Rifle Accuracy/PC/Hardness

[Joshua]

“You don’t get to be new and cool!”Told to me a long time ago by a mentor.

I’m no expert here on this forum. But I am in other areas of my life. I’ve had people seek out my counsel and guidance over the years, only to ignore it because they knew better. I call it the “yah but/I know” syndrome. At least one person has died because they ignored my guidance.

Those of us in the trades are well aware of this syndrome. In hindsight our careers seem to be a series of jobs repairing other peoples mistakes. We have learned how to train young bravado filled apprentices and engineers who can’t understand how the print doesn’t match real life. My filter is pretty good.

Stick around, learn, and give back to the group. We might even defend you someday when some new guy drops a snarky comment on ya!

Josh (my real name)

 

[popper]

Me thinks if 4and1 were to post what rifle and (assume 30cal) his goals, we might be of some help.

 

[Ian]

I said it was a can of worms at the outset.

In order to understand the answer to the question asked, one must have a pretty broad understanding of what tin, antimony, grain refiners, and other things like state of annealing do for us or against us when we are trying to launch a cast bullet in such a way that it will group closely with it's bretheren. If the OP doesn't already know the answer to his question while he is intending no modifications to his normal loading routine for the wheeelweight alloy, then that tells me there are some gaps that need to be filled in with discussion. The comment about harness and leading had me shaking my head.

Another thing is bullet/throat fit. I find a certain myopia regarding this among the heavy or unlimited class CBA competitors and it limits their success to certain alloys and brings about a lot of notions about things like case neck tension uniformity and bullet body diameter (not to mention bullet nose shape and how various forms interact with various throat designs with different alloys and different seating depths) which are not universally true.

Lots to get past if there is to be much of a positive outcome from this. If you are already an expert, I have nothing to offer that will help. Polling the boards isn't going to provide a meaningful answer to the OP's question, either.

 

[L Ross]

Well poop, I wanted to find out how to get well under 1/2 MOA groups for an 8 target aggregate. And what unknown magic powders he used. Whatever it was probably isn't available anyway.

 

[L Ross]

FWIW- Ian stated "1.5 MOA at 300 yards", not 1.5 MOA at 100. If 1.5 MOA at 300 isn't good enough, well, best of luck.

Also FWIW- Ditto What Josh said about arrogance and condescension. We seem to have a lot of that showing up here. Based on personal experience, best to point it out publicly rather than in a PM lest you get put in time out with no recourse to respond. Be nice if all of us would grow a bit more respectful of the opinions of others. It's not just here either.

We don't even know what venue he shot cast bullet bench rest competitions at. 1.5 MOA would be a skosh under 5" at 300 yards. I am getting real close to that as I was hitting 6" discs at 440 yards as 1.5 MOA is about 7".

Oh well, his avatar rocked.

 

[Ian]

Wayne Shaw won a couple of CBA matches using powder-coated bullets back in the spring. I brought this to the attention of the CBA board and got crickets. Ric Bowman was kind enough to send some emails and rouse some well-deserved attention on the subject, although that seems to have faded. My takeaway is that very few people are really interested in altering the status quo and when it comes to competitions, the winners aren't interested in disclosing their secrets.

 

[Brad]

I am sad to see this come to an end.
I really am interested in seeing what PC can do and what it takes to get great accuracy with it. Having a known rifle and shooter eliminates a huge variable.

I don’t hold any ill will towards the competition shooters. They have a system that works, why upset the apple cart and start over? Bet you wouldn’t ever get Rick to try PC in his sillywet guns either- no need to reinvent the wheel.

The kind of testing soon becomes work. It rapidly stops being fun for me. Been down that road before and no desire to go back. I am quite certain that many others would agree.

 

[fiver]

powder coating still has a long way to go just to have a this is kind of the consensus of 'what's the best' [normalized] way to do it.
the coating itself still hasn't been settled on yet and a thickness still doesn't have a consensus.
.002 seems to be what most are getting, I get more like .001,,, .004 [or groove depth] might be the best yet,,,
I don't know, and I'd bet good money on nobody else knowing either.


