20 VT = success!

[acloco]

Absolutely beautiful morning this early am.

On my "to do" list:

1 - 5.20 am - take wife and youngest daughter to shuttle for airport (costs $50/person for the shuttle - airport is 300 miles one way!!). They will be gone for two weeks. Gosh, I will miss them...really. Ok...well, not at first. But in a couple days I will REALLY miss them.

2 - cup of coffee. For some reason, I actually started to like coffee...and one of the side effects.

3 - returned to house, loaded up the range bag, rifles, etc. Spent 30 minutes at the range to sight in two rifles due to switching bases on one and installing different rings on another.

4 - trip to the PRAIRIE DOG FIELD!!!! Longest shot with the 20 VT - 490 yards on an adult male dog. Hit him in the throat with an exit behind the shoulder. All shots at 250 yards and under produced good air effects. I used 32 gr VMax over 18.3 grains of H4198 and CCI 450 primers. Best part - NO recoil. Because I am scope poor (read that fun money POOR), I have a Bushnell Legend 5-15x40 with mildots on top of the rig. Rig consists of a Savage LRPV RB/LP action, factory Savage Target stock, and an aftermarket barrel.

[Rick in Oregon]

acloco: Not a bad start to any day when you can get some "homework" done and still get out into the varmint patch.

Congrats on how well the new VT did. Some don't believe the range the little round is capable of, but it appears you've proven it to be fully worthy on rats to 500, and that's a fer piece for anyone, or any cartridge on prairie rats. Some of my crew, including myself is seriously jumping on the 20VT wagon. I can hear my wife now: "What, you need another varmint rifle? What will this one do that your others won't?"

I'll use "it burns less powder, so cheaper to shoot" routine, it worked with my 17 Ackley Hornet......

Congratulations on the project, but next time we want pictures!

[acloco]

RIO - Honestly, I would not have believed it, unless I was the one pulling the trigger.

Unreal....flat unreal.

[Ray P]

acloco............Way to go! That is some mighty fine shooten.
Roughly what elevation are you shooting at?
What I have noticed, when sighting in here on the east cost at around 1500ft elev. with a 200 yrd zero. We headed out to Chugwater, Wy with an elevation of 6000 ft, we were good out to 500 yrds with no elevation adj. We were of corse shooting 308 win, 7-61 Sharp and Hart, 7mm rem mag, 7 stw. I had my 22-250 with me loaded with 55 Nosler BT............30 mph cross wind made that little bullet hook like a curve ball! I put it away and brought out a heaver weapon. From some of RIO's earlier posts early morning or late afternoon....................the 20 gets thing done in a fashion!
Thanks and glad to hear from you.
Later
Ray P

[acloco]

RayP - 2779 feet.

I loaded some of the Midway Dogtown 34 grain bullets over 18.3 gr of H4198 in new RP brass, just to fire the brass in this chamber. Of course, not just going to waste 100 rounds, so, this afternoon, there are 77 less prairie dogs in Nebraska.

My best bud/shooting partner fell in love with the NO recoil and flat shooting.

[Sidewinderwa]

What kind of accuracy are you getting out of your 20 VarTarg? I would really like to have a Savage with a removable magazine and not a single shot. I think it would be a good gun for night shooting on coyotes as you can see the hit in the scope.

[acloco]

Paper at 100 yards is, well, under half inch. Did not put it on paper at 200, but used the painted metal target....under an inch.

[Bayou City Boy]

RIO - Honestly, I would not have believed it, unless I was the one pulling the trigger.

Unreal....flat unreal.

Todd Kindler's been telling folks that same thing since well before the Millenium... The 20 VT is probably the best of his 20 caliber creations in terms of results per cartridge size. Some folks call what you're seeing by the term "ballistic efficiency".....

All of his cartridge designs generally provide very good performance per amount of powder burned..

-BCB