25 yards:

So... I've never been to a shooting range, except for like 8 years ago at my hunter's safety class. So on our property I can only shoot safely out to about 50 yards. But I heard that if you zero a .243 Win. at 25 yards your maximum point blank range is out to about 300 yards. Any truth to that? Also, is my group in the pic decent? It's hitting a little left I guess but for some reason I always shoot a little left lol, I don't know why.

I'm not planning on shooting a deer at 300 yards, 150-200 would be my maximum for around here

Is the target a normal sized, 9" by 11" piece of paper? If so, you're shooting plenty good enough to effectively and humanely kill a deer.

Keith

I think you need to tighten that up a bit Cowboy. If your group is 1.5" at 25 yards your gonna be 9" at 150 yards.
Should be able to do a little better than that. Make sure you have a good rest and practice a little.

Zim

Agree with Zim. Lots tighter. Like 3 holes touching at 25 yards. Haven't you got a place to shoot out to 100 yards? Then you'd know.

that calculation is approximate

currently you are clear to shoot to 50 yards with a group like that at 25

it has the most to do with height over bore for the calculation

you can run a calculation on the Hornady ballistics calculator and get an idea , but you need to up your shooting game to go past 50 right now.

https://www.hornady.com/4dof

was that group shot standing unsupported or from a bench , prone, across the hood of a truck , ect...

as ZIM pointed out that group doubles at 50 again at 75 and so on

so say we call that 1.5 inches it might be 1.25 but for sake of calculation 1.5

it is 3 inches at 50 yards , 6 inches at 100 yards and 9 inches at 150 yards.

if that was you standing and cutting loose 3 rounds quickly it is one thing but if that was you doing your best rested shooting it is quite another.

If I was a betting man I would say you developed you a flinch if that was rested shooting.

Ball Dummy time
here is the deal , your dad , mom , any trusted safe person is going to take your rifle , they are going to load it place the safety on and lay it back down on the bench or hand it to you carefully , you are handing oof a loaded gun treat it like such , the load will either be a live round or one of your previously fired cases or just empty, I like to use dummy rounds as sometimes a student can hear a empty chamber close vs a round , they do this with their back turned to you so you can not see , you keep your ears on you do not want to know what is in the chamber or not.

also start this off with several dry fires where you make sure not to lie to yourself , did your sights stay on the target through the click...

when you can dry fire keeping sights on target then start ball dummy

they mix it up , you should not be able to guess what is coming next , I like to do around 4-5 dummy's to one ball , it saves ammo and you have no idea when it is coming
they watch you while you shoot , they are watching for the flinch when you pull the trigger on the dummy


anticipating recoil or jerking the trigger is a low left response in right handed shooters.

your job is to identify when you flinch , then you need to learn to just let the recoil hit you , say it doesn't hurt really , just let it hit , force yourself not to flinch , if it is a hard recoiling gun it can be hard after a while. If I don't mind it don't matter is good but at some point your body will say I mind if you are really beating yourself up


PM me I don't recall what part of WI you are in but we might be able to get you to a range if you are not too far away and get a real confirmed zero to 200 yards.

At 50 yds and in yes.
CC I know u dont have much experience and experience only comes with time so dont take any of my comments wrong but I call it like I see it.
First I would advise you to find someone with good experience to mentor you if nothing else on the shooting thing. The fact that you had to ask, which is good that you did, proves you need someone to help you. Thats a 7" group at a 100 yds which is not good. You say you always shoot left. Adjust the sights. This is why you dont take advise on forums. One guy says your good and your not. Something is wrong. Scope is loose, gun is bad or shooting skill needs work. Never go off what someone tells you about your dope " where your gun will shoot at a given range" you are responsible for shooting it yourself to verify that. There is just as much or more poor advise on the internet as there is good.

Keith what were u thinking

You may be pulling left due to your finger’s position on the trigger. If you use the tip of your finger you will pull slightly left. I like the trigger dead middle between my finger tip and the crease of my 1st knuckle. I found that position gives me a nice clean trigger break.

Another piece of advise, dont take a shot hunting you haven't practiced at . That included the distance and the position. Thats how you know if its good enough.

I agree, it could be much better...at 25 yds they should be covered by a dime, at least...

I agree with the others. Are you using a good solid rest and squeezing the trigger really slow so its basically a surprise when the gun fires?

X2 on Good for you asking for advice on it. You'll be shooting the hair off a gnats butt at 100 yards in no time with some practice.

yes , this , I will say to get cheap practice you can practice the positions with a 22lr and use the 25 yard distance to practice a bunch at home.

then go do a few rounds from your deer gun at the actual distance

standing , rested on a bag like a backpack , kneeling , seated are good ways to practice
if you decide to use shooting sticks add that to your practice.

not a bad idea to set up a 22lr similar to your deer rifle , like same optic

It is 14" by 16"

OK, thank you!

I guess I need to go to a range. I am planning on getting the brush hog and mowing a strip I can use as a range but the tractor is dead right now

Thanks for the info! I was shooting out of one of our elevated deer blinds, from a chair and resting it out the window. .243 doesn't have much recoil but I guess I could still be flinching. I'll have one of my sisters load up my clip with a spent shell/live round mix.

Okay, thanks. I'll work on figuring it out

Thanks, I usually put it right there too, or even closer to the crease of my 1st knuckle

Cool, thanks! Makes sense for sure

sounds good thanks