Does wadding affect accuracy?

[SCHUETZENBOOMER]

Does anyone have any thoughts, experience or proof one way or another…… on wadding over light Unique 45-70 loads having any effect on accuracy? My loads are 12gr Unique, ¼ sheet toilet paper wadding lightly tamped over powder, followed with 350gr cast Lyman 457122’s. I seem to get a flyer with most (5) shot groups. Random in sequence. Thanx

[KAF]

Your best to NOT put the wad of any sort touching the powder.

In the kind of shooting I am involved in, when shooting smokeless powder a cork wad is set .200" off the powder.
A shouldered rod is used to do this.

A wad of anything touching the powder will greatly increase the chance of a rung chamber.

[rhead]

In my rifle Accuracy is not affected by wadding with that level of unique. At 8 grains it does need wadding. If you are getting 20% flyers something is affecting it. If it is consitantly near 20% I would suspect inconsistent ignition. Try no wadding, dacron wadding, a caliber sized disk of crepe paper. Others will chime in with different ideas.

Also try a SINGLE thickness of toilet paper between the flash hole and powder. Effectively using lighter primer. Does it shoot well with other loads? Possibly a slightly weak hammer strike?

Good luck

[Nrut]

http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b180/cborba/Popcorn.gif?t=1186688023 (http://javascript<b></b>:void(0))

[mooman76]

I believe it depends on the gun you shoot it out of. If you have a gun that already shoots well I don't believe it will help it shoot better. If you have inconsistancies due to powder placement with low volume it might make it more consistant. I have 2- 7mms with oversized bores. The both shot very poorly and I could hardly get them on paper. With wadding one was shooting 1' at 25y and the other which had an even more oversized bore showed no improvement.

[405]

Your best to NOT put the wad of any sort touching the powder.

In the kind of shooting I am involved in, when shooting smokeless powder a cork wad is set .200" off the powder.
A shouldered rod is used to do this.

A wad of anything touching the powder will greatly increase the chance of a rung chamber.

Did I missed something here? Seems wrong. Loading and shooting any kind of wad that doesn't fill the space between the powder and base, runs the risk of causing a chamber ring. The base of the bullet is the bore obstruction. The wad is the projectile that is slammed into the base of the bullet resulting in a relatively large amount of kinetic energy being concentrated and transferred at the interface between the wad and the bullet base..... hence the ring. Whether that wad is touching the powder or .2 off the powder seems trivial compared to the energy of that wad when it reaches and contacts the base. The issue with the cork wad may be more like..... it may not be dense/hard enough to cause a ring with certain powder charges but still it is slamming into the bullet base just after powder ignition. Most use a very low density filler like loose, fluffy dacron for filling the space between the powder and bullet in smokeless loads.

[R.C. Hatter]

I believe with such a light charge weight of Unique in a cavernous case like the .45/70,
that a filler, NOT a wad, is desirable. A satisfactory filler is Dacron batting, as used for quilt padding, pillow stuffing etc. The use of a Dacron filler of 1-1.5 grs. weight seated in the case with a dowel or pencil, lightly on the powder, will hold the charge against the flash hole, thereby giving more uniform ignition than would be obtained by having the powder strung the length of the case. I have loaded hundreds of .45/70 rounds in
this manner with no harm to either of 4 rifles they were shot in. I believe that uniform ignition is key to good accuracy.

[SciFiJim]

If the dacron is light and fluffy, will not the powder mix into it? Or does not enough mix in to create an issue? Has anyone pulled a boolit loaded like this after handling/carrying it around a while to check?

[35remington]

It will not mix. The dacron is long fibered and springy, and can hold back many times its weight in powder if properly used.

[SCHUETZENBOOMER]

Thank You all.....

R.C.Hatter,
Do you cut a certain size of dacron batting that averages the 1-1.5gr that you identified? I too am seating the wadded 1/4 sheet of TP lightly with a pencil. Most is consumed in the bore as small pc's are all that is left on the snow up to 10ft in front of the bench.

[swheeler]

I have shot many Unique loads in 458 Win and 450 Watts AI, 17-20 grains and do not use a filler with Unique. Try some muzzle up/muzzle down powder position tests over your chrony. Unique is , well unique in this respect, position insensitive.

[runfiverun]

unique is not very position sensitive.
405 pretty much explained how fillers work and how a ring is formed.
the cork wad is used as a false base to the boolit, but woe if it falls to the top of the powder and does slam into the base of the boolit.
a filler does exactly that fills in the airspace between the boolits base and the powder.
i suspect you are not getting the tissue in the case fully contacting the powder and holding it into position against the primer, in effect causing a difference in powder amount consumed from shot to shot.

[jonk]

I'd think of it as a filler, more than a wad. A wad would be (for instance) a cork or vegetable fiber disc on top of a case filling charge.

Either way, both CAN improve accuracy.

The key to fillers is to have a continuous column, whether you use dacron or dryer lint or PSB or whatever, from the powder to the base of the bullet.

I don't think personally one is needed with Unique or Red Dot or 4759 or any of the faster powders. When you hit 4198 and slower, then perhaps. It keeps the powder column over the primer rather than slumping on the down side of the cartridge.

I have little experience with wads but occasionally use them on top of a powder charge in my black powder cartridge guns to help act as a gas check and segregate the grease cookie from the powder. I don't reload much black powder in cartridges so it's not something I have much experience with.

[HORNET]

You could also try a hotter primer without any wad. One less variable to mess with. It doesn't always work but life's easier when it does.

[R.C. Hatter]

:arrow:For Schuetzenboomer & other interested parties :
With respect to your question as to whether or not I cut the dacron batting to a certain size that averages the 1.0-1.5 grs. I identified, the answer is no. It is much faster and easier to set your powder scale to 1.5 gr. and just pull a pinch of dacron off and check weigh it. If it's a bit light, you add a bit more, if too heavy, just remove a bit. It sounds slow and tedious, but after a bit of practice, you'd be surprised how close you can come to pinching off the desired amount. However, it's always well to check weigh a few as you go along. I hope this answer is satisfactory....R.C. Hatter

[calaloo]

KAF is correct about the wad positioned about .2 from the powder charge. The type of shooting he is refering to is schuetzen where the case is primed and charged at the bench. It is then chambered and the shot is taken. I don't think it would be a good idea to load fixed ammo using this method for use later as the wad might slip onto the powder.

Charlie Dell, in his book "The Modern Schuetzen Rifle", reports on tests that he did to determine the cause of barrel ringing. He found that he could ring barrels at will by putting a wad directly on the powder. Evidently the face of the powder must "slump" to prevent pressure ringing.

It must be said, however, that modern steels are much more resistant to ringing than the steels of the late 1800's / early 1900's. Dell could not buy steel of the quality of the old barrels and had to make a barrel with brass chamber inserts for his tests.

[SCHUETZENBOOMER]

All good info guys......Thanx and keep it coming.

To me the reloading process is not "how fast I can get it done", but more a precise, theraputic process that I love to get lost in. I did an aprenticeship under a master gunsmith starting age 15. One of the first mundane tasks unloaded to me was the reloading of thousands of rounds a month. I quickly found "shortcuts" that allowed more production. I will never forget a customer coming in with a demolished .357 S&W. We pulled some bullets and found double charges in several out of a couple boxes. Lesson learned! Quality First....speed last.