Russian snipers “outdid” the Americans in long-range shooting. An American broke the world record for the longest sniper shot

This story began almost three years ago, when a Russian shooter and manufacturer of high-precision long-range rifles Vlad Lobaev saw a video on YouTube where cheerful old men from Texas hit a target with a rifle at a distance of 3600 yards (3292 m). Vlad decided to take on the challenge and compete with the Americans. Fortunately, he had his own weapons factory, Lobaev Arms, at hand.

The Americans fired from a custom-made ultra-long-range rifle of rare caliber .375 CheyTac. By that time, Lobaev’s company was already mass-producing the ultra-long-range rifle SVLK-14 “Twilight” in an even rarer and more powerful .408 CheyTac caliber, which allows sniper shooting at distances of over 2 km. For the record, they took a special custom “Twilight” with a titanium chassis and firing pin, with a barrel length of 720 mm and a weight of more than 9 kg. In April 2015, on a field in Kaluga region(there are simply no multi-kilometer shooting ranges in Russia) from this rifle, Lobaev’s team, after sighting shots, hit the target at a distance of 3400 m. The video with the record was posted on YouTube. The Americans reacted calmly: they say, okay, let's continue the duel in absentia.

Record rifle SVLK-14 “Twilight”

Subsonic

Not only the Americans reacted: a French sniper from the Foreign Legion, after long training, hit a target at a distance of 3600 m, but, apart from an article in a small specialized magazine, there is no information about this record, no one posted videos. The Americans also crossed the mark, first 3600 and then 4000 yards (3657 m). Lobaev’s company studied this video almost under a microscope: some parameters of the shot did not match, the flight time did not match the initial speed and angle of inclination of the bar. Nothing has changed in ballistics, but several hundred meters have been added. This does not happen, but since the competition was originally conceived as a competition of gentlemen, the Lobaevites decided to continue to shoot fairly with the Americans. And win by knockout - hit from four kilometers away.

Ultra-long-range shooting for shooters is considered to be shooting at a distance where at the end of the trajectory the bullet travels at deep subsonic levels, because with supersonic everything is clear - there ballistics are considered easy, simple mathematical methods. But subsonic ballistics is considered more difficult, and what’s most unpleasant is that in this mode some physical processes, which make it difficult to shoot at ultra-long distances. Firstly, a re-stabilization effect occurs. The linear speed slows down per 1000 m, say, three times - from 900 m/s to 300 m/s. And the bullet rotation speed is only 5-10%. At subsonic speeds the speed is even lower, but the rotation speed is still the same. This leads to the fact that all the design and manufacturing defects of the bullet begin to come out, which greatly affects the dispersion. In addition, at low speeds, errors in assessing wind and weather conditions become noticeable. The second factor is turbulence in the bottom part at deep subsonic levels. At speeds slightly less than 300 m/s this is not critical, but at ranges of more than 2 km it greatly affects accuracy. There is only one way to combat these phenomena - to develop a bullet design with a different bottom design.

Classic problems for ultra-long range shooting require increased bullet weight and improved aerodynamics. Lobaev set his first record with a standard D27 bullet, an analogue of the Lost River, widely known in the West. These are elongated, solidly turned bullets for long-range shooting, also called Ultra VLD. They were no longer suitable for new records. If you follow the path of increasing the mass of the bullet, you will need to change the entire cartridge - either increase the chamber or use a new progressively burning powder, or even switch to a different caliber. Another caliber (Browning .50 or domestic 12.7 x 108 mm) is a transition to another class and a completely different weapon with all the ensuing consequences: other barrels, bolts, receivers, dimensions, weight and a significant increase in recoil, at which There is no longer any question of pleasure from shooting.

Lobaev decided not to deviate from the old cartridge case and caliber .408 CheyTac, not to change either the dimensions or weight of the weapon. He was able to develop a heavier 30 gram D30 bullet while staying within the standard cartridge. This was also done because the cartridge is quite accessible and anyone can try to repeat the achievement. The design of the bullet was also modified: it began to resemble a long elongated spindle with two pointed ends, which made it possible to achieve an almost ideal ballistic coefficient of one. This required a change in the rifle's design, with a faster rifling pitch to stabilize the longer, heavier bullet. If the classic rifling pitch in the 408 caliber is thirteen, then on the record-breaking rifle Lobaev decided to use ten. Despite the fact that the initial speed of the new bullet was lower (875 m/s for the D30 versus 935 m/s for the D27), it had a flatter trajectory at 2 km.

