Reloading: Load testing method

By what primary method do you determine your most accurate load?


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Tackleberry270

Well-Known Member
By what result do you primarily determine your ideal or chosen load? A basic poll but will hopefully get the thread going.

Feel free to share the finer details of your testing method - charts? graphs? etc...
 
For my bolt action rifles group size at 100 yards but in the case of the doubles barrel convergence at 50 Metres, plus of course consideration to achieving adequate velocities proven by the use of a chronograph.
 
best at 100 and the best or least factors spread over chrono, i also like to ladder test out to 300 for stalking rifles and at a longer range for foxing set up , so a mix of all
 
Work up and simultaneously group test at 50yards looking for series that overlap and group tightly.

Then test the most promising at 200yards: usually a batch of 10 rounds against top load to date.

Noted a few years back that just because a round groups at 50 or 100 yards it doesn't always work out further.
I always now test even hunting loads at 200 and beyond.
 
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Group size at 100m has to be my primary indicator. Mainly this is down to the fact that the club range I shoot on is 100m. There is space on my shoot to test at longer ranges, but it's a working farm so extended "range" sessions aren't an option. When I get the chance I run the most accurate load over the club chrono. I don't test every test load for velocity.
 
easiest way to explain is google ocw reloading method theres alot written on it it may or not be the best method but is simple which helps me as i am alos a little simple
 

Thanks for this. I remember talking about this some years back with some friends and at the time was getting very good accuracy with my current method so never explored it. I have a rifle that I might try this with.

This is the most important paragraph I think,

19. The OCW load development plan works best with rifles and shooters that are actually capable of MOA accuracy. If your rifle has not shown a propensity for reasonable accuracy, you may want to have it corrected before wasting time and material with additional load developement. If you are not confident that you are at a level where you can shoot consistent MOA groups, you may want to hold off on intricate load development until your skills are better honed. Lots of practice with a scoped .22 LR is invaluable...


It intrigues me how the vast majority of voters in the poll are saying their load development is conducted by firing groups at 100m/yrds. The OCW article identifies a few potential pitfalls with this method but the most basic one is - how can you be sure that the 'good' group that decides your chosen charge weight is actually the most consistent and repeatable when inconsistent shooting, wind, barrel temperature/fouling may mean that the better load produced a bigger group size on the target?
 
for long range f-class competition: group size and extreme spread of speed of the load for 10 shots at 100 yards. less than 1/4" center to center for 5 shot groups and an extreme spread in the teens or less for 10 shots in a row.

if it groups at 100 yards with a low ES, it will shoot at any range beyond that. testing group size beyond 100 is tricky without wind flags and really steady conditions.

for my stalking rifles, group size at 100 looking for as little height in the group as possible. horizontal is often down to condition changes. anything around 1/4" TO 1/3" center to center is sufficient for me. don't bother with the chrono for that.
 
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