I really wish I didn't know anything about bullet swaging, I could have a supercharger or a blower on both of my ford's.

 

[Ian]

I'm still trying to figure out why powder coated bullets seem to form two or three one-hole groups in a run of ten, over and over and over. If I could fix that and learn to shoot under match conditions I'd be winning every CBA match in the country with my AR-10.

 

[RicinYakima]

Ian, no one else knows either (which is why I am betting on you).

 

[Rick]

Bet you wouldn’t ever get Rick to try PC in his sillywet guns either- no need to reinvent the wheel.

Not that it was competition, it's just the urge, curiosity and desire to mess with it never bit me. Which is why I had stayed out of this thread, the OP was specific on asking for PC experience. While I do have extensive experience with hardness/alloy variation it was all with lubed bullets.

 

[fiver]

even jacketed bullets 'rely' on the inner core in some way or another.

 

[Bret4207]

I just wish people wouldn't take offense when they are challenged on a statement they make, especially when it's not really clear what they are using or are trying to obtain. This form of communication is hampered by our inability to read body language, tone of voice, etc. So, people get PO'd by unintentional slights. It's not just us common fools that are hampered by this. I took part in forming a forum once for draft horse people. One of the high muckity ups we really wanted to participate was the publisher of magazine devoted to same. He made 1 or 2 posts and then bailed after stating that the platform was too limited and he was unable to accurately present his thoughts. The guy has years of experience, several books and decades of lecturing under his belt and he found a simple forum too cumbersome to deal with. So, it ain't just us...and I think the possibility of his statements being challenged intimidated him.

As for the rest, the minute I see someone talking about Bhn my eyes roll back into my head and I snort out loud. It's like thinking that you can change the course of a river by moving a single rock.

 

[Rick H]

The written word is so much more harsh than speaking face to face. No intonation of voice, no smile or shrug to give the words context. Face to face you can say horrible things to a man, challenge his ancestry, his abilities, his career choice, and very existence......if done with humor and a smile, or a self depreciating shrug to let him know you are in the same boat with him. If you try to put even a tenth of that in a letter or, God forbid, an open forum and he will react as if you tried to steal his very soul.

It surely helps to have a thick skin.

 

[Bret4207]

The written word is so much more harsh than speaking face to face. No intonation of voice, no smile or shrug to give the words context. Face to face you can say horrible things to a man, challenge his ancestry, his abilities, his career choice, and very existence......if done with humor and a smile, or a self depreciating shrug to let him know you are in the same boat with him. If you try to put even a tenth of that in a letter or, God forbid, an open forum and he will react as if you tried to steal his very soul.

It surely helps to have a thick skin.

Amen brother!

 

[L Ross]

By golly, I am going to powder coat today! I made 21 ice fishing jigs and I'll powder paint those. They will need to hit a 4 1/2 inch hole at 3 feet.

 

[Bret4207]

By golly, I am going to powder coat today! I made 21 ice fishing jigs and I'll powder paint those. They will need to hit a 4 1/2 inch hole at 3 feet.

Ah, but if you use a HARDCAST alloy you'll be able to zing 3 of them in the hole with no leading of your tip up!!!! It's true, I read it on the internet!!!!

 

[fiver]

the harder alloys do click the rocks better than the soft ones.
I started making my jig heads from a 50-50 mix of 4/6 and ww alloy just because I can feel them hit the rock better and I know the fish can hear the clicking sound better.[catch rate went up]
I think it sounds like a crayfish clacking it's pincers together much more than a soft alloy does.

 

[L Ross]

Well powder coating sucked. I ended up using Male Polish. Then I went out and fished in the snow storm the weather forecasters were whining about and brought home 10 nice panfish.

 

[Brad]

Male polish? I don’t even want to know.....