After working up a load for a friends 300WM it shot the 212 ELDX best .015 off the rifling. RS100S for decent groups and great velocity my Sako liked RL19 and Barnes TTSX 180's. I was able to get 3240 out of my 24 inch barrel Using 83.0 grains. That is the max load n the Barnes manual so work up to that carefully. No other manual showed a load that high.
What is causing my flyer.
- Thread starter WildBillG
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West Calamus
Well-Known Member
Sounds like you already have a nice accurate hunting rifle. Let me tackle this from another angle. Your first 2 shots touch. Let barrel totally cool ( 20 min if not in sun or hot outside) shoot 2 more, cool barrel and shoot 2 more and what do you have? Just because the barrel feels cool does not mean the barrel has totally relaxed after heating up due to metallurgy inconsistencies. If hunting the cold bore shots are what counts so drop en in the first 2 shots. Now if you just want to impress the boys down at the range and have your wheatherby shoot as well as the PRC rifles in 5 shot strings you are screwed.
A hunting taper barrel will heat up quickly especially in these high capacity magnum cases. Many times 3 shots will heat up the barrel enough to change POI. Everything in life has a trade off. In the case of these hot magnums, that is one. Go with a heavy barrel, upping the overall weight to 15lbs and you might be able to get a 5 shot string touching like the first 2 shots. If it's a one shot kill hunting rifle that you are looking for, it sounds like you have it. 1st and 2nd shots are dead on. If you wanted to match shots with the PRC guys at the range, you are outmatched.
I loaded up a few more cases last night for another trip to the range. Next time I will let the barrel cool longer to see if that helps as well. These last loads were loaded seated out to 3.625 and 3.630. 3.630 will put the bullet .018 off the lands.
bob4
Well-Known Member
Can't wait to see how you do.
Got out to the range yesterday with a Lab Radar to test loads. Velocity with 86.0gr of Retumbo and the 212 ELDX was 3004. That is basically what the Nosler manual said it would be. How ever seating bullets out proved not to be the answer as the group went bigger to 2 inches. My next test will be seated as I was and .005 deeper to see what happens. I also think I will go up a half grain on the powder charge.
beware that seating the bullets deeper will increase pressure. Add to that changing the powder charge upwards by 0.5 grain will also add to pressure. Have you ever fired this round/rifle at night to see how much fire you are producing at the muzzle? Too much fire indicates a lot of powder not burning until it is outside the barrel. The problem with looking at this is, HOW MUCH is too much.
bob4
Well-Known Member
Not trying to be harsh here but your not methodical enough. Changing the seating depth and charge weight at the same time isn't how most would do it. I feel like your grasping. It's a slow process. I use Bergers method. Most either find a good seating depth or charge weight then the other. Then start tweaking each of those as you get closer. But only changing 1 thing at a time.
I should have been more clear when I posted I am not going to change seating depth and charge weight together. I will seat some deeper at my known charge and see if group improves then try some with a little more powder. Once again I should have been more clear on my plans sorry.
MOOSE39465
Well-Known Member
I believe with this powder bullet combo putting 2 rounds basicaly on top of each other. This leads me to believe there is just some small tweaking left. As I mentioned this rifle has always been a good shooter that is why I don't think it is a rifle problem.
Not so much a rifle problem but a rifle preference. If you don't have a dial micrometer get one, Harbor Freight under 20 bucks. Load twenty longer than normal rounds with no powder, no primer. Gently load each round, single shot like, and close the bolt. Don't slam the round home. You want the bullet to gently contact the rifling and get pushed back into the case. Gently extract and measure each one. Hopefully all your measurements are within .001 - .002 of each other. Write down each of these measurements. Variations in length with this method could be due to crud where the lands start, non concentric round, inconsistent bullet dimensions, differing case neck pressure, any one or combination of things. Anyway once you get a consistent consistent length load a live group of 20 to an overall length of .020 less than what you got in your test measurements. I have the same rifle but with a factory barrel, it loves .020 off the lands. A friend of mine has his at .018. The usual process is to identify your accuracy nodes by mucking around with powder / bullet combinations, then fine tune it with seating depth. As bob4 mentioned, only change one thing at a time. Use the same mfg brass, same powder lot, same primer lot, same bullets. Keep a written log of what you've done. I've given up on a rifle without enough meticulous work and sold to a guy at the range who, within the next year is shooting warts off a pickle at 100yds. He was more patient and found the recipe that worked.
Emp1953 I use a Sinclair bullet depth guage to determine cartridge length. I keep records of what I do and what works and what doesn't. At this point I am leaning toward seating depth and neck tension. The reason I think neck tension could be an issue is when seating the bullets it felt almost effortless. That is why I am looking at getting an anealing machine now. In my 30 some years of reloading it had never crossed my mind to annealcase necks. Thanks to the good folks on this forum I have learned a lot about it and its benifits. I try to learn some thing from every post I read on this site and it has helped me a lot the last couple of years. My next move with this setup will be to seat the bullets a little deeper and see what happens.
There is a lot of good knowledge flowing around here for sure.
