Is seeking ¼ Minute precision worth it?

Is seeking ¼ Minute precision worth it?

Whether we are perusing forums, pages on Facebook, or just talking with friends at the range, we inevitably find someone asking how to improve the precision of their rifle. It may be a different projectile, custom action, new powder, custom cases, a new barrel contour, a chassis, brake, barrel tuning, etc. there are endless suggestions guaranteeing ¼ minute of angle precision. But is it worth chasing?

Mass manufacturing of firearms has come an extraordinarily long way, especially in the last decade. Before ten years ago, if you wanted a solid sub-MOA rifle it would almost always require a trip to a gunsmith. Especially, if it was for any type of competitive shooting. With the renewed push of sniper-style competitions and the explosion of the Precision Rifle Series in recent years, manufacturers have been able to develop and market, out of the box, sub MOA rifles for extremely affordable prices.

One of my favorite tools for analyzing anything shooting related is the Applied Ballistics Weapons Employment Zone (WEZ). To properly do a comparison we are going to start with a basic scenario. The data I am going to use is essentially a bolt action .308 with match ammo. A 175 grain sierra match king with a velocity of 2650 will be our load. Initially, we are going to put our wind error at 0 MPH and our velocity variation at 20 fps. Everything else will be at the default settings.

With all these factors and assuming a 1000 yard 1 MOA target, our hit percentage is 75.4%

If we use all of those same factors but change our rifle precision to ¼ MOA what happens?

Our percentage of hits remains the same. A few less egregious flyers and a slightly tighter overall group, but statistically you are just as likely to hit that target as the guy with the stock RPR. So what can we do if chasing the quarter minute group doesn’t increase our effectiveness downrange? For starters, we can look at ammo consistency. If you scroll back up you will notice I used a muzzle velocity with a spread of 20 fps. This would be fairly standard for a lot of your high end box match ammo or decent hand loads. It also contributes to most of our spread at 1000 yards. If we reduce that deviation to just 10 fps, you can see our group and hit percentage significantly tighten up.

Yet, with our new found consistency how is there still no statistical difference from the two rifles? Also, keep in mind we still have 0 MPH of wind on our hypothetical range.

The main reason you don’t see a change is that the preciseness of the rifle is only a fraction of the equation. Yes, it is a very important fraction, but only to a point. Once you have reached that 1 MOA group the noticed effect is greatly reduced due to the other factors affecting your group becoming a larger percentage of that equation.

Now that we have our loads within a more desirable spread of muzzle velocity, let’s make our range more realistic and throw in some wind. I’m going to add 2mph of wind error into the equation. What that means, is the shooter is capable of calling the wind within 2 mph of what it is doing on the range (this is very realistic even for experienced shooters).

Our hit percentage drops to a staggering 29.1%. Yet, our two rifles are still statistically in a standoff due to the wind call now being the largest part of our equation. This, of course, is blind to the preciseness of your rifle.

You can increase your hit percentage by switching to a higher Ballistic Coefficient (BC) projectile, and/or by increasing your base muzzle velocity to better shed the wind, but, the results will remain the same. A 1 MOA rifle will statistically perform the same as a 1/4 minute rifle. Instead of continually pushing the limits for tighter and tighter groups, your focus, money, and time are better spent improving consistency with your load and your consistency as a shooter.
Our hit percentage drops to a staggering 29.1%. Yet, our two rifles are still statistically in a standoff due to the wind call now being the largest part of our equation. This, of course, is blind to the preciseness of your rifle.

Written By Johnathon Solinsky- USMC Shooting team (RET.) and POI SR. Reviewer