I have been shooting for close to 35 years, but only recently did I become educated to the nuances of barrel quality, twist, bullet weight, quality ammo and bullet design.

Recently I got an Armalite with a 20" 223 Wylde bull barrel 1:8 twist. It seems to prefer Black Hills 223 with a 69 gr Sierra Match King bullet.

This combo makes it worth my while to really start thinking about a useful front rest and hearing protectors that allow a repeatable cheek weld.

More than that, I need a checklist of things I can do as a shooter to improve accuracy!

100 yards from the bench off a sock stuffed with pinto beans:

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What kind of scope are you using?

A late friend of mine, spent 2 of the last three years of his life experimenting with 1:7, 1:8, & 1:9 twist and Wylde chambers in a target action Savage bolt action. He just couldn't get the group size below 2" .......................at 1000 yards. His conclusion was 1:9 Twist either Wylde or standard 223 chamber ,77 grain Berger VLD, Remington 7 1/2 primer, and all the Varget it will hold. ( His preferd brass was Lake City from a batch intended for SAW ammo, with a little thicker head area, with Lapua Match brass second.)

I have one of his rifles, a stock Savage Target single shot 1:9, with his data it will do 3" out of the box. This load is too hot for an AR action and way too long for a magazine. It also has the same point of impact with A-Max 75 grain and almost as good accuracy with better varmint performance. Both of these bullets perform better in the wind than the ballistic programs (three different ones) predict their windage to be.

If you want to shoot 80 and 88 grain you should have a 1:7 or maybe you can get by with a 1:8 twist, but the Wylde chamber is the only way to get up to speed without deforming the BC. A lot of smith's use a Wylde chamber for fast twist 223's but just mark the barrel 223 Rem. to avoid confusion. I'm a little fuzzy but I think Mr. Stoner preferd the Wylde chamber for the platform. Some research will reveal a whole lot of the AR's and the 223's secrets.

Ivan

Leupold Vari-XIII 4.5-14x50mm AO cranked up to 14x

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Assuming your target has the ten ring at a standard 2", that's nice shooting. About a 3/4" tall and 5/8" wide. I like your model of scope also, all I ever got were Leupold's 40 mm objective, you should have a lot better light.

For purchased ammo, I don't think you can buy a better brand, that Black Hills. Before the "Run on ammo", the blue box was reloads (fired Military brass) and one of my rifles with a 1:12 twist liked cretin lots of the 50 grain A-Max loading, When I figured that lot out, I bought all the store had and ended up with a case and a half. I found latter, that my older Bushmaster AR 1:9 twist likes it also. If you can get a quantity of the same lot of ammo, That lets you shoot with one less variable when shooting day to day weather conditions.

Ivan

"More than that, I need a checklist of things I can do as a shooter to improve accuracy!"
You have committed the far too common error of confusing accuracy with precision. Small groups = precision. Hitting the target = accuracy.

Not to belabor the obvious, but probably the best way to improve grouping is to experiment, experiment, experiment with different loads, cartridge OALs, and components. Uniformity is the key - case length, case weight, bullet weight, and propellant weight. That's what the bench rest shooters do. It is surprising what a change in case manufacturer can make. My best-shooting .223 loads are made with Israeli military cases. It has been well-established that uniform case length and finding the correct cartridge OAL for a specific bullet are the most important of the factors you can easily control. By the way, if you REALLY want to test and compare the grouping capability of your gun and loads, the most efficient method to achieve statistical confidence is to fire at least five 10-shot groups and average the extreme spreads of each. Anything less and you are fooling yourself while wasting ammunition.

my competition AR is chambered in .223 Wylde. its a gun i built on Aero Precision matched upper/lower set. it was chambered in 5.56/.223. changed to the 18" FN 1 in 8 twist .223 Wylde bbl. and groups tightened up at 100 yards by about half... not me, but better quality bbl did make a difference.

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