Target Shooter 1

A typical modern 7.62mm TR rifle – David Archer’s
Norman Clark built Barnard. David was impressed
by the RUAG ammunition’s long-range
performance in this year’s ‘Imperial’
match numbers from certain years. Eventually, the
US Army caught up and commissioned Sierra to
design a bullet with the 173gn model’s excellent
ballistic properties allied to the 168gn SMK’s superb
accuracy – result the current 175gn MatchKing used
by handloaders, commercial ammunition producers,
and loaded in the military 7.62mm M118LR sniper /
target cartridge. So, we have the interesting situation
that US shooters in their primary NRA controlled rifle
discipline used military rifles, albeit much enhanced
in the accuracy influencing bits, but put quality
commercial match ammo or handloads through
them, while we used increasingly specialised and
expensive custom built single-shot precision rifles,
but limited their performance by insisting on cheap
ammunition best restricted to belt-fed machineguns!
So what did we use? ‘Selected’ batches of run
of the mill military 7.62 followed by the ‘superior’
(for that read ‘less bad’) RG ‘Green Spot’ sniper
round that used the light military FMJBT bullet
Many shooters handload precision .308W ammunition for their 7.62mm
tactical rifles. Simon Rodgers used this Accuracy International Model AE
successfully in early F-Class
with the base cavity topped
up with a little lead and
weighing 146gn. Variations
between production lots were
significant, and even those
selected after range-testing
by the NRA could produce
unpredictable fliers in
prestigious events like
the ‘Imperial’. Rifles were
tailored to the ammunition
with tight-bores, not only to
suit the bullet diameter but
to maximise MV, the light
projectile unable to stay
supersonic at long range, and
a key feature was the use
of a slow 1-14” rifling twist
to suit the short bullet and
reduce the rate of spin to the
lowest level that still stabilised it to reduce dispersion.
155gn
Eventually, somebody in the MoD discovered
‘Palma Rifle’, a long-range civilian discipline
restricted to .308 Win and employing the
ballistically efficient Sierra 155gn HPBT ‘Palma
MatchKing’ bullet that far outperformed the NATO
projectile. The then government owned Radway
Green facility was commissioned to design an
FMJBT version for use in a new sniper round
to let the L96A1 (Accuracy International Model
PM) rifle achieve its potential, defined as a high
probability first shot hit at 800 metres. The resulting RG
‘Bisley Match’ round became the mainstay of UK TR
shooting for several years, and while a huge
improvement over its 146gn ‘Green Spot’
predecessor, was still inferior accuracy-wise, and
to a certain extent ballistically to commercial or
handloaded cartridges using Sierra or other
HPBT Palma match
bullets. This era
ended abruptly last
year when RG’s post
privatisation owner
BAe withdrew from
the civilian market,
and the MoD
terminated the
l o n g s t a n d i n g
practice of paying
for military use of the
Bisley ranges through
ammunition supplies.
After a year-long
testing and tendering
process, the NRA
awarded a contract
Target Shooter 71