Explanation of terms/acronyms?

[jennageit]

Hi Guys,

Whilst reading through this forum, I have noticed that most of you use acronyms.
The problem is, as a complete newbie, I have no idea what you guys are talking about, and as such, am probably asking more questions than need be.

Is there somewhere on here that explains the acronyms, or commonly used words and what they mean in reference to shooting, guns, calibre etc etc?

Thanks in advance.

Jenna

[Hennie Dreyer]

Jenna,
Please list some of them - I need to learn as well

[chilliman]

tell us which ones you are referring to

here's a couple of common ones:

LGS - local gun store
FL - firearms licence

[tom604]

WTF,,,well that's funny

[MeccaOz]

WTF,,,well that's funny

LOL, well I had a different take on that .. "What The Firetruck"

[jennageit]

Okay guys, here's a few words that I could do with explanations for:

Plinking
lr - is it Long Range?
MHR - again, is it something to do with range?
SMLE

Someone mentioned 'cheek weld" is a reply to me. Can this also be explained please? I think it is to do with where you place your cheek against the stock of the firearm, but not entirely sure.

Thanks guys

[Baldrick314]

Okay guys, here's a few words that I could do with explanations for:

Plinking
lr - is it Long Range?
MHR - again, is it something to do with range?
SMLE

Someone mentioned 'cheek weld" is a reply to me. Can this also be explained please? I think it is to do with where you place your cheek against the stock of the firearm, but not entirely sure.

Thanks guys

SMLE is Short Magazine Lee Enfield. The trusty old 303.

LR is long range.

Cheek weld is indeed placing your cheek on the comb of the stock. Good cheek weld lines your eye up with the scope and prevents the stock from moving too much during recoil.

Plinking is shooting for fun.

Another your likely to encounter and may not know:

MOA = Minute Of Angle. It's an angular unit of measurement. 1 minute of angle is 1/60th of a degree. It's mostly used to define group size. Basically it's 1 inch at 100 yards. It gets progressively larger as distance increases, 2 inches at 200 yards and so on.

[jennageit]

Hi Baldrick,
Thanks for the explanations.

The rifle I'm looking at is the Marlin XTR 17HMR

In the description it has Twist Rate 1:9" can you explain this?

Also, who much does the weight of the longarm come into choice? This one is apparently 6lbs, so around 3kgs I guess.

Jenna

[Baldrick314]

Hi Baldrick,
Thanks for the explanations.

The rifle I'm looking at is the Marlin XTR 17HMR

In the description it has Twist Rate 1:9" can you explain this?

Also, who much does the weight of the longarm come into choice? This one is apparently 6lbs, so around 3kgs I guess.

Jenna

Twist rate is how much barrel length it takes for the rifling (grooves in your barrel) to make a full rotation. So a 1:9 is one twist every 9 inches of barrel.

Considering weight will really depend on use. On large calibres a heavy firearm will reduce felt recoil. With the rifle you're looking at there will be barely any recoil so your main concern will be how much weight you want to lug around all day

I'm guessing it will mostly be used for hunting small game? 6kg isn't too heavy but you'll be adding a scope to that plus carrying some ammo. No problem if you drive between shots or camp and wait for your game but it weighs on you a surprising amount if you're carrying it around all day on foot.

From what I hear marlin make some great rifles, haven't had a chance to buy one myself.

Oh and welcome to the forum, probably should have said that first haha

[jennageit]

Thanks Baldrick.

I've actually changed my mind to the Marlin XT 22R, which seems to have some pretty good reviews, and is the same weight, about 3kgs.

When it comes to shooting foxes, I'll probably sit and wait near our old barn. There's a couple of fox superhighways that pass within 50 metres (at most) of that side of the barn, so I plan to start there. I figure I wont be able to stay there for long, especially if I manage to kill a few! The foxes come onto our place for the wood ducks, and the lambs. We've also got a plague of bush rats, which keeps my border collie dog on his toes, not sure about the foxes.
The hares that make our place home don't seem to be getting harrassed by the foxes, but I wont be shooting them anyway. They aren't doing any damage.

As I have to save my dollars for everything, I'm happy with the price of the Marlin XT 22, it's advertised price is $345, not sure what the ammo would cost though. I'm hoping it isn't big dollars as I want to be able to purchase some targets. Not sure about scope. I hadn't thought about it until you just mentioned it. I guess I'm going to need one at some stage, but the prices are a bit prohibitive for me at the moment

Jenna

[Baldrick314]

Thanks Baldrick.