Lateral support

One of the main problems with record shooting is that you can't keep raising the bar forever. optical sight. When shooting at such distances, the rifle has large elevation angles, as when shooting overhead, almost like a howitzer. At the top point of the trajectory, the bullet travels at an altitude of several hundred meters. No scopes allow making such adjustments for aiming, so for record shooting they use special rails for the scope. However, you cannot endlessly raise the bar: the muzzle device begins to block the aiming line. This is precisely what confused Lobaev in the last American record: the angle of inclination of the bar did not correspond to the correction required for such a distance. Lobaev spotted a solution to this problem at the artillery, where the sight had long been moved to the left of the barrel. The solution is simple, but no one in the world has used it before Lobaev. If you look closely at the photo, you can see that the sight on Lobaev’s record-breaking rifles runs to the left of the barrel. Which turned out to be more convenient for shooting: you don’t need to throw your head back and you can take the optimal position.

Lobaev's know-how is the side mount of the sight for ultra-long-range shooting. A year ago it was forbidden to even photograph it. This system can also be used by troops: when shooting at long distances, it helps to get by with available Russian sights.

On the second try

They were going to break the record last summer in the fields near Krasnodar. For this purpose, a giant target measuring 10 x 10 m was made in order to at least take aim. No one knew how a bullet behaved at such distances, and there were no exact mathematical models. It was only clear that the bullets would enter the ground in the target area almost vertically, so the target was positioned at a large angle. Another difficulty was that the soil was wet during the shooting, so it was necessary to hit the target exactly: traces of hitting the ground at such low speeds and almost vertical angles are not visible. Unfortunately for the whole team, the record didn’t work the first time: they couldn’t even hit such a big target. While they were preparing for the next round, the Americans posted a video on the Internet with a 4 km record. It became clear that we needed to shoot even further.

All last year Lobaev and his team conjured over the rifle and new bullets, practically not giving out information about the project, fearing to jinx the world record, constantly approaching the cherished milestone, first taking 4170 m, then 4200. And in October of this year they succeeded in the incredible: a famous shooter and promoter Andrey Ryabinsky hit a target measuring 1 x 1 m from a distance of 4210 m. For such a shot, it was necessary to take into account a huge number of factors, including the rotation of the Earth - the bullet spent 13 seconds in the air! As the record holder himself said, it took him eight years to achieve this shot. So now the ball is in American territory. Or, more correctly, a bullet.

December 27th, 2017

Only recently I told you, as well as another interesting thing about them.

This story began almost three years ago, when Russian shooter and manufacturer of high-precision long-range rifles Vlad Lobaev saw a video on YouTube where cheerful old men from Texas hit a target with a rifle at a distance of 3,600 yards (3,292 m). Vlad decided to take on the challenge and compete with the Americans. Fortunately, he had his own weapons factory, Lobaev Arms, at hand.

In April 2015, on a field in the Kaluga region (there are simply no multi-kilometer shooting ranges in Russia), with this rifle, Lobaev’s team, after sighting shots, hit a target at a distance of 3400 m. The video with the record was posted on YouTube. The Americans reacted calmly: they say, okay, let's continue the duel in absentia.

Record rifle SVLK-14 “Twilight”

Subsonic

Lobaev’s company studied this video almost under a microscope: some parameters of the shot did not match, the flight time did not match the initial speed and angle of inclination of the bar.

Nothing has changed in ballistics, but several hundred meters have been added. This does not happen, but since the competition was originally conceived as a competition of gentlemen, the Lobaevites decided to continue to shoot fairly with the Americans. And win by knockout - hit from four kilometers away.

Firstly, a re-stabilization effect occurs. The linear speed slows down per 1000 m, say, three times - from 900 m/s to 300 m/s. And the bullet rotation speed is only 5-10%. At subsonic speeds the speed is even lower, but the rotation speed is still the same. This leads to the fact that all the design and manufacturing defects of the bullet begin to come out, which greatly affects the dispersion. In addition, at low speeds, errors in assessing wind and weather conditions become noticeable.

