I put together my first AR, everything except the bolt carrier group was a drop in.  I went to the range for the first time to zero in my scope.  This was my first time ever in my life shooting a single bullet from a rifle.  I'm pretty new to guns.  I got my first handgun about 6-8 months ago,but never touched a rifle outside of a store, and the only handgun I have ever fired is my own,

I think I did really good, especially since I was trying to zero in the scope at the same time.  But I did  want to know if this is good or if it is pretty easy to do this your first time.

100 yards.  I think 12 inch target.  I'm looking more at the closeness together of the bullets because I think I can get them over the bullseye once I finish zeroing.  I only got to shoot 59 bullets total because I got there late and they were closing and I had to hurry.  I didn't shoot all those at the same time, I shot groups of five, then tried to zero.
Then five more.

I will say, I thought it was super fun.  More fun than I even thought it would be.  A lot more fun than shooting handgun at indoor range.  I think the gun I built is awesome and I feel better building it myself.  I've been collecting parts for months.  It's good to have it finally together.  The trigger surprised me.  It didn't take half the force my pistol does.  Very, very nice pull.  I think it makes a huge difference to how good I will shoot.
ok, off to clean the rifle.  Here is a photobucket link to the target.  Hope it works.

Welcome and fantastic shooting. The more you shoot, the more proficient you will be. Enjoy yourself and be safe.

Yup that's great.

Nice shooting!

Why did you hang the target sideways?

You did good and obviously enjoyed it so, welcome to the club but, you forgot something... We need pictures and specs on the rifle you built. This is a gun forum after all and without confirming pictures of this alleged build, you might have poked those holes with a pencil.

Trigger control and breathing, those are your two biggest factors in marksmanship. Nice shooting for first group, but we need to see pictures of the gun!

Nice start!  Depending on your barrel and ammunition that may be about as good as it can get.  I enjoy shooting for groups as well.  

This.

OP, were you using a front rest or bipod, and a rear bag?  If not, that will help tighten up your group(s).

Was this with irons, or an optic?  If optic, which one?  Seems like you still might need to go Right one click, and Up two clicks.

...and Welcome to Arfcom!

Not bad at all for a total rookie! We all started somewhere!!!

Sight Picture
Sight Alignment
Trigger Control, slow steady squeeze.
Fire at the bottom of the exhale.
Positive Mental Attitude!

http://www.ar15.com/forums/t_3_128/670464_Proper_Basic_Shooting_Positions_For_You_and_Your_New_AR15.html


Do yourself a favor and read this. Apply the fundamentals and you'll shrink those groups an inch or more.

Thanks!  I will get some good pics taken today.

nice job,  at a 100 yards that is a fine group for a start.  

Depending on the barrel with a scoped rifle, a good front and a good rear rest you might be able to get it down to an inch and a quarter or inch and a half with good match type ammo.   With standard any brand 55 fmj ammo I'd expect you to be about to do 2.5 to 4 inches with a scope.  There are some better 55 fmj's than others out there that can do better.  With any of the match ammo's (52 bthp, 69 bthp, and 77 bthp) that fit your twist you could push around an inch of f the bench with good rests.  


A man slung up prone with a good gun and decent ammo with iron sights can do about 2 inches with practice.  Some better, some worse.

Most clubs have something to shoot off of to zero a gun; sand bags, wooden blocks, foam blocks, carpet rolls.   I see many shooters use them with no rear rest.  They do about as good as your target.   A front sandbag and a rear bag of some sort is fine for much improved shooting.   You can make a rear sandbag out of a cut of leg from a pair of blue jeans stitched shut or even better an older style (heavy) canvas shot bag.   I've made the latter on the range with a bag from the club house when I forgot my store bought rear bag.  Even a balled fist under the rear of the stock will work better than no rest.  

Anyways nice shooting, get her zeroed and are confident with your zero, do your self a favor and get off the bench and practice your prone, sitting and or kneeling, and off hand shooting.  Those skill are the basics for being a well rounded shooter.  

Welcome to the club!

It would be easier to tell how well you shot if you marked which shots belong to which 5 shot group. I use a blank target and as I shoot mark on the blank target where each shot lands then circle each of the groups. Then when I retrieve the target I know which group is which.Do use sand bags or a rest on the front as well as sandbags on the rear when your shooting groups as others have suggested. It will really improve you groups. Good luck with your new AR.

Agreed on the circling.  I will.  The groups were the ones closest to each other.  

I used a small Harris bipod that was attached to my rifle and shouldered the back.  I didn't use any sandbags at all.  I thought using a rear one was cheating, lol!  

If I was in the Olympics or a big time tournament, how do they stabilize their guns?

I have a 1/8 twist barrel.  I was using American eagle 55 grain ammo., but In the future, I have different kinds of Hornady varmint or match ammo between 55-77 grain.

I was going to post the same thing!

