Saturday I spent five hours at the range. I didn't invite anyone to join me, and by the end of it I was mentally pretty wiped. Why? It was a working session: I re-zeroed both the irons and optics on three AR-15 uppers, plus I chronographed some new 9mm handloads and my preferred self defense ammo (Speer Gold Dot) so that I could compare the two—my goal being to create a handloaded duplicate of the Gold Dots.
The ARs were pretty straight-forward once I (again) remembered which clicker controls the horizontal vs. the vertical on my Aimpoint T-1s. (I always get those backwards! For some reason I think the top clicker spins the optic around the Z axis, but it's actually raising or lowering the entire optic.) The Troy sights were quick and easy to adjust, even though I'd forgotten my front sight adjustment tool. And, I was actually more accurate with the irons that with the optics, which surprised me, but I felt that it took me longer to get the sight picture I wanted with the irons.
I'm not sure why I had to re-zero the optics, though. I'm guessing that I've removed/replaced them enough times that the LaRue mount's settled a little bit in the slot on the top rail. That's not a ding on the LaRues; they're top notch, but any mount's going to drift a little bit if you remove and replace it enough times. I guess I've just hit that point. Even then, the drift was only about an inch to the left at 50 yards on the worst offender.
I do have to laugh at/with the fellow next to me at the range, though. He was there with a few of his buddies, and they were having a hard time of it. The range safety officer was all over them, in a polite way, for breaking just about every rule except for muzzling folks. (Thankfully they weren't doing that!) They didn't lock the actions open during the cease fire, and it took them a while to figure out how to do it with their particular rifles. Then they kept stepping over the white safety line, or lingering by the benches during the cease fire. They eventually got the hang of things, but I'm sure it wasn't fun getting there.
With the ARs sighted-in and happy, I headed over to the pistol range to setup my chronograph and test out my new handloads. It was my first time using the infrared screens with my CED, and they worked great. It can get to be a tangle of cords setting the thing up, but the infrared screens proved to be more reliable than the unlit ones that come standard.
Unfortunately, my handloads didn't perform as well as I'd hoped. The 147gr Gold Dots were averaging 994.8 ft/s from my M&P 9, while my max-load handloads with 5.8gr of Blue Dot were only averaging 959.6 ft/s. Pretty close, but I was hoping for better. I could load the Blue Dot to +P pressures, but I'd rather not stress my pistols like that on a regular basis.
After doing a little more research, it looks like Vihtavuori's 3N38 may provide some additional velocity. But, at twice the price of Blue Dot I don't think it's worth it for just another 40 ft/s. I wasn't shooting for accuracy Saturday, so I'll need to load up some more handloads and see what kind of groups I can get. If the accuracy is good (fingers crossed) I'll definitely stick with the Blue Dot.
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