The second factor is turbulence in the bottom part at deep subsonic levels. At speeds slightly less than 300 m/s this is not critical, but at ranges of more than 2 km it greatly affects accuracy. There is only one way to combat these phenomena - to develop a bullet design with a different bottom design.

If you follow the path of increasing bullet mass, you will need to change the entire cartridge, or increase the chamber, or use a new progressively burning powder, or even switch to a different caliber. Another caliber (Browning.50 or domestic 12.7×108 mm) is a transition to another class and a completely different weapon with all the ensuing consequences: other barrels, bolts, receivers, dimensions, weight and a significant increase in recoil, at which There is no longer any question of pleasure from shooting.

Lobaev decided not to deviate from the old cartridge case and caliber .408 CheyTac, not to change either the dimensions or weight of the weapon. He was able to develop a heavier 30 gram D30 bullet while staying within the standard cartridge.

This was also done because the cartridge is quite accessible and anyone can try to repeat the achievement. The design of the bullet was also modified: it began to resemble a long elongated spindle with two pointed ends, which made it possible to achieve an almost ideal ballistic coefficient of one. This required a change in the rifle's design, with a faster rifling pitch to stabilize the longer, heavier bullet.

If the classic rifling pitch in the 408 caliber is thirteen, then on the record-breaking rifle Lobaev decided to use ten. Despite the fact that the initial speed of the new bullet was lower (875 m/s for the D30 versus 935 m/s for the D27), it had a flatter trajectory at 2 km.

Lateral support

One of the main problems with record shooting is that you can't keep raising the scope bar indefinitely. When shooting at such distances, the rifle has large elevation angles, as when shooting overhead, almost like a howitzer.

At the top point of the trajectory, the bullet travels at an altitude of several hundred meters. No scopes allow making such adjustments for aiming, so for record shooting they use special rails for the scope. However, you cannot endlessly raise the bar: the muzzle device begins to block the aiming line.

This is precisely what confused Lobaev in the last American record: the angle of inclination of the bar did not correspond to the correction required for such a distance.

Lobaev spotted a solution to this problem at the artillery, where the sight had long been moved to the left of the barrel. The solution is simple, but no one in the world has used it before Lobaev. If you look closely at the photo, you can see that the sight on Lobaev’s record-breaking rifles runs to the left of the barrel. Which turned out to be more convenient for shooting: you don’t need to throw your head back and you can take the optimal position.

On the second try

Another difficulty was that the soil was wet during the shooting, so it was necessary to hit the target exactly: traces of hitting the ground at such low speeds and almost vertical angles are not visible.

Unfortunately for the whole team, the record didn’t work the first time: they couldn’t even hit such a big target. While they were preparing for the next round, the Americans posted a video on the Internet with a 4 km record. It became clear that we needed to shoot even further.

Over the past year, Lobaev and his team have been conjuring their magic on the rifle and new bullets, practically not giving out information about the project, fearing to jinx the world record, constantly approaching the coveted milestone, first taking 4170 m, then 4200.

And in October of this year, they succeeded in the incredible: the famous shooter and promoter Andrei Ryabinsky hit a target measuring 1x1 m from a distance of 4210 m. For such a shot, it was necessary to take into account a huge number of factors, including the rotation of the Earth - the bullet spent 13 seconds in the air !

As the record holder himself said, it took him eight years to achieve this shot. So now the ball is in American territory. Or, more correctly, a bullet.

sources

New distance record sniper shooting belongs to the team of Vladislav Lobaev, a Russian weapons manufacturer whose high-precision sniper rifles were adopted by the FSB and FSO of Russia.

The record was set on September 28, 2017 at the training ground in Tula region in Russia. Effective shot fired Andrey Ryabinsky from a distance of 4,170 meters on a target measuring 1x2 meters, from a rifle SVLK-14S "Dusk" cartridge caliber .408 Cheytac.

High-precision sniper rifle SVLK-14S “Twilight”

To set a new long-distance shooting record, Lobaev Arms specialists modified the rifle and modified the cartridge. This made it possible to accelerate a bullet weighing 30 grams to initial speed at 1000 m/s.

