35 Whelen Progress Report

[35 shooter]

TXGunNUT won't hurt to try at least a couple of groups with a known load. See if it tightens things up kind of thing.
With j's i always seat to the lands (no crimp) and work the loads. With cast however, i was having problems getting it to do the same thing twice. Long story short Eric at Hollow Point Moulds suggested i try crimping and backing off seating depth. It worked for me but i dragged my feet a while before doing it. If you're shooting any "hot" loads tho
probably be a good idea to reduce the load for the crimp and work back up just in case it adds to much pressure.
(Like you didn't already know that huh?)
All i know is it started grouping good and it stopped all smoking of the case necks so i've stuck with it, much better powder burn too, with almost no residue left in the bbl shot to shot. My rifle has a throat then rifling (no leade).
Pretty harsh environment for my boolits to start out from.

One of these days i'm gonna try seating all the way to the nose band on that 200 grain boolit with no crimp and try that. I will be reducing the loads first when i do tho. Still, without a leade for the rest of the boolit i don't know how that's going to work out. Stuck with the crimp in my ol contrary rifle for now.

You're Thor results sounded good.

[nanuk]

35 shooter, the deeper the seating, the lower the pressure, all else being the same, in bottle neck cartridges

don't be afraid to seat deeper.

[TXGunNut]

Thanks, I crimp my levergun and revolver loads but didn't think about crimping for a bolt gun until you mentioned it. Load is pretty mild so I think I'll let that ride, like to change as few variables as possible. I load for hunting situations so I generally keep the J-words off the lands, I've found there's generally another "sweet spot" .005-.015" off the lands. Ol' Ugly has a bit of a leade. I haven't bothered with tweaking the seating depth, boolit has a pretty fat nose (.352") so I'm not sweating it much.
Guess I'll go ahead and post some pics. Not very happy with them but I learned a good bit from them.

[35 shooter]

nanuk i may not have been clear on that. I meant seating into the rifling to the nose band not deeper into the case.
Were you talking about seating into the rifling?

[TXGunNut]

Addressing feeding issues this week. Tweaking the magazine lips helped but the last round from the right side is a bit balky. Big fat LFN boolit seems to be hitting the ramps leading to the chamber. Hoping a little polishing on the ramps will clear this up. Ran out of patience, reassembled the gun and started a thread over on the Gunsmithing forum. I'm learning.

[35 shooter]

Hope that gets straightened out easily. Groups looked good on the Thor.Looks like it IS gonna shoot as good as it looks! Can't wait to see more of that.

[TXGunNut]

I think you're right, this boolit is going to do well in this rifle. Was looking for 1.5-2" groups but pretty sure I can get it under 1.5" with out much fuss. Haven't even dug out the good primers yet!
Weellllllllll...it wasn't easy but I eventually got Ol' Ugly feeding as good as I think it will get with this rifle, these boolits. Wrapped & taped some emery cloth around a Bic Stic pen, got some light on the subject and polished it as best I could. Big wide meplat still hits the back of the chamber now and then but it's better. Dummy rounds are a bit dinged up so it will do better with real ammo, I hope.
Doubt I'll get to shoot it this weekend, suspect half the club will probably be out there trying to sight in deer rifles. General season opens here Nov 3rd. May be a good weekend for some BP SAA action.

[nanuk]

nanuk i may not have been clear on that. I meant seating into the rifling to the nose band not deeper into the case.
Were you talking about seating into the rifling?

Sorry, I misunderstood

I was talking about seating into the case deeper so as to have a shorter COAL, giving the boolit a running start.

[35 shooter]

Sorry, I misunderstood

I was talking about seating into the case deeper so as to have a shorter COAL, giving the boolit a running start.

Ok... yeah seating off the rifling and deeper in the case HAS worked best so far in this rifle. Seems like a lot of things with cast so far is just the opposite of what i always did with j's. All i know is looks like TXGuNut is close on that THOR. Can't wait for another report on that...MORE THOR...MORE THOR...MORE THOR...Hey that rhymes!

[44magLeo]

I have Lee's reloading manual second edition, in there he has a section on lead bullets, hardness, chamber pressure and accuracy.
We all know that higher velocity needs harder boolets. Richard Lee has figured out just how much velocity you can get by knowing boolet hardness. The hardness indicates the strength of the bullet. Knowing the strength of the bullet tells you how much chamber pressure the boolet can withstand.
Adjust the chamber pressure to just below what the boolet can withstand gives the best accuracy.
Select a powder that gives you this pressure, Using a slower burning powder at this pressure gives you the highest velocity the boolet can handle and still be accurate.
I know this doesn't explain it as well as Richard Lee can.
If you have the book read this section. If you don't have the book it don't cost much and is a very interesting read.
Leo

[TXGunNut]

Lee's manual gives an excellent detailed overview, I recommend it highly myself. Fryxell's book is a better source for understanding the hardness and strength of a boolit, they aren't the same thing. Boolit fit, lube and construction are other factors to consider when deciding if a boolit can withstand a certain amount of pressure. I can measure boolit hardness, fit and velocity but pressure and how it builds are factors I have to theorize about after studying velocities and on-target performance.