'I thought using a rear one was cheating, lol!'  

There is no cheating in what you are trying to do, which is to shoot small groups of shots so sight adjustments will be meaningful, allowing you to align the sights with the point of impact. Or, you could call it 'zeroing'. What you try to do is take the 'human' out of the picture to every extent possible so you end up not influencing the shot. This is why some shooters use elaborate rests - to make sure it's all about the rifle, not the shooter. Once the rifle is zeroed, you can use the rifle without any rests, confident that the rifle is good. Now accuracy is up to you. That means, when you miss, you can't blame the rifle. You need to settle on a certain type of ammo to shoot. Any time you make a change, you have to re-zero.
I thought your shooting was good. You obviously have built a good working rifle, and I imagine you are going to be a very good marksman.

Good shooting.

OP, regarding fundamentals, and mentioned in the link above, but often not stressed enough to new shooters, is achieving your NATURAL POINT OF AIM

The goal is to shoulder your rifle exactly the same every time.  Consistency = Accuracy.

What this essentially means is that you develop a REPEATABLE & CONSISTENT cheek weld, eye relief, and support for the rifle.  You want it to be exactly the same every time, and you want to rely on bones for support, not muscles...as muscles get tired.

The First thing to check is your LENGTH OF PULL.  With an adjustable stock it's certainly easier, as with a fixed stock you may need to add or remove pads or spacers.  There are many that believe that LOP should equal from your elbow to your trigger finger's pad above the 1st joint just comfortably resting on the trigger.  There's no quick answer for this as everyone's body is different. But it should be comfortable...too short a LOP and you can end up with too much finger on the trigger, and too long may have you struggling to reach.   You may have to readjust depending on the season and what you're wearing.

Next, you should set up your stock and your scope so that you're far enough away from the eye piece to see the full circular image...that's good eye relief, which means that you have your cheek BONE comfortably resting snug on the stock, and see the full view of the scope, with no scope shadow from the scope housing.  If you have to move your head one way or the other to get full view, you're using muscles...and you'll be inconsistent as your muscles tire.

One good test for this is to get prone with your rifle.  Support the stock with a rear bag.  With your good cheek weld and your good eye relief, you should be able to lay comfortably resting your cheek on the stock....full image....without any strain in your neck.  Acquire a target (this may be difficult to do in your house in you have small rooms, depending on the minimum focus of your scope)  --- NOW CLOSE YOUR EYES......wait 10 seconds -- or wait 30 seconds -- OPEN YOUR EYES  --- you should still be right on target.

If you're not -- you need to adjust either the stock comb height or the scope eye relief (or possibly the mount height itself as a last resort) until you can do this repeatedly without any strain.  This is your NATURAL POINT OF AIM, and with practice you will achieve this without trying.

Another often overlooked technique to improve your skill is DRY FIRING...   The goal here again is to remove as much of the shooters influence as possible from the release of the bullet.  First you want to make sure you're not using too much finger on the trigger.  You should be using JUST the pad of the tip of your finger above the first joint....not the pad between the 1st and 2nd joints.  You want to 'press' the trigger --- straight back....not 'pull' the trigger which often results in applying diagonal pressure to the rifle, skewing your trajectory at the moment of release.

DRY FIRING is free...and is possibly the single best exercise you can do to you improve your precision.  One GREAT TOOL for getting the most of your dry firing time is to get an I.O.T.A. (or Indoor Optical Training Aid)....this is a special lens mounted in a Butler Creek flip up cap that mounts to the front of your scope, allowing it to focus at MUCH closer distances...about 10+/- feet....so that you can set up a target inside your house, and get proper focus on it so you have something to aim at when dry firing.  If you're interested in an IOTA, they are about $60 and you can read more about them here

Good  information, thanks!

I didn't mean it was cheating to use stabilizers when zeroing a scope, just when actually firing to see how well you can shoot,

What exactly is considered match ammo?  I was using 55 grain a,rei an eagle for this shooting, but I have a lot of the Hornady varmint ammos like superformance and a couple other $20 a box 55 grain ammo and some Hornady match in 77 grain.  Is there a big difference between the American eagle and the Hornady?

I'm going back to the range tomorrow  to finish zeroing and then to take my time and try some targets and see how I can do.  I was firing too fast last week, in part because I wasn't used to how easy the trigger was to pull, it seemed like I just touched it and it fired.  I definitely need to learn trigger control and when it breaks,  I don't know why they say they break like a carrot or candy cane or whatever, mine just fires, you can barely feel a break.  You really just touch it lightly and it fires.

In a 1/8 twist 16" stainless steel barrel, what kind of ammo would you use for best results, even if it is something I don't have?  What grain?  I will probably stick with 100 yards for a while.

I will definitely soon practice prone, kneeling, etc...I'm particularly excited to try switch hand, because my other eye is dominant.