As Vladislav Lobaev himself reported, 4170 meters is slightly more than the recent record of colleagues from North America— they recorded a shot at 4,157 meters. However, this is not the limit. In the coming days, Russian gunsmiths plan to set a new record - 4,200 meters!

Lobaev's team except production precision weapons has already distinguished itself with previously record shooting - they set it in April 2015. After this event, debate flared up on the Internet about whether live shooting at such distances makes sense. Some particularly knowledgeable “experts” claimed that the bullet supposedly loses all destructive power and falls on the head like “pigeon droppings.” Let's leave these statements on their conscience and on the conscience of the developers computer games, where “experts” draw their knowledge, and in order to find the truth, let’s turn to reality.

In June of this year, in the Iraqi city of Mosul, Canadian sniper from the unit special purpose Joint Task Force 2 killed one of the ISIS militants with a precise shot ( terrorist organization, banned in Russia, CIS countries and Europe), attacking Iraqi army soldiers. The most remarkable thing about this story is that the shot was fired from a distance of just over 2 miles, namely - 3,540 meters!

Canadian sniper in Iraq
(c) dinardetectives.info

The command of Canada's special operations forces did not disclose the name of the sniper and the circumstances of the battle, saying that the fact of the shot and the elimination of the militant was confirmed by documentary satellite photography.

It is only known that the sniper used a rifle McMillan TAC-50 with ammunition .50 BMG (12.7×99 mm), the sniper position at the time of the shot was in a high-rise building, the flight time of the bullet was about 10 seconds. At the same time, the shot had a strong demoralizing effect on the terrorists and actually disrupted the offensive, representatives of the Canadian military department reported.

The previous “combat” record sniper shot was installed in 2009 in Afghanistan, in the Musa Qala region. Then Corporal Craig Harrison, a special forces sniper from the UK, shot from McMillan TAC-50 eliminated 2 Taliban machine gunners from a distance 2,475 meters.

Harrison said that on the day of the record shot, the weather was almost ideal and absolutely no wind, and visibility was excellent. It took him 9 sighting shots to then accurately hit the target with 3 shots. The bullets fired by the corporal from sniper rifle, reached their targets in 6 seconds.

There is also information about the alleged absolute record firing range from a sniper rifle - 3,850 meters, which was established last year Jim Spinell from the American company Hill Country Rifle. But this is not a “combat” shot, but in terms of high-precision shooting in “peaceful” conditions, the world record now belongs to the team of Vladislav Lobaev.

“We set a new world sniping record for accurate shot range - 4210m! I shot, spotters Yuri Sinichkin, Evgeny Titov, Vladimir Grebenyuk. I couldn't have done it without these people. Team work, requires the highest level competence from everyone. And everyone demonstrated exactly this level!

Before this, our team was approaching 4170, then 4200. And now 4210 is the final distance! There are only a few shooters in the world who could get even close to such results. I have been preparing for this shot for 8 years. Thanks to the guys from Lobaev_arms for the tool specially made for us and active working together to set a record! Well? In which country do the best snipers in the world live? - said Ryabinsky.

Using a specially prepared rifle SVLK-14 “Twilight” Russian production First, ranges of 4170 and 4157 meters were taken, after which a target measuring 1 x 1 m, placed at a range of 4210 meters, was conquered. Previously, this record belonged to the Americans, who conquered a distance of 4158 meters.

The unique ultra-long-range rifle SVLK-14S (SVLK-14S), for 6 years has been demonstrating record performance at ranges significantly exceeding the 2-kilometer line - this is power, accuracy and extreme range in your hands.

The accuracy and range of this line of rifles sounds almost unreal and, yes, daring. Its owners often achieve sub-0.2 MOA 5-shot groups. And this is with such a powerful cartridge as the 408 Cheytac, which few can make shoot. We did it.

Hit over 3 kilometers? Easily! Nice band for 2 and a half? Yes, it is available with her. New world record? She can do that too.

The new model features a reinforced multi-layer sandwich of carbon fiber, Kevlar and fiberglass, and is specifically designed for use with high-power ammunition such as Cheytac. Also, to further strengthen the structure, a long aluminum chassis is integrated into the stock.

