Effects of Rifle Cant at Long Range — Tubb Explains
Eleven-Time NRA National High Power Champion David Tubb knows a bit about long-range shooting. One of the key factors in long-range accuracy is making sure that the tilt/cant of your rifle does not change throughout your shot string. In the clip below, the first in McMillan’s Master Class Video series, David Tubb explains the importance of keeping your rifle level. He explains that, at 1000 yards, your Point of Impact can change dramatically by canting the rifle either right or left. David states that, when shooting at 1000 yards, if your rifle is level and your shot is centered-up on a 72″ (six-foot) square target, you can actually put your next shot OFF PAPER by canting your rifle. That means you can move Point of Impact (POI) three feet or more, just by canting your rifle! Bryan Litz confirms Tubb’s observation. Bryan tells us that, as a general rule of thumb (for common cartridges), a 1° cant will produce five (5) inches of lateral displacement at 1000 yards. Thus, if you cant your rifle just 8°, the POI would move 40″ from the center of the target, putting the shot off the edge of a 72″-wide target.
David explains that, after one of his students has made two or three 1000-yard, X-Ring hits with a LEVEL rifle, “then I’ll have him take his rifle, and cant it to the right. I’ll have him shoot a shot. He will MISS the six-foot-square frame off to the right. Then I’ll have him cant his gun to the left and shoot another shot. He will miss the six-foot-square frame to the left.”
Rifle Hold and Canting — Consistency Counts
Remember that you must maintain the exact same amount of rifle cant from shot to shot. Yes, some iron sights shooters do tilt their rifle slightly to achieve a better hold or to index their sights better. However, these shooters do not change the tilt from shot to shot — the amount of cant remains the same on every shot.
When shooting prone with a scoped rifle it’s probably best to keep the rifle dead level, with the scope’s vertical crosshair straight up and down. Use a rifle-mounted bubble level to maintain a level hold, and avoid canting the gun either to the left or to the right. Affordable bubble levels that mount to your scope or scope rail can be purchased from Brownells and other vendors, starting at about $15.00.
Similar Posts:
- Avoid Canting Your Rifle to Improve Your Long Range Shooting
- Control Rifle Canting to Improve Long-Range Accuracy
- Shooting Skills — Canting Left or Right Alters Point of Impact
- Improve Your Shooting by Using an Anti-Cant Device
- The Anti-Cant Device for Scopes — Why You Need One
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Tags: 1000 Yards, Cant, David Tubb, Level, Tilt
From the video:
“I can’t stress how important a level is to long range shooting”.
Couldn’t agree more. Many people overlook the importance of a level for long range shooting, thinking they can just ‘judge’ when their sights are level. Consider this rule of thumb: At 1000 yards, for every 1 degree of cant (rifle tilt), the shot hits 5″ to the side. So 2 degrees of cant will cause the bullet to hit 10″ to that side, 5 degrees will cause the shot to hit 25″ to the side, etc. [To clarify the above rule of thumb (5″ of shot displacement per degree of cant). That rough rule of thumb applies for a typical trajectory at 1000 yards. Shorter ranges the effect is less, longer ranges it’s worse.]
Now consider that the unaided eye can only resolve within about +/-3 degrees of ‘level’ with no references in the field of view. That’s +/-15″ of miss distance that will appear as ‘mysterious wind’ to the shooter, but is actually the effect of cant.
Levels are essential for accurate long range shooting! — Bryan
To clarify the above rule of thumb (5″ of shot displacement per degree of cant).
That rough rule of thumb applies for a typical trajectory at 1000 yards. Shorter ranges the effect is less, longer ranges it’s worse.
Shooting F-Class I prefer to line the horizontal cross-hair with the target frames to get a consistent shot to shot cant. Its quicker and easier on older eyes than a level bubble, but I can understand the value of a bubble with iron sights.
I can speak from some real world results this last weekend. My brother and I took my 50 out to the desert and were shooting folding chairs at 1600 yards. We were having trouble with the wicked bad mirage spotting hits so I set up a little closer to spot for him. He was still all over the place. The weekend prior we were nailing the 3’x4′ boulder and chair pretty regularly with a steady 12 mph left to right wind all the way to the target. I was a little baffled that he was struggling so bad this time. I chalked the misses up to the horrible horrible mirage then asked him after if he was paying attention to the bubble level for shot to shot consistency. He was not. It was pretty evident what the problem was at that point. He went from nailing hit after hit with a decent wind to getting skunked with no wind at all just from not paying attention to the cant. Very very important info for those that shoot for distance.
There are four aspects of level that could be considered here.
#1 Gun level, affecting hold, & recoil.
#2 Scope reticle level, affecting holdoff accuracy.
#3 Scope adjustment level, affecting dialed accuracy.
#4 Spindrift countering scope adjustment level.
I dial elevation, hold off for wind, and shoot mid ranges off bipod or rest, so #3 is my priority.
A rail or barrel mounted level don’t get it for this. But a system that can be calibrated to cover all but #1 is a ‘ScopLevel’ http://www.scoplevel.com/
Not that #1 isn’t important. For Mr. Tubb, I’m sure it’s a priority.
^Mike,
I think you missed the purpose of the article and need to read it again.