I've actually changed my mind to the Marlin XT 22R, which seems to have some pretty good reviews, and is the same weight, about 3kgs.

When it comes to shooting foxes, I'll probably sit and wait near our old barn. There's a couple of fox superhighways that pass within 50 metres (at most) of that side of the barn, so I plan to start there. I figure I wont be able to stay there for long, especially if I manage to kill a few! The foxes come onto our place for the wood ducks, and the lambs. We've also got a plague of bush rats, which keeps my border collie dog on his toes, not sure about the foxes.
The hares that make our place home don't seem to be getting harrassed by the foxes, but I wont be shooting them anyway. They aren't doing any damage.

As I have to save my dollars for everything, I'm happy with the price of the Marlin XT 22, it's advertised price is $345, not sure what the ammo would cost though. I'm hoping it isn't big dollars as I want to be able to purchase some targets. Not sure about scope. I hadn't thought about it until you just mentioned it. I guess I'm going to need one at some stage, but the prices are a bit prohibitive for me at the moment

Jenna

22 is a good choice. It will be way cheaper than 17HMR. 22 is about $4 for 50 rounds. Buy in bulk and it's cheaper again.

Scopes can be had for pretty cheap too. For the range your planning I'd suggest either a low fixed power eg 4x. Or maybe 3-9x. Bushnell or Redfield are both entry level scopes that will do what you want fine and won't break the bank. Plus you'll get more hits than just using iron sights so it's an investment against wasting ammo

[Combat_Wombat]

The marlin you are looking at is cheap and cheerful, a good way to get into hunting. As far as ammo goes it's just about the cheapest to feed I get the remington bucket o bullets for $80 for 1400 rounds.

[jennageit]

Another couple of explanations needed guys, if you don't mind.

cleaning rod and jag?
wet patch?
barrel pitting?
floor plate?
floated?
throat wear?
copper fouling in the bore?
plinking? if not answered previously
and can someone please explain what MOA means? I've seen 0.4MOA and still have no idea what it's about.

Thanks in advance guys

Jenna

[Baldrick314]

Another couple of explanations needed guys, if you don't mind.

cleaning rod and jag?
wet patch?
barrel pitting?
floor plate?
floated?
throat wear?
copper fouling in the bore?
plinking? if not answered previously
and can someone please explain what MOA means? I've seen 0.4MOA and still have no idea what it's about.

Thanks in advance guys

Jenna

Cleaning rod is a rod that you use to push brushes and cotton patches down your barrel to clean it. A jag is something you attach to the cleaning rod to spike the cotton patch for pushing it down the barrel.

Wet patch is a cotton patch soaked in either solvent or oil.

Barrel pitting is corrosion in the barrel of your firearm caused by not cleaning the barrel.

Floor plate is holds the magazine in on internal magazine rifles.

A floated barrel is a barrel that has had material removed from the stock to ensure that the stock doesn't contact the barrel at any point forward of the action.

Throat wear is when the start of the rifling in your barrel erodes. This happens to all rifles but certain calibres are famous for having this occur sooner rather than later. Certain factors influence the degree of wear to your throat, most notably pressure of load, case design.

Copper fouling is small portions of copper that are scraped off the projectile as it travels down the barrel. This builds up over time and can impact accuracy and also will lead to corrosion if not cleaned out properly.

I answered plinking before but my phone changed it to planning lol. It's just shooting for fun.

There's a brief explanation of MOA in one of my previous posts but at it's simplest application you can use MOA to measure your group size. To maintain 1 MOA you need to keep your groups at 1 inch per 100 yards. So a .4 MOA group would be .4 of an inch in size if shot at 100 yards. If the group was shot at 200 yards a .4 MOA group would measure .8 of an inch. There's a good video somewhere explaining MOA, I'll try and find it.

These are pretty basic explanations so if you need elaboration on any of them just ask .

[Baldrick314]

Here you go. This should explain MOA for you. Might take a couple watches cos it is a bit of a weird concept to get your head around at first.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=VA2PZBD5Tjg

[jennageit]

That's excellent Baldrick, thank you.

As I'm still pretty much bedridden, I've nothing left to do but read, which is probably why I'm pestering you guys with questions.

