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223 will not group

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ruger7mag

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The gun: rock river upper, 20 inch barrel, 1x9 twist, the lower is a double star with a jp trigger. Brand new leupold rifleman 4-12x40 scope Burris pepr mount.

We can not get tight three shot groups with the gun. It's averaging about 3 or 4 inch groups. We have tried black hills 62 grain, 55 grain pmc bronze fmj, 55 grain federal fmj, and 55 grain Winchesters that were soft points I think. All shots were off a lead sled with little to no wind. The barrel had plenty of time to cool in between shots and all rings and mounts are tight. The gun was bought used so we do not know round count. Any ideas?
 
Assuming 100yds? Did you clean the barrel? How the bore look? With that twist it ought to shoot those 62-50gr just fine. Sounds like a scope/base/ring problem but you said you checked that. May just be a lemon.
 
Yes 100 yards, sorry about that. The barrel was cleaned before we shot, and I can't see anything wrong with the bore. We have checked the rings and mount several times. Very frustrating...
 
Chaneylake said:
do you have enough trigger time?
Click to expand...

Are you asking if I have shot much? If so, yes I have done a lot of shooting. I'm not a competition level shooter, but myself and the other shooter can shoot pretty good.
 
I would start at the weakest link in the chain.
Those groupings are obviously too large and consistent over differing brands of ammo w/different weights...so i would start with the hardware.
The first thing i would is check the crown of the muzzle and make sure it didnt get dinged up from cleaning rod abuse or a manufacturing defect.
The next thing i would look at would be the burris pepr mount. Is the rail its mounted to a picatiiny or a weaver? Is it locked down tight? Double check the screws to make sure they are snug.
I had guns come through my little hobby shop that appeared to be fine but wouldnt group well. Over half the time it was some sort of problem with the mount. I kept a good quality Leupold mounting/ring system to swap out if I couldnt figure out the problem. Most of the time that fixed it.
One guy brought me his rifle for not grouping. I finally figured out that the objective lens on his nikon scope was slightly loose inside the scope bell. Nikon replaced it under warranty, but figuring it out almost made me pull my hair out in frustration.
 
You mention Lead Sled. Was is strapped down in the Lead Sled or did you just use it as a rest?
 
The crown appears to be in good shape after looking at it under a light. The mount is a picatinny rail. Everything on the mount and rings is snug and has blue loctite.

The gun was shot at 50 yards, and I believe the groups were fairly tight, but we will shoot at a closer range to confirm.

The lead sled was only used as a rest. I never strap guns down when I use it.

The weather is looking good for Monday. Hopefully I will find some time to shoot. I'm going to shoot a couple groups at 50 yards,and maybe swap scopes out to make sure that isn't the problem. If that doesn't work, I'll try and find a torque wrench and double check the barrel nut.

Thanks for the replies so far.
 

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