Kestrel Elite issues
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I recently bought a kestrel elite with applied ballistics software on it, problem I’m having is the solutions it gives are always .3 or .4 of a mil high. I’ve checked doubled checked, and check again all of my inputs. The firing solutions from my iPhone app are usually spot on. Anyone on here using one of these? Any suggestions?
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I haven't noticed a problem with mine...but I've only shot past 600 with it a handful of times. Yet even with .22lr it is usually spot on or very near. I've shot .22 out to 340 yards.
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I haven't heard much of this. Everyone I know that has a kestrel with applied ballistics reports it to be dead on.
Can you give me all the variables for your load and atmospherics? Give me your reported firing solution for a 1000yd target too.
Also, how do you know the solutions it gives are .3 or .4 high? Is it based on live fire or other solutions?
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@orkan it’s based on live fire, I can’t give you the atmospheric data cause I didn’t save any of it Saturday I’m around 275 in elevation here where I live. Shot 1000 yard Fclass match Saturday and the kestrel gave me a solution of 8.47 mils but 8.1 was dead on. It’s also high at 600 but can’t remember the exact dope it gave me. My load is a 140 grain nosler RDF running 2758 fps. I haven’t “trued” the kestrel to my dope due to the big discrepancy in firing solution vs actual dope required.
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Ok, well if you want help I'm going to need data. Exactly what you've got in the kestrel for all variables.
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@orkan I’ll send you everything later tonight when I get off work from the kestrel and the ballistic app I have that has actually been spot on.
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This is a screen shot from the kestrel link app, it is linked to the kestrel and was just easier to take a picture of the data vs trying to take one of the kestrel itself
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Is that a 96 yd zero?
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Yes it’s what the actual yardage is to the target behind my house where I zero everything
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If I true the kestrel to my actual 1000 yard dope it gives me a adjusted MV of 2820 fps which is ridiculously high.
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Show me this screen in the kestrel:
Show me a similar screen from the other app you're using also plz.
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did you check your speed with a Chronograph and record your enviornmentals when you checked it? I didn't catch that in the post.
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@orkan
This is the input screen from the app.
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@martino1
Yes I always fire 20 rounds across the chronograph for my finial data on MV and SD. Temp was 74 degrees when I chronographed that load and was about the same the other day at the match. This isn’t the first time I’ve had problems with the dope being off on the kestrel had the same issue at 600 and various ranges from 400 to 1000 yards out of a different rifle always high.
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There's your problem. Kestrel thinks the ballistic coefficient is 1.0.
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@orkan
No that’s the default it shows when you run the custom curve provided by applied ballistics. They don’t want you seeing the number I guess. I tried swapping it from the custom surge drag model to the G7 and it made basically no change I think was .02 difference in the two in the firing solution. I’ve left several messages with applied ballistics but no one will return my calls go figure
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@orkan said:
There's your problem. Kestrel thinks the ballistic coefficient is 1.0.
"CC" beside the Ballistic Coeff line in the Kestrel Link app denotes that it's using the Custom Curve model which always shows 1.000.
- this should give an accurate solution if the proper bullet was selected from the library
@bull81 - what was the wind doing during your live fire?
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beat me to the CC explanation while I was typing, dang it
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@tscustoms said:
what was the wind doing during your live fire? Wind was 5-7 from my left, but I didn’t have any wind factored in the kestrel or the app.
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@bull81 In the screenshot from the Kestrel Link that was outputting 8.51mils elevation, there is a 5 and 10mph 9oclock wind. .4mils of crosswind jump would be a lot, but I'd be curious to see what the Kestrel outputs if you changed Wind Speed 1 to zero mph.
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@tscustoms said:
@bull81 In the screenshot from the Kestrel Link that was outputting 8.51mils elevation, there is a 5 and 10mph 9oclock wind. .4mils of crosswind jump would be a lot, but I'd be curious to see what the Kestrel outputs if you changed Wind Speed 1 to zero mph.
Aerodynamic jump was where I was headed with this thread, but first wanted to see what his programs were setup with.
If you had 2 tenths of jump, well that means you'd have to be shooting inside 2 tenths to explain the other 1 to 2 tenths. That kind of thing gets awful hard to diagnose.
@tscustoms @bull81 Thanks for the correction the "cc" in the app. I've not used the kestrel companion app before.
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@tscustoms said:
@bull81 In the screenshot from the Kestrel Link that was outputting 8.51mils elevation, there is a 5 and 10mph 9oclock wind. .4mils of crosswind jump would be a lot, but I'd be curious to see what the Kestrel outputs if you changed Wind Speed 1 to zero mph.
Good catch it dropped down to 8.4 when I turned all wind off. I think I may have found some of the problem I just went and swapped from a custom curve to the G7, it’s stated in the kestrel as .313 but is normally .330 which thus far has worked really well for me. I changed it in the kestrel to .330 and it’s giving me 8.15 mils at 1000 so that’s gonna be right where live fire has proven to be. Wonder why it’s listed as .313 in the kestrel? With the G7 being low I bet there’s a problem with the custom curve as well which sucks because it’s usally a more accurate figure at all ranges.
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@tscustoms @orkan
Thanks for the help.
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This is interesting. So I have a 5700 AB as well.
Can someone explain the Aerodynamic jump deal? Is this a bad thing in using the Kestrel?
I typically mark target direction, then let the Kestrel capture the wind speeds and use the output for my firing solution. Am I doing things I correctly?
Thanks for any help
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Well applied ballistics sent me an email with a huge check list for firing solutions. After going through it I found that my latitude was incorrect and the compass needed calibrated. After changing my latitude and compass calibration the Firing solution was much closer to my actual drop. I trued my MV in the kestrel and this time it only adjusted my velocity by about the 15 FPS and everything looks pretty good using the custom curves instead of the G7. I’ll check everything ar various ranges with live fire next chance I get.
@pizfiz
Can someone explain the Aerodynamic jump deal? Is this a bad thing in using the Kestrel?
Applied ballistics has a good article on Aerodynamic jump on their website. It’s not a bad thing it’s just a variable that most ballistics programs don’t account for. Usually only .1 or so at 1000 yards so I guess they don’t put the effort into calculating it for you like applied ballistics does.
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Aerodynamic jump in a nutshell:
A left to right wind will allow a right spun bullet to "fall down" while the bullet will "climb up" a right to left wind. A left twist barrel will behave oppositely. This phenomena can account for .2 to .4 mils of elevation on a distant firing solution.
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Wow, surprised at that amount. So it is important to enter target and wind direction accurately or you could mess up your solution. Is it safer to zero wind or just try to be exact?
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Very few ballistic computers actually solve for it. Applied ballistics stuff all seems to.
You can find success by shooting in windy conditions and applying the appropriate hold instinctively. It really starts to matter at distance when the wind gets on the plus side of 15mph.
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@orkan said:
Aerodynamic jump in a nutshell:
A left to right wind will allow a right spun bullet to "fall down" while the bullet will "climb up" a right to left wind. A left twist barrel will behave oppositely. This phenomena can account for .2 to .4 mils of elevation on a distant firing solution.
What distances are you seeing the .2-.4 variance in elevation? I wonder if Shooter ap allows for this. I use the shooter ap more that I use AB ap. May need to change that.
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@martino1 Depends on what you're shooting. ... and no, shooter does not compute for aerodynamic jump.
