Brillo

I was recently informed of the new rule in the 2019 NRA RCO manual on page 1 of the Introduction which is copied directly as follows:

5. Shooters who hand load their own ammunition must provide certification that their ammunition was prepared in strict accordance with accredited published loading manuals and must ensure that the Muzzle Energy (ME) value is within the permitted limits. They must be prepared to provide samples of their ammunition for chronographic analysis.

Any thoughts or comments please. How is this workable and how are we hand loaders expected to comply with this rule?

Interesting!

 

As an aside, what do you do re 'jump' for the 155gn Hybrid? I've not found this an easy bullet to 'tune' - in my chamber / barrel it seems to need a large jump (40 thou' or more) before it'll perform. (By contrast, the 168gn Hybrid only performs if treated like a VLD and seated 'in' - not just me who has found that so it seems to be a general feature for this model. I'm not over-impressed by 30 calibre Hybrids as the Berger / Litz claims of tangent ogive like flexibility simply haven't stood up to scrutiny for me so far.)

I found the same thing with the Berger 155 hybrids, and strangely the same as the SMK Palma bullet #2156. They both perform well after a 0.040" jump.

The OP sounds like the guy was shooting at 1000 yards without already having a confirmed elevation at 900 or even 800 yards and that could be said to be stretching the boundaries of hope a bit too far.

I was shooting on Stickledown a while back where a shooter was having a similar problem to that referred to in the OP. After 4 shots that the marker couldn't mark or call the fall of the shot, the RCO stopped him shooting.

When I spoke to the guy afterwards it turned out it was the first time he'd shot that rifle at distance and hadn't even obtained an elevation at 300 yards.

Luckily for him we were shooting at 300 yards that afternoon and I helped him get a 300 yard zero having got him on the paper on the second shot.

I advised him to leave shooting at 1000 yards again until he could first hit the target at 600 yards then 800 yards then 900 yards.

Hi Bergeon. I've sent you a PM.

Hobbit, I run my CM with H4350 and SMK 142 grain bullets at ~2850/60 fps and 139 Scenars at ~2900 fps. Accuracy is excellent in both cases. I know some like to push theirs faster but the elevation and wind compensation isn't worth it IMHO.

I understand (and QuickLoad verifies this) that RS62 gives higher MVs but I've yet too test it.

Viking Arms have had Peterson Creedmoor brass on order since September and they don't know when it will arrive. But they do have Lapua Creedmoor cases in stock.

Viking Arms said some months back that they would be importing Peterson Creedmoor and 308 brass as well as others.

Thanks Laurie. I'll call them.

Is there a UK supplier of Peterson Creedmoor cases? I have some .308 Palma's to try and they are excellent.

SEB Joy-pod every time.

I can think of a few who would love to shoot that brute at Orion

Good luck Mark. Soon to be filled with shelves full of man cave stuff eh.

There was an interesting paper published recently on the effects of accuracy on annealed cases, or rather, the adverse effects due to case hardening. The conclusion was that annealing does improve accuracy and there was a lengthy explanation as to why.

From a personal point of view, based on annealing by hand, I hadn't noticed any spectacular improvement. However, since a mate of mine acquired an AMP machine and has annealed some cases for me, I have noticed a definite reduction in vertical dispersion.

You don't say which bullets you'll be using.

The two bullets that work the best in my CM are the 140 grain A-Max and the 142 grain SMK.

I've tried RS60 and this gives high MVs but the most accurate powder so far, with the bullets mentioned, is H4350. With my load of 42.1 grains with both bullets I'm shooting around 2860 and 2850 fps respectively.

I've only shot the CM out to 900 yards so far, I only needed 19 moa of elevation to get there and hit the target.

This tells me that about 2850 fps is about right.

Ok, I could load the RS 60 and get 2950 fps but I know I'll lose out on accuracy.

HTH

George, 220 grn at 2659? Wow, I think I'm gonna need bedding compound rather than Fixodent :-)

Amleto, now I know what I'm doing wrong. My wind reading is bordering on dyslexia so I'm going to have to try the heavy bullets, ha ha.

 

No disagreement re ICFRA, my point was more in response to the comment that 155.5 gr projectiles belong in "yesterday's FTR" and references to 200 + 215 projectiles. That may well be the case in FTR however my previous post was about FB projectiles, in particular the relationship, if any, between bearing surface and chamber/bore dimensions for the 3 listed projectiles (Berger FB 155.5gr, Sierra 2156 155gr and HBC also 155gr).

I think that, like in Formula 1, our engines' power is growing more and more despite all the associated issues (shorter barrel's life, huge recoil, vertical grouping, high pressures, etc.).

Just a couple of years ago my go to loads were the 155.5 FB for medium ranges up to 600 yds and the 185 jug for 800 yds up.

Today are the 200 Hybrid up to 800 yds and the 215 for 900 and 1000 yds, running at 845 m/s and 825 m/s respectively with very good vertical dispersions.

 

As you can understand the excellent 155.5 FB and co. bullets belong to yesterday F TR.

Interesting comments. However, in the UK I don't know anyone shooting F TR who uses anything other than the 155.5 FB Bergers and that includes most of the GB F TR team.

However, for full bore, ICFRA rules mean TR shooters are limited to 155 grainers for 0.308.

Just to be picky, the ICFRA rule state that .308 bullets must not exceed 156 grains or the factory tolerance for 155 grain bullets where factory ammunition is used. This is an important point otherwise it would rule out using Berger 155.5 FB target bullets in reloaded ammunition.

Hi John,

What is the fitting?

gbal is right. I did overlook the parameter of cost, and considering the kit you describe the #2155 SMK is a really good bullet. So, my apologies for giving you a minor scare. Up to 600 and even 800 yards the 2155 performs well but will never beat a Berger in a custom rifle (but that's not what you are after). I would add though, and I'm sure other's will agree on this, the #2156 new Palma bullet is very finicky to tune. They are known to be jump sensitive and it can be a pain to find the best seating depth, whereas the 2155 is very jump tolerant.

I can only call it as I see it from experience. I used the SMK Palma's and everyone I met said that "if you want to compete it has to be Berger 155.5s." Since changing over I've won three comps. The difference is very noticeable.

I batch measured and weighed both SMk's and Berger 155.5s recently and the range difference was small with the Berger's but the SMKs were disappointing. The ogive measurement range was very wide. Out of only 100 I had 4 different batches compared with 2 compared to Bergers. And then there was the weight difference as well. Not impressed.

Very informative post thank you

+1 to that. A very interesting read.

Does anyone know the size, in MOA and in inches, of the scoring rings on the 900 and 1000 yard F-Class targets?