I managed to find an owners manual to download for the Marlin XT 22R, which will hopefully give me a better understanding of the rifle.

In the meantime, I'm just reading my way through the forum, soaking up as much information as I can.

Thanks again,

Jenna

[jennageit]

Another one:

Subsonic?
Supersonic?
Low Velocity?

Does the 'velocity' of the ammunition dictate how far the projectile will go?

[Baronvonrort]

Subsonic? = Slower than the speed of sound which is 344 meters per second
Supersonic? = faster than the speed of sound,greater than 344 m/s
Low Velocity? = subsonic..lol

Does the 'velocity' of the ammunition dictate how far the projectile will go? = Yes,faster bullets also hit harder.

[jennageit]

Thanks Baronvonrort.

I'll probably have some more soon. The further I go into my research, the more questions I seem to have lol

[T_M]

The firearm category chart might come in handy when filling out a permit to acquire:
http://www.police.vic.gov.au/content.as ... t_ID=34394

Firearm type codes

• AR Air Rifle
• BL Breech Loading
• CA Cannon
• CC Combination (Centrefire Cat B)
• CF Centre Fire Rifle
• CR Combination (Rimfire Cat A)
• DR Drilling (3 Barrel)
• HP Handgun
• HQ Antique Handgun
• HU Humane Killer
• MA Machine Gun
• ML Muzzle Loading
• MO Mortar
• NF Needle Fire
• PB Paintball Marker
• PW Powerhead
• RF RimFire Rifle
• RL Rocket Launcher
• SH Shotgun
• TR Tranquilliser Gun
• VR Vierling

Action codes

• AR Air
• AU Automatic
• BA Bolt Action
• BF Blank Fire
• BM Modified Break Open
• BO Break Open
• CH Combination (Handgun) Category H
• FB Falling Block
• FL Flintlock
• FP Flare Pistol
• HL Hammer Lock
• LA Lever Action
• MH Martini Henry
• MO Mortar
• MX Matchlock
• MZ Muzzle Loading
• PA Pump Action
• PH Powerhead
• PM Modified Pump Action
• PN Percussion
• RB Rolling Breech
• RO Rocket Launcher
• RV Revolver
• RX Rolling Block
• SA Semi-Automatic
• SB Sliding Breech
• SC Screw Breech
• SN Sneider
• SP Starting Pistol
• SW Swivel Breech
• TD Trap Door
• TF Teat Fire

[jennageit]

Thanks T_M.

you guys are just full of valuable information, arn't ya? lol I love it!

[sooey]

Plinking
lr - is it Long Range?
MHR - again, is it something to do with range?

Plinking is target shooting for fun, often at a metal plate with the *plink* sound of hitting the target.

LR = Long range, or in case of the cartridge .22LR that's "22 Long Rifle"

MHR = Um? You mean HMR? Hornady Magnum Rifle? Full name for the 17HMR you're looking at is .17 Hornady magnum rifle?

[RealNick]

Does the 'velocity' of the ammunition dictate how far the projectile will go?

It does, when you're starting out though I wouldn't worry about it too much.

Real quick explanation, but velocity is really only important once you're doing long range target shooting and need to maintain supersonic velocities over long distance for accuracy. Or for long range hunting to have enough energy for humane kills.

If you're target shooting with a .22 subsonic ammo is the most accurate.

If you're looking at hunting with a 17HMR though you're obviously after foxes, bunnies and other lightweights and won't be shooting huge distances so you don't need to worry about either of the above.

[Monty]

I'll probably have some more soon. The further I go into my research, the more questions I seem to have lol

That's usually the way it goes.

In any case, don't be afraid to ask.

[Noisydad]

Remember the old saying, "The only stupid question is one that wasn't asked". You can bet that if you want to know what this (almost) foreign language is all about, there will be lots of other new shootbook members that are lurking in the background soaking up the same knowledge that you are! We wouldn't be doing our job (as experienced shooters) in promoting our sport if we didn't train as many new shooters as we can.

[Oldbloke]

Perhaps check out the ssaa web site. There are plenty of free articles for beginers here https://www.ssaa.org.au/stories/stories-home.html

[jennageit]

Thanks guys, going to go and do some reading now.

I'll be back later today or tomorrow. I'm off to hospital for an injection into my spine. Not sure how it'll go, or if I'll be able to sit up much after it's done.

Take care

Jenna

[jordy]

Geez, good luck with that