At the heart of this model is the award-winning King v.3 bolt group, manufactured to tolerances much tighter than industry standards. Accurate and indestructible.

The receiver body is made of aircraft aluminum with a threaded insert made of high-alloy corrosion-resistant steel. The shutter is also made of solid, corrosion-resistant steel. The SVL model K-14S was deliberately left in a single-shot version to ensure the required rigidity of the receiver required for ultra-long-range shooting, as well as modularity and interchangeability of calibers (bolts with cylinders: Cheytac, Supermagnum, Magnum).

A LOBAEV Hummer Barrels stainless steel match barrel completes the picture. Manufactured to the highest standards in the shooting world, these barrels take shooting to the edge - POSSIBLE. Anyone who has tried it knows.

All lengths produced by us are optionally available for this model.

Price: 1,945,000 rub.

TACTICAL AND TECHNICAL CHARACTERISTICS:

Technical accuracy - 0.3 MOA\9 mm between centers (5 shots at 100m)
Maximum Effective Range (sp) - 2500m++
Muzzle velocity - more than 900 m/s
Operating temperature range - -45\+65 C
Caliber - .408 Cheytac\.338LM\.300WM
Length – 1430 mm
Height - 175 mm
Width - 96 mm
Weight - 9,600 g
Barrel length – 900 mm
Trigger force – reg. 50-1500g
Bolt - right
Port - right
Shop - no

BASIC EQUIPMENT:

Barrel contour - SHG
Barrel length – 900mm
Caliber – 408 Cheytac
Muzzle brake- T-Tuner
Doly - 6
Bipod - no
PBS - no
HB\TV mount - Dedal OSB-1
Sight mount - STD Picatiny

Hitting a target from a distance of 3.5 kilometers with direct fire is a difficult task for almost anyone. military equipment. When it comes to civilian weapons, then completely unattainable. More precisely, it was unattainable until this moment. The Texas guys from the Hill Country Rifle company, which produces and refines rifles, did the hitherto impossible - they hit the target from a distance of 3,475 meters (3,800 yards).

Thefirearmblog reports that the previous unofficial record was 3,550 yards (3,246 meters). The author of the new achievement is Jim Spinella, who shot from a modified Long Range Extreme 375 Cheytac rifle ($6995 for the base model) and used CHEYTAC .375/350 GR cartridges.

It took the sniper 19 rounds to zero. After making all the adjustments, the hit accuracy was 90% on a 36-inch target (91.5 cm). The shooting took place far from being under “hothouse conditions” - when the record was set, the wind was blowing at a speed of 4 m/s with gusts of up to 7.5 m/s.

To understand the severity of the moment, here are a few facts:

at the peak of the parabola the bullet was 100 meters above the aiming point;
from the moment of the shot to the hit, the bullet flew for more than 8.5 seconds;
due to air vibrations, the target is almost invisible at such a distance even through an optical sight.

The guys are not going to stop at the achieved result, planning to conquer the 4,000-yard bar (about 3,658 meters) this fall. Until now, the achievements of snipers in accurate shooting range had not been officially recorded, but Spinella and his comrades decided that it was time to put an end to this.

In combat conditions, the farthest confirmed sniper shot was made from a distance of 2475 meters. In November 2009, British Army Corporal Craig Harrison participated in a joint force operation in Afghanistan. During the battle in the Musa Qala area, using the L115A3 Long Range Rifle rifle, from a distance of 2475 meters, he managed to destroy two Taliban machine gunners with two shots, and with the third, disable the machine gun itself. In an interview with the BBC, Harrison said that it took him 9 sighting shots to then successively “place” three bullets exactly on targets.

Corporal Craig Harrison - author of the "combat" sniper shooting range record

Harrison also mentioned that on that day in the Musa Qala area weather conditions were ideal for long-distance shooting: clear visibility and complete calm. The bullets fired by Harrison from the L115A3 Long Range Rifle reached their target after approximately 6 seconds of flight.

It is noteworthy that the rifle and type of cartridge used by Jim Spinella is legal on the civilian market and is available for purchase as a hunting weapon in many countries around the world. Thus, anyone can purchase a rifle if they have a purchase permit rifled weapons and the required amount of money.