[taco650]

I'll 2nd Fryxell's book. I downloaded it recently & got lots of good tips from it.

[TXGunNut]

No range time this weekend, stormy outside and back is going absolutely bonkers for reasons unknown. Shooting buddy was called out of town on a family emergency so it's just as well. Been doing hours of surfing here and elsewhere, may have learned a thing or two.
Another often overlooked factor in the boolit hardness/velocity relationship is the RPM threshold principle that Larry Gibson addresses in a sticky around here somewhere. It explains, for example, why my Winchester 70 in 30-06 with it's 1/10 twist will always be fed jaxteted boolits. It also explains why my 30-30 with a 1/10 twist doesn't like to go fast with the same alloy and similar boolit construction that my 35 Rem is perfectly happy with at an additional 300 fps. I've never truly understood the RPM thing until tonight, now it's not all voodoo and magic anymore.
I think I'll take my crippled-up butt to bed, mebbe I'll get to do some loading tomorrow.

[44magLeo]

Fryxell's book? Title and where to find?
Leo

[TXGunNut]

There's a link around here somewhere, it's only available as a download.

"From Ingot to Target: A Cast Bullet Guide for Handgunners" Glen E Fryxell and Robert L Applegate

Much of what he talks about applies to rifles as well as handguns. Don't get bogged down too much in the metallurgy, COWW is an excellent alloy and can be adjusted for most situations. He does an excellent job of explaining why.

[taco650]

Fryxell's book? Title and where to find?
Leo

I think I found it through Google

[TXGunNut]

Fryxell's book? Title and where to find?
Leo

There's a sticky and a link under "Cast Boolits", thoughtfully posted by cbrick. I saved it to my hard drive. Good thread, too.

[TXGunNut]

Hope that gets straightened out easily. Groups looked good on the Thor.Looks like it IS gonna shoot as good as it looks! Can't wait to see more of that.

Loaded up a few 359-190's and some Thors a little while ago. Tightened up the crimp a bit, hope it wasn't too much. Had ten prepped cases left and remembered the SFRB that you sent me, I think you may have solved my feeding problem! Nice looking boolits, BTW. Meplat is smaller than the RD or the Thor, maybe it won't catch on the back of the chamber. Lube is drying on them now, wish I'd thought to look at them a few days ago. I was thinking about the 358-009 boolit to overcome this issue. Just wish the NOE/RCBS boolit weighed another 40-50 grs.

[35 shooter]

Loaded up a few 359-190's and some Thors a little while ago. Tightened up the crimp a bit, hope it wasn't too much. Had ten prepped cases left and remembered the SFRB that you sent me, I think you may have solved my feeding problem! Nice looking boolits, BTW. Meplat is smaller than the RD or the Thor, maybe it won't catch on the back of the chamber. Lube is drying on them now, wish I'd thought to look at them a few days ago. I was thinking about the 358-009 boolit to overcome this issue. Just wish the NOE/RCBS boolit weighed another 40-50 grs.

The rcbs version is even smaller at the nose. Noe kind of blunted it off and i like that. Looks like it'll smack something for sure. RCBS makes a 250 gr. that looks like it has a small meplat too.

Shot the NOE'S again today and the 26 gr. load of 4759 shot like usual except for the last group, i popped the last shot 1/2" high of the group. The 33 grain load that the RCBS liked so well did not shoot well tho, gonna have to tweak that one for the NOE a bit. Haven't shot any hot loads with it yet. Hope i don't have to change them too.
That's weird tho cause the other day i shot 2 groups with 33 gr. and it shot well....go figure. With my luck i'll probably have to tweak my other loads for it a little too. Funny how 2 boolits so close in configuration like the NOE and RCBS can shoot so different. I think the NOE is gonna beat it out in the end tho, it's just a tad more nose riding.

You may just have to box that old THOR mould up and send it to MS.

[TXGunNut]

You may just have to box that old THOR mould up and send it to MS. -35 shooter

Maybe so, but I have it on good authority it makes a good 35 Rem boolit! Let me know how it works for you. Thanks for the tip on the RCBS 250 grainer. I'm still not mad enough at my shoulder to try the 358-009 but the Thor boolit is not unpleasant at 2100-2200 fps in this rifle. The 358-009 @ 2000 or less shouldn't be all that bad. Mebbe I need to start a GB discussion thread about a NOE copy of that RCBS 250 gr boolit. Lots of 35 Whelen shooters around here and most of us don't need to shoot thru moose or big bears, even fewer headed to Africa after the big plains game.