[Blaster3094]

I did some unplanned shooting at 100 yards with my Dan Wesson Valor today. I was planning on only shooting Bulls at 25 yards but I spotted two full sized silhouettes that were sporting only .223 holes at the 100 yard berm at my club. I figured my .45 wad-cutter holes would be easy to differentiate and decided to give it a go.

I know that my sights are perfectly aligned out to 50 yards but have never taken this gun beyond 50 until today. I was shooting 200 grain SWC loaded over 6.5 grains of Unique. I experienced very little drop POA/POI at 100 yards. I replaced the stock DW rear with a 10-8 U-Notch rear sight (.156).

What I did experience that really surprised me was a 7" - 8" shift in windage to the left. This is the type of target i was shooting at.

I was aiming center of mass and hitting around the bent elbow on the left. The sun was high in the sky and at about 10 to 11-O'Clock (to my left) and very bright. I thought it was the sun or me that was causing my shots to impact to the left. I figured I might have a trigger control issue that showed up at 100 yards. Or the sun caused it.

Tonight I ran across this on the net. A few people report that the Point of Impact tends shift in the direction of the sun. Which is just what I experienced.
http://www.starreloaders.com/edhall/nwongmain/ironsightsurvey.html

 

[Cappi]

I genuinely ammazed myself by shooting TWO 100 yrd groups under 6"
One was 5"

from a rest obviously, but still shocked when I drove the golf cart downrange and saw those groups

I was shooting my mild target loads (230fmj/770fps) as i recall, they were 8-10" low of my POA ..but pretty well center

..L.T.A.

 

[pacific keeper]

Iron sighted handguns at distances out to 200 yards can be a lot of fun ! It helps a lot to have a BIG bull and a big sheet of butcher paper .

 

[jkhouw1]

Hickok45 mentions this briefly in one of his videos... He was shooting a rifle using the irons- maybe chapter 2 on the ruger gunsite and mentioned the sun angle always affects him at that time of day.

 

[Jackhammer]

The old adage is that you tend to shoot towards the sun, that is if the sun is to your left, you tend to shoot left of center.

 

[shovelstrokeed]

Silhouette shooters have know about this for years.
It is why I put a King Tube sight on my unlimited gun. Consistent sight picture regardless of the angle of the sun.