12-03-2020, 08:13 PM
KABOH1100
i perused the article very quickly but this caught my eye: "All 5 Grendel Uppers Sent to the Author" how many different manufacturers of uppers are there??? way more than 5. so the SA may be one of the better ones that PPT reviewed in this article, but as guys with a lot more experience have just said, 1. get as good a barrel, trigger, and optics as you can. 2. putting one together isn't hard to do. consider doing it yourself so you can have more $ for 1.
as a kid growing up i was blessed to be able to shoot prairie dogs. if you intend to shoot them at distance, a benchrest rifle isn't going overboard. the little buggers were about 2.5 to 3" wide when standing up on their haunches. a 1.5 MOA rack grade barrel will leave you with misses past 200 yards, even if you can dope the wind perfectly and hold and trigger squeeze and follow through well.
we started with 22LRs and tried to get the closer ones first, because once the CFs came out to play, everything within 200 yards ran down the holes due to the noise. this left us with shots from 200 to 400+ yards.
so a 1/2 or 1/4 moa barrel/ammo/optic/trigger setup will be quite helpful on pounding sod poodles past 200 yards. gives you some leeway in misjudging wind. it's quite a gamble to end up with a rack grade upper that will print that well. statistically not impossible but the probability is low. start with a much better barrel if you really want to shoot prairie dogs at distance.
for coyotes, that rack grade may be entirely adequate. they're a LOT bigger than a sod poodle.
of course some of us may tend to go overboard on Col. Townsend Whelen's mantra "only accurate rifles are interesting" but as other we'll experienced AR builders have stated, a sub moa AR starts with the best barrels, tiggers, and optics.
whichever way you decide to go with the build, however, have fun with it!!
-tdbru
i perused the article very quickly but this caught my eye: "All 5 Grendel Uppers Sent to the Author" how many different manufacturers of uppers are there??? way more than 5. so the SA may be one of the better ones that PPT reviewed in this article, but as guys with a lot more experience have just said, 1. get as good a barrel, trigger, and optics as you can. 2. putting one together isn't hard to do. consider doing it yourself so you can have more $ for 1.
as a kid growing up i was blessed to be able to shoot prairie dogs. if you intend to shoot them at distance, a benchrest rifle isn't going overboard. the little buggers were about 2.5 to 3" wide when standing up on their haunches. a 1.5 MOA rack grade barrel will leave you with misses past 200 yards, even if you can dope the wind perfectly and hold and trigger squeeze and follow through well.
we started with 22LRs and tried to get the closer ones first, because once the CFs came out to play, everything within 200 yards ran down the holes due to the noise. this left us with shots from 200 to 400+ yards.
so a 1/2 or 1/4 moa barrel/ammo/optic/trigger setup will be quite helpful on pounding sod poodles past 200 yards. gives you some leeway in misjudging wind. it's quite a gamble to end up with a rack grade upper that will print that well. statistically not impossible but the probability is low. start with a much better barrel if you really want to shoot prairie dogs at distance.
for coyotes, that rack grade may be entirely adequate. they're a LOT bigger than a sod poodle.
of course some of us may tend to go overboard on Col. Townsend Whelen's mantra "only accurate rifles are interesting" but as other we'll experienced AR builders have stated, a sub moa AR starts with the best barrels, tiggers, and optics.
whichever way you decide to go with the build, however, have fun with it!!
-tdbru