Vulcan50bmg

I was looking at wind meters and there are so many diff. ones out there i was wondering what you guys use I would like one to go one my truck so can use it for other purposes.

neolithic hunter

read left to right, after all this is America. when reading don't ship any words as that will change the meaning of the sentence.

DaRkWoLf

Vulcan,

For your own sake, please don't start with wind meters; and if you're using a 50, get an affordable .308 or .223 LTR to practice with.

Wind has many variables, and you can have to account with more than one. With a 50, reaching out to 1200-1800, you may be encountering over 6 different winds in a comparatively good field setting. Intense wind close to the shooter has a large effect on the bullets downrange flight, as do medium and strong winds further away where your velocity in going through them is low, though those don't affect shots before you hit them. Some winds can even make your bullet rise or plummet. These decisions usually need to be made in less than 3 seconds or the wind changes or you miss your shot window.

A wind meter will also only give you the wind at the gun, which won't help a long range shooter that much; its just a piece of the puzzle, and inside 300 you can have a hurricane at your barrel and you should still hit your target anyway.

The key points of the observation method are:
Ÿ+ Under 3 mph - The wind can hardly be felt on the face. The
presence of a slight wind can be detected by drifting smoke.
Ÿ+ 3-5 mph - Winds can be felt lightly on the face.
Ÿ+ 5-8 mph - Winds keep leaves in a constant motion.
Ÿ+ 8-12 mph - Winds raise dust and loose paper.
Ÿ+ 12-15 mph - Winds cause small trees to sway.
Ÿ+ 20-25 mph - Winds cause large trees to sway.

A good way to practice the feel of wind at the gun is to drive in your truck on an isolated road and get a feel for how certain mph feels on your hand outside your window. If you need a wind meter for other purposes, you can carry it around, guess the wind with your hand or a visual cue, and confirm with your wind meter. FWIW, I have a Kestrel 4500; it is very good and I can recommend it.

neolithic hunter

DW your getting quit well informed in your old age. what dw said is pretty much correct, reading wind is a difficult thing to teach, without you doing it yourself. if your are really wanting to get good at it keep a conditions book, log the conditions for that shooting session and your impression of the conditions effects on your shooting. log what happened at the beginning and how you corrected for it to make your hits. the reason i haven't given you anything specifics is that shooters become 3 kinds of wind mechanics. you either learn to scope correct for wind and mirage, you learn to hold off for conditions wind and mirage, or you learn to shoot through conditions wind and mirage. i have seen all methods work for long range shooters. one of the best ways to learn to correct for conditions is the single bullet method. it takes a while to start with, but you will learn a lot about your rifle and the ammo you are using. site you rifle in on a good calm day, then when conditions kick up, fire 1 round, log your aiming point and log where the round hit for you. make logged corrections and bullet impacts doing it over and over. in a short time you'll start to see a correlation between what works for you and what doesn't work so well.

money30

For your own sake, please don't start with wind meters; and if you're using a 50, get an affordable .308 or .223 LTR to practice with.

Wind has many variables, and you can have to account with more than one. With a 50, reaching out to 1200-1800, you may be encountering over 6 different winds in a comparatively good field setting. Intense wind close to the shooter has a large effect on the bullets downrange flight, as do medium and strong winds further away where your velocity in going through them is low, though those don't affect shots before you hit them. Some winds can even make your bullet rise or plummet. These decisions usually need to be made in less than 3 seconds or the wind changes or you miss your shot window.

A wind meter will also only give you the wind at the gun, which won't help a long range shooter that much; its just a piece of the puzzle, and inside 300 you can have a hurricane at your barrel and you should still hit your target anyway.

The key points of the observation method are:
Ÿ+ Under 3 mph - The wind can hardly be felt on the face. The
presence of a slight wind can be detected by drifting smoke.
Ÿ+ 3-5 mph - Winds can be felt lightly on the face.
Ÿ+ 5-8 mph - Winds keep leaves in a constant motion.
Ÿ+ 8-12 mph - Winds raise dust and loose paper.
Ÿ+ 12-15 mph - Winds cause small trees to sway.
Ÿ+ 20-25 mph - Winds cause large trees to sway.

differ

The part about the hurricane is not true, of course, if the current situation is a cross wind. It will blow even the .50 match bullet well off of a man target at 300 yds, if the wind is just 30mph. all that wind reading is, really, is a better guestimate of what to do than is possible by an inexperienced man.. It's still just a guess, and misses most certainly will occur, if there is much wind at all, or much mirage effect.

nikto

no you will NOT hit at a 'mere 300m" with a hurricane going on! a mere 10 mph crosswind, which is barely noticable, will blow off a 308 10" at 300m. Plenty far enough off to miss a man. In fact, such a breeze can easily make you miss a sideways man at a "mere" 200m, since he's just a 8=9" wide target. and no, you dont group 1 moa on a moving man. a gusting 40 mph wind can make you miss a sideways man at a mere 100m, no matter what rifle or load you are using.

nikto

basically all of this long range stuff is a bs crap shoot. There's no reason to risk it, or bother with gearing up and practicing to do it. NVD's will get you plenty close enough to anybody and a silencer and rapidfire will get the hit and get you "clear" of the site. The concealable, silenced M4 is useful for other stuff, while the long range rifle is too specialized to be worth jack squat for anything else.

Garand

Gun kid you are so full of BS, that you need to apply toilet paper to your ears! Some of us enjoy long range shooting! Some of us enjoy long range shooting on a windy day, out to 500yds! Like this Last July, out to 500 yds on a windy day with a 405 grain lead RNFP bullet in my .45-70 Shiloh Sharps #3 Sporting Rifle. I must admit I need practice as I only got 8 out of 15 possible points, but they gave me a nice certificate.
Uploaded at Snapagogo.com

Or earlier this week on Tuesday morning, I was zeroing in my 1915 manufactured Mauser Model 1896 in 6.5mmx 55mm at 200 yds with 150 grain cast lead bullets. You know those bullets that are a bit more difficult to shoot cause they are not FMJ. Well this was my 2 round group at 200 yds, bolt action, iron sights with a 100 year old rifle;
Uploaded at Snapagogo.com
But then gun kid since you really aren't allowed to own firearms it is understandable.

DaRkWoLf

Massive gusts could be at your barrel, and as long as they're not continuous the whole way to the target you would be quite fine. The application here would be shooting past varied terrain or architectural features. Winds affect the bullet differently with different exposure times.

Without any holds at all, a 10mph full value all the way to the target will still result in an effective hit on a human profile at 300 yards using inventory 308.

A 100mph continuous front all the way to a 100 yard target would still connect if you hold the relevant edge. As I haven't shot in 100mph I had to calculate that one: you'd be within 8" using .308.

nikto

but that's not how wind IS, and you know it. if there's gusts at your site, there's gustsall along the bullet's path, quite often in different directions and speeds. beyond 1/4 mile, silenced and scoped M4 ranges, getting hits on men is a crap shoot, even if they are holding still, erect and frontal to you and you all know it.

nikto

also, there's no need to take such shots, and it's a bad idea to do so, especially without a silenced autoloader, nvd goggles and concealed armor. you're wasting resources and taking unnecesary risks. Just stay undergroun for a year, during daylight, if shtf and nearly everyone will be dead. the reason that you "think" you'll need such ranges is cause you're being stupid, by being in open country in daylight, above ground.

nikto

men don't wear BE's to aim at, they don't hold still and they dont allow spotter shots and you wont have a sandbagged benchrest. the fact that you can't ADMIT that says legions about how little reality you perceive

Garand

Show us your underground cave, gunkid, pictures are everything!