I don't know about the M4 and short barrelled AR variants because my military experience was with the M16A1 with a 20" barrel. Back then, we would sight it in to hit the target about one inch low at 25 meters. The bullet would still be climbing in its natural ballistic arc at that point. It would cross the line of sight and peak about one inch high before it started slowly dropping. At about 250 meters, the bullet would be dropping and crossing the line of sight again. This would let you basically hold an aim point directly on target from anywhere close (ten meters or so) out to about 275 yards. No need to correct for rise or drop in the flight.ORIGINAL TEX wrote: ↑Thu Oct 24, 2024 11:14 pmMilitary M4s are normally battle zeroed at 300 yards, but this creates a big offset at distances you might encounter in your home or on your property unless you live on fairly large acreage. What I mean is that at 10 yards that 300 zeroed AR is going to hit 2-3 inches low. For ARs I suggest a 50 yards zero with the large aperture which gives you a vertical impact area about 2 inches from top to bottom from 7 yards to 200 yards. Unless you shoot 200 yards quite a bit, it is further than you are probably thinking. If you zero a Mini at 50 yards, you have basically a 1 inch vertical impact area from 3 yards out to 150. 150 is a long shot in an urban environment.
Of course, we were always shooting silhouette targets and anywhere on the black counted too. Combat accuracy from the muzzle to 275 meters was all we needed. For self-defense, I always figured that anything that hits the suspect is close enough.
But I do agree that convincing a jury for self-defense when the suspect was 100 yards away is very hard, let alone 300 yards.