U.S. Rifle M1903a3 "03-A3" to 500yds: Practical Accuracy

This episode was brought to you by Slate Black Industries. For M-LOK grips and accessories, visit slateblackindustries.com. The 1903A3, a very well-respected target rifle in the US. However, I do think that this run is going to leave some to be a little bit disappointed. On the contrast to that, I'm actually fairly happy about one element in this run. I had trouble seeing the front sight and I had trouble seeing the target. Both of those put together put this particular rifle in a distinctive disadvantage compared to some other rifles out there. America's rifle. Two world wars, baby. Ready? Yeah, 150. Impact. I took it. Looks like I'm out the money today. Impact. How's the left and right? Fine, that was on the left half. OK. Impact. Better? Yeah, that was on the right half. Alright, I'm on it, 250. Impact. One more here at 250. Impact. And neutralize. OK, 300 yards. Yep. How was the windage on those last two? The right half of the plate. OK, I have been aiming to the right half of the plate. How was the elevation on the one that I missed? It looked like it might have been a touch high. OK, I was aiming on the top. I was using a 200 yard sight, and I aimed on the throat area of the plate. OK. So then after that, I came down a little bit. On the miss, it looked like it also might have gone toward the left. It was hard to see. It's hard to see because it's so flat, so straight, so quick. OK. Alright, so for a 300, I'm going to try to maintain the windage, but because I set it at the 300 yard sight, it should be dead hold. Impact, right half. OK, I'll center the windage then. I mean, I see the wind in the grass. It is moving right to left, just this is cutting through it at this distance. Impact, dead center. OK. Alright, we're on a 350. Impact, left edge. Just off the right edge. OK, I felt that I was pushing a little too far to the right there. Ready? Impact. OK, so that was on the left edge again, right on top of your first impact. OK. Alright, I'm on it four. A little bit of camouflage out there for you. Alright, got it, got it. Were those last two you said it hit on the right side or the left side? Two impacts at 350 were on the left edge. Your miss was off the right edge. OK. So that's a little challenging. It seems like windage I'm having to hold off to the right a little bit, so I can't dead hold these things. Yeah. Now that is actually one of the things with the 0383 sights that I dislike. I prefer the Garand sights because it's thicker. With a thicker sight, you have more of a horizontal plane to do a windage hold off. So let's see how we do at 400. Just off the left edge, nine o'clock. Perfect elevation. Bottom left corner. This one is really difficult for me to see right now. Impact, dead. Just off the right edge. Impact, neutralized. I'm barely seeing that target now. Yeah, well, I know if you're struggling that much to see it, for those who aren't aware, Henry has phenomenal eyesight. I can't, I mean, it's, I don't, I know it probably isn't camouflaged on the... It's not that bad on the camera, but it's pretty, you can see that it's... It looks like a clump of grass and there's no reference points around it for me to look at. Right. And the blade sight is so fine that I have to actually find a good reference point to hit. So anyways. Well, are you ready for a slightly easier to see target? Yeah, I could see this one, but it's 450, so I need to get the elevation correct. All right, here we go, 450. Okay, you're high by about maybe a third to a half target length on the left edge of the plate. Okay. Just on the bottom right corner. Impact. Just off the left edge. Just off the right edge, just split that difference. Impact. Yeah, I wish we could spray these things. It's, this one's a little bit hard to see even on the camera because of the shadowing, where the sun is. It's very difficult for me to make out right now. Even through the Vortex binos? No, I can see it through the binos, no issue. I'm talking about with iron sights. Yeah. Do you want to try to take a different target? Let's see if we could do this one. All right. Because what I'm doing, you see on top there's a shadow. Just to the top left of the plate? Yes. Yep. I'm going to use that shadow as a windage reference point, and I sort of see where the elevation is, and I'll aim that way. All right, sounds good. Ready? Well, you like put it in the shadow. Okay. Like perfectly into the shadow. Okay, that was at eight o'clock off the left side of the plate. Okay, how about this? Why don't we just go to the other one? Yeah. That I could actually see. Okay. Because that's not fair to the rifle, to the armistice. So there's our gong. We're just going to move over here to this diamond. That's got a better angle against the sun. Right. It's going to let it be a little bit easier for Henry to take these shots since the standard 500-yard