. For the price i think it's phenomenal. It's accurate, slug compatible, , adjustable trigger(I've never adjusted mine) fed from a detatchable magazine and regulated. Many higher cost airguns cant say the same. If you do go for a gauntlet you may want to put a moderator on it.

If you're going to be hunting with it or expect to hold zero after moving it id put a hajimoto barrel band on it though. Mine had bad point of impact shifts just from moving it around. It's a very large rifle so hitting the barrel on things when slung was basically a guarentee, and sometimes it seemed like i lost zero just from picking it up and setting it back down. The barrel band has removed that issue for me
 
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I have a gauntlet .30.
the version that i have is still the bolt action instead of the new side lever version. The bolt requires some effort to pull back, if i was worried about my shoulder id go for the sidelever version. It has trouble chambering slugs without having to beat them into the barrel. However 64 gr dbhp slugs from griffin ammo slide in smoothe and are also the largest slugs that fit in the mag. I have gotten good groups out to 300-400 yards with it but the power drop when compared to something like a texan that can fire heavier slugs with a much higher bc at higher velocities becomes very noticeable. For me spotting the splash from misses became difficult and shifting winds threw the shots around a bit.

But if you're looking for an accurate entry level slug gun thats sub moa at 100 and CAN be accurate out further in the right conditions then a gauntlet is a good choice. For the price i think it's phenomenal. It's accurate, slug compatible, , adjustable trigger(I've never adjusted mine) fed from a detatchable magazine and regulated. Many higher cost airguns cant say the same. If you do go for a gauntlet you may want to put a moderator on it.

If you're going to be hunting with it or expect to hold zero after moving it id put a hajimoto barrel band on it though. Mine had bad point of impact shifts just from moving it around. It's a very large rifle so hitting the barrel on things when slung was basically a guarentee, and sometimes it seemed like i lost zero just from picking it up and setting it back down. The barrel band has removed that issue for me
where do you order the barrel band from? do you have a link?
I wonder if it will fit the side lever gauntlet SL 30.. because it now comes with baffles it it.. so I wonder if they changed the shroud size..
I read a few articles about the seeall sights and thought it might be a good fit, since I prefer open sights.. but I talked to a friend that had one and he was not happy with it because the markings were crooked and it also hid the lower half of the target..
so if I get a gauntlet SL 30, I'm stuck back to getting a Williams notch rear sight, assuming it is still available and then having to make my own front sight..
thank you for letting me know about it being hard on the shoulder.. that was not my worry, but that brings up a bigger problem likely with the bolt action.. most people use their thumb and hand as a lever and I just assumed that they were used to regular powder bolts.. but now with you saying that it's hard on the shoulder.. I'm assuming that it would even be worse for me with carpal and ulner tunnel.. I can't handle 177 pellets and I can't run a gas chainsaw anymore.. I sure don't want to buy a toy that I can't use.. and I haven't seen any reviews yet on the SL 30..
any ideas? I don't have a single scope.. everything is open sights and I like adjustability.. figured if I did go with the seeall sights I would put a cold shot or the other one that's similar on for compensation on distance..
nothing like a repeatable click settings.. I also prefer sights to be as far apart as possible.. good reason I prefer long barrel and well I honestly don't have a clue about the seeall sights now especially since the are just like a reflex sight without battery.. well sort of..
id prefer to get input from anyone who will.. because my funds are very limited and I don't want to buy something and not like or use it.
Mark
 
all the above comments are very true.. I've been interested in the Quigly bucket challenge and there's lots of guessing about the actual distance in the movie..
now all the videos I have watched they were using supposedly stock airforce texan 45 with the long barrel, some use the cold shot scope jack and some even used the digital absolute readout.. basically a digital dial indicator on the scope jack.. a few are using the raven scope jack for the crossbow but although it has markings and detents so you can get exactly the same settings, I wonder what it is made of because I got the feeling it was plastic, I'm just not a plastic fan.. it's good for some things but not all things..
also everyone I saw was teathered and some were shooting over 1999 yards..
but I have a good question for you all.. I'm old and get sore way to easy.. all my PCP are 22 caliber but if like to try a larger caliber.. I have a gamo varmint shotgun 22 spring gun and after 19 rounds I am sore and it's not fun.. but it also has a attached for shooting pellets and does well at 59 yards.. sorry that was probably a little off topic..
so I was thinking about the umarex gauntlet 30 caliber as my budget is limited.. but well I wish someone could tell me what caliber might be too much recoil.. thanks to the person above I gather the 59 caliber Texans are going to be too much for me.. but I also was wondering about 398,357&45..
I don't need a really heavy slug just something accurate for a long distance.. my 22 PCP shoots well at 169 yards and then it turns into a scatter gun at 170.. I shot a rimfire to compare conditions and I was fine at 1/4 mile and well I just prefer airguns but I'm interested in long distance.. so I am assuming that it lost stability and probably tumbled..
Mark
sorry I didn't catch until today that my phone autocorrected the "0" in my post to"9"..
 
where do you order the barrel band from? do you have a link?
I wonder if it will fit the side lever gauntlet SL 30.. because it now comes with baffles it it.. so I wonder if they changed the shroud size..
I read a few articles about the seeall sights and thought it might be a good fit, since I prefer open sights.. but I talked to a friend that had one and he was not happy with it because the markings were crooked and it also hid the lower half of the target..
so if I get a gauntlet SL 30, I'm stuck back to getting a Williams notch rear sight, assuming it is still available and then having to make my own front sight..
thank you for letting me know about it being hard on the shoulder.. that was not my worry, but that brings up a bigger problem likely with the bolt action.. most people use their thumb and hand as a lever and I just assumed that they were used to regular powder bolts.. but now with you saying that it's hard on the shoulder.. I'm assuming that it would even be worse for me with carpal and ulner tunnel.. I can't handle 177 pellets and I can't run a gas chainsaw anymore.. I sure don't want to buy a toy that I can't use.. and I haven't seen any reviews yet on the SL 30..
any ideas? I don't have a single scope.. everything is open sights and I like adjustability.. figured if I did go with the seeall sights I would put a cold shot or the other one that's similar on for compensation on distance..
nothing like a repeatable click settings.. I also prefer sights to be as far apart as possible.. good reason I prefer long barrel and well I honestly don't have a clue about the seeall sights now especially since the are just like a reflex sight without battery.. well sort of..
id prefer to get input from anyone who will.. because my funds are very limited and I don't want to buy something and not like or use it.
Mark
Here is where you can order the barrel band https://hajimotoproductions.com/index.php/product/hp-barrel-band/
 
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