Round ball wind drift?

[Daryl]

At 300 meters on steel, the .69's still hit with a clang, Bob. A "sighting" shot hit the new 2x4 hanger board exactly in the middle and almost cut the 2x4 in 1/2.
 The back of it was blown out 8" long and full height of the board. It was a HUGE hole. Of course that was back in the 80's but I don't think she's lost any steam
 over the last 36 or so years.
And, of course, that is the difference between a 134gr. ball and a 482gr. ball.

[Jeff Murray]

If you want to shoot a 32 and don't want to worry too much about drift, get one with a slow twist barrel and load it up.  I have a light weight, fast twist, short barrel 32 that shoots great with 25 grains of 3F.  My go to 32 has a 40 inch Douglas XXX barrel with a 1 in 66 twist (over 45 years old) and is a tack driver with 50 grains of 3F.  That was the load that produced the tightest groups with a 315 ball.  Produces a pretty flat trajectory for shooting at multiple ranges but loses steam beyond 75 yards.

[StevenV]

 LH attached are three pics of targets my daughter and I shot the other day. You asked about wind drift on a round ball. Yes it is real, and given equal velocities as 32 cal. or 54 cal. is traveling down range the heavier ball  is " pushed" less by wind yet still pushed. All three targets were shot at 50 yds. off a bench with wind flags ( 4 flags for 50yds.) The top two were shot with my hunting gun of 30 years , 50cal. fixed open sights, flint. The bottom target was shot by my daughter with her bench gun 50 cal. peep sights. Whether you shoot offhand or bench the ball is going to drift. The key is to get your gun to it's "proper " powder charge which keeps the 5 shot group to a minimum. As you can see in the top target the five shot group is up and down, this calls for more powder. The middle target is a much tighter group ( increased powder charge by 5 grains ) . I would consider this the powder charge for best (tightest ) group. Now comes the drift, as you can see I was impatient in the middle target and shot with the wind less then ideal. I was shooting red wind ( right to left). When I shot that shot to the left of the group 3 of the 4 flags were white wind ( right to left ) I thought is was okay. Well, it went to the left, so I was more patient for the remainder of the shots and the group shows that. That same "proper" powder charge is evident in the bottom target. The top bull 105 grains, the bottom bull 100 grains. This gun/barrel shoots 100 grains best/tightest group. Packing the barrel with more powder to increase velocity only opens up the group. To keep the drift to a minimum you need to read the wind, or use Kentucky Windage when aiming. With that said ,I use a 40cal as my competition /target gun . When shooting I mind the wind and the fact that the velocity is greater then larger calibers this helps with drift. The moral of the story: find the powder that your barrel shoots to yield the tightest group then mind the wind as you squeeze   the trigger or use Kentucky windage when aiming. Wind and gravity affects all bullets/balls. Drop a bullet and shoot a bullet ( both bullets/balls the same) at the same exact time and they hit the ground at the same time.       Steve