target, based on the sun's position, is just kind of occluded in shadow, making it hard to see through the iron sights. Um, I think that was an impact. Seriously? I couldn't see. I thought I saw a splash on the plate. Okay, let's do it again. Ready? Yeah, go ahead. Yeah, that's two. Two for two? I'm like 99% sure that that first one was on the plate. I mean, I'm pretty... That was the same hold I did. Yeah. So I'm fairly... Phenomenal. I'm quite confident with it. So the main struggle point with it were those really fine front sights when it came to a target that was somewhat camouflaged. And I will say that this is actually something that Ian and Carl stress a lot on their targets that they do at Desert Brutality, is that they don't paint targets. And in real life, having a target that's trying to hide at that distance, it's quite difficult to hit. Regardless, we'll take it to the debrief. The American Ordnance Corps develops rifles at Camp Harry. They develop rifles from competition. So pretty similar to what we're talking about, competitors. You're a competitor. SOCOM likes to grab things from what the USPSA... Yeah. SPHERE is using. Absolutely. Red dot sights on pistols is one of the glaring things that's grabbed from the USPSA SPHERE. LPVOs on your AR systems. Yep. So this is no different to it. However, let's dial back. The 1903 uses a leaf sight that is incredibly complicated. And both of these systems are developed on the KD range on target shooters. And that's just how America has, the Ordnance Corps specifically, how they had adopted target practices and target rifles towards military use. Right. I don't think that's the best practice all the time. I mean, I think there are certain merits to it. USPSA is more on the practical side. So I do think some adaptations work. But a KD range may not be the best. Right. Because what you're noting is that you found yourself in a situation where you had over-designed or over-engineered the sighting system for a rifle that needed to be at a much lower common denominator for use. It's not just that. Manufacturing side. It's much easier to manufacture the 03A3 sights than the old 03 sights. But then even the 03A3 still has a very fine blade front sight that they used in target competitions. That's all great when you're shooting at a USMC regulation target that's the size of a jeep. But with a well-contrasted white background behind it. Allows you to get a really refined sight picture in that instance. In a target competition environment. Right. Where you know the distance. Right. That's not reality. The Germans don't walk around with a giant white poster board behind them as a silhouetted figure. So the issue that I have with the 03A3s is that the front sight is very fine. It's very difficult to shoot at camouflage targets. And we are not shooting at camouflage targets out here. And even here I have issues. Because what I do and the M1 Garand actually stepped away from the very fine front sight. And I actually really like it. Because when you use a square notch. You're able to use that flat top of the square notch to adjust for windage left and right. When you've adjusted your elevation on your rear sight. So effectively you're using points within your larger front sight. And where it hits the target on the top bridge of that sight. To help hold for wind. Whereas when you have an extremely fine front sight. You don't have the same ability to gauge the location of the target in relation to the front sight. You know that is what I do with even target rifles out to one kilometer and beyond. I set my elevation and I like to use the mill scale to judge the windage. And that's how you work. That's how I work with wind. And I learned that from camp parachuters as well. Ironically camp parachuters that I learned it from. Walked away from the fine front sights that were developed for camp parachuting. Right so just to hammer that point home. There were moments where you were shooting on the course. Where we ran into instances where you're like. I'm having trouble gauging where I should be holding from a windage perspective. And I'm losing the target. It's very rare in my history shooting with Henry. To see Henry have to come off the gun to try to find where the target is. And then go back on the gun. Or to need glass to be able to see where a target is. To then get back on the sight and find it in relation. Generally you have really good eyes. And he never really ever does that. If you go back and watch him shoot other rifles on other runs. That rarely happens. I might do that all the time because my eyes are crappy. And I need to find where a target is in relation to the sight. You rarely do that. But you had to do that several times today on this run. It's difficult for me to use fine bladed front sights. Which is why I prefer M1 Garand front sights. Which is why I prefer the stock M16 A1 A2 sights. It's because it is that