In this day and age of instant gratification it was difficult (for me) to wait for my dream rifle to arrive but all said and done it was worth it. The rifle was packed securely and double boxed and upon arrival there was no visible damage to it upon opening the box.
View attachment 397989 Next up was to sight this puppy in. I jokingly told Mike that it must be defective because it took me three shots to zero it in. He promptly replied to pack it up and he would look it over... On second thought ….. naaaaaah.
View attachment 397990 That sight in was yesterday. I live in a rural residential village and my neighbors don’t appreciate loud rifles being shot in close proximity to their homes so 3 shots were about all I could let fly without folks coming out with frowns to greet me so I put it away for the night.
Today I made a trip to the range to put it on the bench and see what this gem could do at 50Y. Even though we had sustained winds of 15 and gusts to 24 I was pleasantly surprised that the HPX puts lead where you tell it to if you can read the wind correctly? The misses were all my fault for bad wind calls.
View attachment 398002View attachment 398001 Here are first two targets:
View attachment 398003 I was experimenting with several different batches of FX and JSB MRDs, deep and (old) shallow cavities and they all performed slightly differently so it’s going to take a while for me to learn what this rifle likes best and what position it prefers atop of the Arnold rest. All pellets shot VERY well but there were some minor differences in POI between different pellets. Lots of experimentation ahead but all in all I am thrilled with my new HPX. I was particularly impressed with the lack of vertical stringing. The horizontal misses were missed calls, all on me.
Our outdoor season is nearing an end with only 1 match left to shoot this Saturday. I’m so looking forward to N50 2024!
Thanks again Mike for building a rifle that I am likely not worthy to own.
