My son shoots a CVA Cascade XT chambered in 7 PRC. It has a Vortex venom 5-25 x 56 FFP scope mounted on top. I am not a novice and have sighted in my share of rifles. We bore sited the rifle and then zeroed at 100 yards last month. This weekend he took a couple shots at 200 and 300. After not being on paper (24” tall and 36” wide) we moved back to 100 yards where he was shooting a sub moa group one inch right of the bullseye.
We then took three more shots at 200 where again he wasn’t on paper. He is normally quite accurate.
Everything is tight and he is shooting the same ammo. Was he just having a bad day or has anyone else come across and fixed a similar issue?
I had this problem with my 30-06, but 50&100 yards. If he is suppressed it could be the barrel won’t support the weight (this was my issue). Or if it muzzle breaked, it could be loose. It’s sounds like the barrel isn’t staying put as he shoots.
The above was good advice but also would have to say the one time I had something serious like this happened it was due to the fact that the scope mounting screws were not lined up with the barrel. I had it sighted in at 100 the past that it was off paper. The axis of the scope and the axis of the barrel met up at 100 yards but not past that
I’ve gotta think this is going to come down to incorrect dialing of the scope at 200, possibly with the wind being a factor if it stacked the error of being off by 1 inch already at 100.
If we were talking about just a slightly bigger group at 200, I might point to different things. But not hitting the paper? I’d say dope and MAYBE wind.
I would start with replacing the firing pin spring. Spring get weak. I had a Remington 700 and the serial number marker it as 6 months old upon purchase. It could hold a 4 inch group but no better. After trying a different barrel, I tried a different firing pin spring. This has fixed accuracy on many rifles for me.
Have you cleaned the barrel down to bare steel and checked it with a bore scope? When doing this confirm your twist rate for me please.
Ladies and gentlemen. CLEAN YOUR GUNS TO BARE METAL.
We did our normal cleaning and added a carbon solvent step and the gun is grouping out at distance. I dont know if new guns have tighter tolerances or what but my old .308 never seemed to care if it was dirty.