We get a lot of questions about our published velocities on our website and packaging, especially now that so many new shooters are coming into the shooting world. One of the more unique things we provide to our customers is a standard by which we've achieved our published velocity. It baffles us that other companies don't provide this, especially with the huge variance in barrel length options in both handguns and long guns.
On our ammo boxes, you'll see something like this: 3000fps, 20"
That simply means that we chose our 20" test rifle to establish our published velocity of 3000 feet per second. That does not mean that you must have a 20" rifle to fire that particular ammunition.
For most recreational shooters, velocity doesn't really matter at all in your decision to choose a bullet and you likely it is completely overlooked. However, if you plan to dabble in long-range or competitive shooting, you might be a little more 'velocity-aware'.
We provide our barrel length as a starting place for you to work off of. As any avid shooter knows, our 24" 1:7 twist barrel in North Carolina won't shoot the same as a 24" 1:7 twist in Colorado. In fact, they likely won't achieve exactly the same velocity if they were both shot in North Carolina on the same day at the same range. However, we do feel that it's important for you to have some sort of expectation about the velocity. If we publish a velocity on a 22" test barrel, you can bet that your 16" is never ever going to hit that published velocity because it simply doesn't have the extra length to get that bullet moving to the speed the 22" could provide. As a general rule, if your barrel is shorter than our test barrel, you won't get the speed that we've published. If you're barrel is longer, your bullet has more time to accelerate, increasing the velocity beyond what we've published. There is much to learn on how a bullet stabilizes in a barrel and believe us when we say it is absolutely fascinating.
For shooters interested in learning more about how a particular round will perform over distance, ShootersCalculator.com is a great resource.
For all of our precision rifle rounds, we offer the ballistic coefficient in the product description online. We don't typically publish the b.c. for rounds that really aren't intended for distance, like subsonic 300 Blackout or 450 Bushmaster. But, if you find yourself in a long-range contest with a "non-traditional" round and need to figure out how to lob it onto a target at distance, give us a call and we'll help you plan for the best.