I recently took a ruger precision rifle and chambered it in 30-284 to use it for hunting, I believe the 30 cal might be better for elk and I use another of these ruger rifles for competition in NRA highpower and really like the adjustable stock and straight in line recoil these are great rifles. I could not get the rifle to shoot very well around 1.25 moa for 5 rnds, not horrible but not as good as I would expect. I wanted to load rnds mag length and got a mag that allows 2.960 but that would not allow bullets to touch rifling and tryed over mag length rounds also in trying to find a load. I hate load development and shoot a 260 rem for high power because the loads seem to work well with very little tweaking when a new barrel is put on. I use 42 gr of 4350 with a 140 mk at the 600 yd line and take it to a match for load checking, if the x count is a little low you can tweak a bit at the next match but it should shoot within the 10 ring with that load right away. makes you wonder about barrel harmonics, this load works in different contours of barrels and different lengths, just like federal gold metal match always works in a 308. Any way I figured I made a mistake with the 30-284 then got a neck sizing die and neck sized the next batch of brass after it had been shot and instantly got 1/2 min results with 5 shot groups and shot off my elbow with a M-1 cotton sling for the 180 hornady bullets for hunting and for some 190 MK's I am going to shoot in the next 800-900and 1000 yd match which I loaded .010 off the lands, the other day I put that same load to mag length which is about .060 off the lands and it shot just as well as .010 off. I measured the fired cases and the full length sizer made the case .002 smaller .125 above the extractor groove and .007 smaller .100 down from the shoulder on the body which I think is too small and since this rifle has a plunger ejector like 90 % of all actions when you full length resize the ejector is shoving the case out to one side of the chamber so it is no longer straight with the bore. My 260 match rifle I always neck size only so I don't have to fool around with lube and I believe the cases last longer. I have probably shot 10,000 bullets since I started shooting highpower this way and have had good results. I keep reloading as simple as possible and spend time shooting or dry firing instead of reloading and very much believe trigger time is way more important than making little 3 shot groups at 100 yds. I don't check groups at 100 yds ever 200 or 300 yard groups give way better definition and I also don't think 3 shot groups do much good with 7 or 10 shots giving a real answer. Early on in high power I made a load and it shot 5 shots into less than an inch at 200 yds so I was happy and went home and loaded up 300 of these only to find out they didn't shoot well and I had just got a random 5 shot group that was not representative of the true grouping of this load. I
am not sure but I think with my pre64 m70 match rifle I had better results neck sizing only and I think this might be because the pre 64 does not have a spring loaded ejector which will position the case to the side of the chamber the same way each time so a neck sized only case will be aligned in the chamber the same way as the preceading case. I get 5 or 6 loads out of my match rifle neck sizing only before needing to fl resize. for the 300 yard line and the 200 yard line we shoot rapid fire so I fl resize these loads to go in the chamber easier. I shoot 40 gr of 4350 with a 120gr bullet at 300yds and this load works with every barrel I have had to put on, which I have had about 15 barrels and set them back an inch each time. at the 200 yard line I shoot 90 gr tnt with about 36 gr of medium speed powder sometimes up or down a grain and this load is very mild brass lasts very long, I have reloaded some over 150 times, some of my very old brass is now not giving any neck tension so I have to scrap those cases. I totally agree with the fellow that said just because the rest of the crowd does something you need to follow them, this sport is the most trendy sport I have ever seen with most experts repeating the newest thoughts not ever testing these theories just repeating the most popular opinion.
am not sure but I think with my pre64 m70 match rifle I had better results neck sizing only and I think this might be because the pre 64 does not have a spring loaded ejector which will position the case to the side of the chamber the same way each time so a neck sized only case will be aligned in the chamber the same way as the preceading case. I get 5 or 6 loads out of my match rifle neck sizing only before needing to fl resize. for the 300 yard line and the 200 yard line we shoot rapid fire so I fl resize these loads to go in the chamber easier. I shoot 40 gr of 4350 with a 120gr bullet at 300yds and this load works with every barrel I have had to put on, which I have had about 15 barrels and set them back an inch each time. at the 200 yard line I shoot 90 gr tnt with about 36 gr of medium speed powder sometimes up or down a grain and this load is very mild brass lasts very long, I have reloaded some over 150 times, some of my very old brass is now not giving any neck tension so I have to scrap those cases. I totally agree with the fellow that said just because the rest of the crowd does something you need to follow them, this sport is the most trendy sport I have ever seen with most experts repeating the newest thoughts not ever testing these theories just repeating the most popular opinion.