The difference between match ammo and 'regular' ammo comes down to velocity.  

'Regular' ammo may have velocity variances within the same batch of several hundred fps, while match will have much tighter tolerances.  The more consistent the velocity of your ammo, the more accuracy you're going to be capable of.

Typically in match ammo, the components are better quality, the techniques used are more consistent and carefully controlled, the powder measure and powder quality are more consistent, and the seating depth is also more carefully controlled, all to create a more consistent velocity and repeatable trajectory.

Good match ammo will typically cut the size of your groups in half.  To take it even further, you start reloading your own, and 'tune' your load specifically to your chamber and barrel harmonics to shrink your groups even further.

It's still not cheating. In combat, soldiers will use any kind of rest/support they can find when trying to shoot for accuracy. They train standing in a hole in the ground with sandbags for the rifle. At the same time, its always good to get used to shooting completely 'off-hand' and from different positions.

You might try 52 grain Sierra Match Kings since your shooting 100-300 yards. With 26.2 grains of W748 My AR 15's ( LWRC M6A2 SPR, Noveske N4 Afghan, HK MR556. POF 415) among others all shoot 5 shot groups at least moa @ 100 yards a few a lot better. Hornady Match 52 grain HPBT do almost as well.

Good shooting.  A few clicks on you scope turrets and you are there.  Concentrate, use front and rear rests, and slow consistent pressure on the trigger until the hammer drops.  Cheap ammo will not give you the best results.

Very nice.

i went for the third time today and I've got the scope zeroed really well.  I will upload my newest targets.  it's good.  On one of them I got them all inside the bullseye and I think all within one inch of each other.  I have to go find the tape measure and find out.  I also need to google how to measure to see exactly what kind of group I got.

I tried shooting standing at 100 yards and that is a lot harder, but I did manage to get all three shots within the target.

If I was at a tournament, how many bullets would I shoot for each target? Or does it change for each kind of tournament.  I really want to find some and sign up once I get better.  Besides three gun, what are some kinds of AR specific games?

Lastly, I'm pretty shocked with how expensive ammo is.  I shot two ten round clips of Hornady Superformance 55grain ammo and that cost $20!  And it only took about ten minutes...wow!  But i think it did work a bit better than the American Eagle ammo I had been using.  I'm not good enough, or have shot enough to know for sure, but my best two targets were the two that I used the Hornady on.  I'll have to keep experimenting and see what my gun likes best.

The american Eagle is good, so that can be the main one I practice with and then I will find a better type that I use for special occasions, or at the end of the day when I want one last target to take home that is a keeper.

Nice shooting OP!

For NRA High Power Rifle, Offhand at 200 yards (or shorter with a reduced size target),  is either 10 or 20 rounds, single loaded and fired within 10 or 20 minutes respectively.





For precision, use a bladed, bone-supported stance, and squeeze the trigger on the inward movement of your "wobble area". Followthrough and call your shots before looking at them.





 

There is a FREE (shareware) program you can use to do the measuring for you called ON TARGET.

Courses of fire at matches will vary.  What part of CA are you in?  If you're around the LA area, I can recommend a few fun matches, but I suspect you're up North?

As to your sticker shock, that's why the majority of regular shooters (at least those not trust fund babies or independently wealthy) reload.  It's a moderate to large initial investment (and time consuming) but allows you to shoot-more-for-less (usually you won't REALLY save a lot of money...you'll just shoot more often).

PRO TIP:  they're NOT clips, they're mags... (unless I misunderstood your intent)

Clips hold cartridges so that they can be more easily be loaded into magazines.  Clips look like this:

And magazines look like this:


ETA:  For more on places to shoot in California, I strongly urge you to also get active on www.CALGUNS.net

The clip vs magazine thing is a pet peeve of mine too. Magazines have springs, clips do not. That said, glad you are enjoying your new rifle OP. For shooting groups, use the expensive stuff. For just blasting off some rounds, the cheaper stuff works just fine. You seem to be pretty interested in the accuracy (groups) side of things more so than the combat/tactical shooting so, your ammo is going to run a bit more and depending on how into it you get, reloading can be a very viable option. Not just because of cost savings but, because of the ability to tailor your load to your specific rifle. Every rifle has it's own personal preference of what it like to shoot. Some do pretty well with most rounds. Some do phenomenal with a couple of rounds but, shoot like shit with damn near everything else. If you really get into the accuracy game, finding the optimal load for your rifle will be a benefit. Granted, this is down the road. Right now you should shoot what you can afford, work on shooting fundamentals and understand the limits of the rounds you are using. Expecting MOA from tula is obviously pointless but, that doesn't mean it can't be a cheap and viable training tool (steel vs brass argument aside). If you use it to work on fundamentals and cut groups from 5" to 3" at 100 yards, you're doing about as well as can be expected from said ammo and have accomplished a lot for a little $.