Is BC important with pistols?

[tjgmba]

I'm a newbie, not only to pistol competition but to reloading. So this is probably a dumb question, but is Ballistic Coefficient important for competitive pistol reloading and shooting. It seems after all my reading and research that BC is almost an exclusive rifle issue because of the distance to target.

Help a novice, please.

[boz1911]

IMHO BC is not important in this game. A gun that shoots accurately certainlly is. The longest shots we will ever see is 50 yards, and that's pretty rare.

[George]

Correct, BC means little to nothing in pistols shooting at under 50-75 yards.

For those folks shooting metallic silhouette pistol competition at beyond 100 yards with high powered cartridges (.357, .44, etc..), it matters a lot. Higher BC means less velocity slew-off. This means flatter shooting AND more downrange punch left.

For example, wad-cutter bullet profiles are as accurate as anything at 50 yards, but they slew V and fall from the sky pretty quickly after 100 yards.

A boat-tail base and slim nose profile is the hot-ticket to fly well at distance. Long slim boat-tail projectiles are not the most accurate at shorter distances as they are still hunting around a bit and usually produce tighter groups at 150yds plus than they do at 100yds and under while they are still stabilizing.

[Jeff686]

One could easily argue that sight height above bore (for open guns with red dots) is much more important than BC. What I mean is that basic triganometry is is the biggest issue to consider in picking a distance to zero the sights, not distance and BC.

However, most open shooters use C-More sights, which are very high over the bore, so it must not really matter all that much either.

[George]

However, most open shooters use C-More sights, which are very high over the bore, so it must not really matter all that much either.

Correct!

My C-More topped .38super open gun is sighted so it's dead-on at 40-50 yards. This requires a top of target hold for an A in the upper A/B at under about 15 yards, just under that to 25 and dead on after that.

My J-Point topped open gun has the same sight/bore relationship as iron sights so it gets a 12-15 yard sight-in. I prefer this, but have no problem with the 50 yard C-More sight-in mode either. I really don't think about it when I shoot, it's just as easy either way.

Doing the "Find The Dot" wrist dance is the only thing I dislike about the C-More. Presentation consistency is everything with a C-More