I've owned a good number of service arms, from turn of the century bolt guns to the euro-variants, AK's, a Galil, PE57, SVD, you name it. And, I shot them all alot.

I was a slow warmer to the AR, having listened to biased, stupid people fill my then young head with myths and half-truths about its reliability, "shits where it eats", fragile, etc.

So, when I bought my first a few years ago it was nice to dispel those myths and rediscover what I truly think is the best multi-purpose weapon of this century.

Today, I was just doing some load testing, blasting ammo, nothing more. Sat on the bench, with the chrono fired up, and shot some 10-shot groups to test out some plinking stuff with a very stock Bushy, cut to 18", chrome lined-A2 with a scope on the carry handle. Plain jain, the only mod whatsoever is a RRA 2-stage trigger.

Here was my first group, off a cold barrel:

First shot, the flyer, was the dead center hit. The next 9 went into a .812" group (center to center). The first 3 shots of that group were literally on top of each other. This load uses good bullets, but brass that's unprepped, just garden variety load, I didn't even weigh each charge....just crap that came off the progressive.

Here's a second group, on a warm barrel using cheapie bullets:

Not quite as good, but the first 7 shots were well within an inch before the warm barrel started pushing them open.

This isn't a match gun. It's not accurized in any way. It's a $750 Bushmaster XM15, nothing more....and it's 100% reliable, after many thousands of rounds. It's really impressive, when you think about it. Look at the vaunted AK. Yes, it's a reliable mo-fo, but even the most accurate sniper variant would be hard pressed to deliver those groups (trust me, I've owned 2 of them). After 3 shots, the SVD would walk them all over the place.

I know there's more to a good service weapon than accuracy, but being able to lay those rounds inside of a quarter, with just a rumdum simple A2, speaks volumes about the gun's design.

[/off soapbox]

Am I missing the distance to the targets in there somewhere?

Quoted: Am I missing the distance to the targets in there somewhere?

Doh! 100 yards, of course.

Good shooting there, Swingset.

CSP

Quoted: Good shooting there, Swingset. CSP

Darn right!!

Hey, thats good shooting even if it was @ 7yds! much less a hondo

Quoted: Its always nice to see someone post an honest 5 shot group instead of  3/5ths of a group.  A ten shot group is even nicer.  Nice job!!

Yeah, that rubs me wrong too. 3 shot groups say nothing about the gun. Let it warm up, shoot 10, or better yet 20 shots, and see how good that action is. I've got a Browning A-Bolt in 220 swift that will shoot dime sized 3 shot groups, but once you push it past 4 or 5 rounds, it strings. I could post those 3 shotters, and say "wow this gun's great", but on a prairie dog hunt that stringing would cost me a shot past 200 yards.

Nice groups and good shooting!

I've been hung up on ARs since before my first in 1986 and I'm still in love with them.

Danny

Those are some nice groups!  

Quoted: Those are some nice groups!

+1

This an a 16" SS MRP with Hornady 75gr TAP @ 200M. The M16/AR platform today is very capable.

The group positions are me testing the windage & elivation adjustments on a Leupy MR/T.