square notch and post. And it's easy for me to judge on the windage with that type of front sight. However, this is a Mauser action. Where the US government actually got sued by Paul Mauser's company. They settled with Paul Mauser. And it was DWM who sued and actually got money. However, it is a Mauser action with sights on it that are not barleycorn. And I would say this is a far superior sight system than barleycorn. Barleycorn is some backwards ass system that I don't know how it survived so long. Okay, so in terms of this versus the Mauser, from a sighting perspective, you would choose this hands down. Yes. What about from a caliber perspective? Obviously, this shoots the venerable 30-06 round. I think the 30-06 is far superior to the 8mm Mauser. In fact, if you look at what the Norwegians did after World War II, when they had stockpiles of 98K from the surrendered German soldiers, they changed the sights into post and rear notch, let's say U-notch and square post front sights. And then they changed the caliber to US 30-06. So they turned 98Ks into something that's like, you know. So I think I like the rifle. I wish the front sight wasn't so fine. I wish it was thicker. I understand that's not something that you would do for target shooting, for paper shooting. But it's something that I like to use in the field. It's a personal preference thing and how you've trained and how you utilize your iron sights, you'd prefer that. So the caliber makes sense. 30-06, especially M2 balls shooting, you know, the 150 grain. Nothing stupid like the 180 grain. Nothing ridiculous like the 8mm shooting the 197. This is, it just makes a lot of sense if you're using the Mauser action to do something like this. However, see that dust cover in the front of the front sight? I took that off when I was shooting. It's all piece. It pops off. It is to protect the front sight. During transport. Am I dumb? No, just pull it off. Yeah, it just pulls off. You see the fine front sight. Another downside to it, if you knock that against something accidentally. Oh yeah, that looks like it could bend easy. So would you just shoot it with the hood or? No, the hood's too small. Here, look through it. The hood's very, it's very difficult to find your front sight and your target behind it when you use the little dust cover hood. Definitely does obscure a significant portion of your sight picture. So I mean, that's another big issue. And so to me, if I were to re-look at the 1903 A3, which in World War II bolt actions were already at the point, I mean, of, you know, bye-bye. Yeah. I feel like the next iteration, they would have changed the front sights. Towards something more in line with the M1 Garand. Yeah, but they never got to that point. Yeah. Because these became obsolete. Right. And then turned into CMP rifles, which as a CMP rifle shooting at targets. Yeah, brilliant, right? Excellent. Some, and in part why we've had probably so many requests to run this because it has such a reputation in that field. One thing I do want to talk about though, unlike other Mausers, you see something on the left side that is not on a Mauser? Yes, that is a magazine cutoff. Certain generals in the Ordnance Corps had designated that they wanted the magazine cutoff to be put on for the 1903s. It's interesting because this was during the adaptation of magazine bolt action rifles. And it was a carryover from the Civil War era, where officers would control formations of soldiers into volley firing into, you know, distance targets. And the fear was that if you did not, if you allowed the men to load from a magazine with such great firing rates, that they would exhaust their ammunition and you would just become overwhelmed by the enemy. So this was, if you think of it, an adaptation from Civil War tactics and theory. So to show you how elements on this rifle have really, it's just, it's spanned decades and centuries. And it's actually hard to fathom that someone who fought in the Civil War had influence on the Ordnance Board to generate something like this. Yeah, that is pretty cool. Yeah. Who do we have to thank for this one? Oh, huge thanks to Brandon at the Gun Room. Not only does he do a lot of our FFL transfers for us, and he does a lot of that up in North Houston in the Woodlands area. But he has a pretty wicked collection of new and old stuff. He says from classical to tactical. And so huge thanks to Brandon for learning us the gorgeous example of the 1903 A3. And I'm sure a lot of guys out there, a lot of viewers also thank him for that as well. We're very good. Guys, thanks for tuning in. See you in the next one. Furthermore, it's already separated into the different categories, so you can go back to your argument as quickly as possible. And whether you decide to support us via Patreon, subscription, or just a normal viewer, we thank you. One six. It's been like two. One Victor. Two Facts. Recon one. Over.