Once again I have been surprised at the extent to which reloading is just alchemy and not proper science at all. Yesterday I finally made my way down to the BSRC at Bisley with a box of reloads to test in my Simson drilling, using 145 gr Fox Classic Hunter lead-free bullets. I'd sort of fudged the Viht tables and landed on five test loads at 0.5gr increments from 47gr of N550 to 49. But first things first: the NRA requires that you shoot a special zeroing target before doing anything with non-lead, in the presence of an official RO. It is a totally nonsensical hoop to have to jump through, but them's the rules. To this end I'd brought along leftover factory rounds, but the thing is, I just couldn't quite place the three required shots in the black circle. It wasn't that surprising, these were the leftover rounds from loads the rifle didn't like, hence the fact that they were left over. So I tried a second test target, which started eating into my test loads, and just about scraped it, so I could move on to the proper load testing. But this wasn't looking promising at all.
Anyway, what with tweaking the zero for these new rounds under the well-meaning eyes and friendy sledging of the ROs (they're nice people, it's OK...), my standard zeroing target started to look like I was using the shotgun barrels.
At times like these you really have to make the effort to trust the method, because this was going nowhere. Maybe my drilling just didn't like non-lead bullets, or at least not these Fox ones and I'd have to go on a series of wild goose chases. From my reloading notes:
1. 47.0gr - "No idea, can't tell" (there wasn't even a group)
2. 47.5gr (that's the big middle orange target) "3 inches"
3. 48.0gr - "A bit better..."
But all of those were bad, honestly. And then, at 48.5gr, the second bullet hit an inch from the first. But two shots are not a group. So I concentrated on the 3rd, and lo and behold! A group! So I pushed my luck and threw another at it, adjusting the windage a bit. BOOM!
"You've found the node!" says the RO. So just for the hell of it and the sake of completeness, I tried the 49.0gr ones (bottom left). There isn't even a group there, nothing, waste of time, powder, and a growing bruise on the shoulder.
Honestly, developing loads is stressful and doesn't make any sense. I'm done with this. 48.5grs of N550 and a 145gr Fox bullet and that's it. We're done.
Anyway, what with tweaking the zero for these new rounds under the well-meaning eyes and friendy sledging of the ROs (they're nice people, it's OK...), my standard zeroing target started to look like I was using the shotgun barrels.
At times like these you really have to make the effort to trust the method, because this was going nowhere. Maybe my drilling just didn't like non-lead bullets, or at least not these Fox ones and I'd have to go on a series of wild goose chases. From my reloading notes:
1. 47.0gr - "No idea, can't tell" (there wasn't even a group)
2. 47.5gr (that's the big middle orange target) "3 inches"
3. 48.0gr - "A bit better..."
But all of those were bad, honestly. And then, at 48.5gr, the second bullet hit an inch from the first. But two shots are not a group. So I concentrated on the 3rd, and lo and behold! A group! So I pushed my luck and threw another at it, adjusting the windage a bit. BOOM!
"You've found the node!" says the RO. So just for the hell of it and the sake of completeness, I tried the 49.0gr ones (bottom left). There isn't even a group there, nothing, waste of time, powder, and a growing bruise on the shoulder.
Honestly, developing loads is stressful and doesn't make any sense. I'm done with this. 48.5grs of N550 and a 145gr Fox bullet and that's it. We're done.
