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Thread: By George...

  1. #61
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    It's quiet around here. Too quiet. So:

    Well, here it is next year, and it was "better," at the Quigley, I have to agree.

    Rangemaster duties were pretty much down pat, and the Scorekeepers do all the heavy lifting, anyway. I got squadded perfectly with my shooting partner, so could concentrate better on the shooting. It was a Paper Patch Extravaganza; I fired 150 shots this year. The Paper Patch Bullet shooters are still a minority, noticed and whispered about by the other shooters.

    The wind was pretty bad the first day; almost like the wind conditions of the legendary Quigley of Ought-Twelve. The dust wasn't quite as visible, but it got all over everything anyway. The second day started out relatively calm, but the wind picked up again pretty quickly. My shooting partner had to fire one of his relays in the rain; one cloud's worth came by at just the "right" time.

    I got a 21, not my best, but equivalent to a couple previous scores with grease groove boolits, and I'm proud to say that I tied with the Third Place Small Fry shooter. However, I did manage to exceed the Match "average" of 19, and I've never despised a C+ in school if the subject was difficult enough. Best I did was 5 on any one target and the worst was 2. The wind was really getting to everybody (almost). Lots of "Nice Tries!" at the end of the relays from the Scorekeeper. They said at the Awards Ceremony that they saved a lot of money on Straight-8 Pins this year. But some people got them. One of the guys in a relay I was Rangemastering got two Pins on two successive targets. Even with the gale conditions, you had to be well up into the 30's to get much of anything in the award line. Dave Gullo won overall with an incredible 43, five shots above the second place winner, IIRC.

    I had three slightly different boolits loaded over the same 80-gr Swiss 1Fg powder charge. All from Brooks moulds, this year: a 0.440", a 0.441+" and boolits from the 0.441+" that I had lapped out to 0.443". Weights went from 543 to 547 gr. In practice and sight-in Thursday and Friday, all diameters and weights seemed to shoot to the same elevation, except for the Buffalo, which required a minute or so difference between the heaviest and lightest. I also had a few experimental loads of 80 gr 1-1/2Fg Swiss over the same boolits. They seemed to shoot as well as the 1F loads, except that for every target I tried them on, they shot about the height of that target high. Looks like I found another load that works, anyway.

    The bore-pig and dry patch cleaning routine suggested by Brent went without a hitch, and was easy to accomplish in the time I had between shots. There were occasional slight smears of fouling in the rifling ahead of the chamber after one of these wipes, but there didn't seem to be any elevation change or accuracy difference between these and a mirror bore, at least on these targets. I would, of course, run a second pig&patch if there was time, but if I had to adjust the sight setting, or consult with my spotter, sometimes I just had to take the shot when it came up. It went where it was called, anyway.

    My homemade mouth reducing die let the shell hold the boolit securely without appearing to damage the accuracy. I think they're in there good enough so I can put them in my uber Cool C. Sharps cartridge belt and parade around with them next year. The only mystery to me is why I could take any one of these loads, and morning and afternoon, on two practice days, hit the Octagon with monotonous regularity, and yet get only two hits when the chips were really down. I also sighted in during the pre-Match practice session on the Diamond, two hours before I was to shoot for real, and got twelve hits out of fourteen, but no pin when the nitty got gritty. Well, that's one reason I keep coming back, I guess.

    The people at the Goex table now have added 1Fg to their list of Olde Eynsford granulations, as a result of the comments from users at last year's Quigley. I got 5 lb of the stuff for paper patch and grease groove trials. It's nice that these people respond to customer wishes. I think I can make this stuff work; it seems the barricades are gradually crumbling. More and more, the criticality of variations in boolit diameter, design; even weight (within reason); patch thickness and bore wiping seem to be getting lost in the "noise," where before, everything seemed to make a huge difference. Maybe it wasn't all that critical in the first place, although at the time it certainly seemed so. Kind of like swimming, or driving, or playing the piano. After a while, you just "do it."

    I've done one Silhouette match with Paper Patch and didn't get much of a score, but I think I'll concentrate on using them now and see if the scores get better. I'll probably stick with the 0.443" diameter, just for consistency.

  2. #62
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    Sounds like a productive and informative shoot for you. Keep working on it keep good records of everything done so whatw orks can be repeated and what doesn't isn't repeated. I'm doing better with the 40 cal and paper patched than the 45s. I may lapp my mould out .001-.002 in dia as its dropping 442 dia with 20-1. Brooks mould and is adjustable for length or weight. It does okay but not as good as the 40 does, yet. I haven't purchased a mould yet for the 38-55 to try them in it. Bit it sounds like a great time was had and you had some good results and worked out well. Great job

  3. #63
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    Bent Ramrod, thanx for the fine post and comments on the 2017 quigley. i'm sure hoping to attend in 2018 in the white buffalo class. i've got a .45-70 shiloh #1 sporter due in january to suss out, it'll sport a custom ppb chamber to boot.

    my current gun is a pedi roller in .45-70 that has a big greaser chamber. the load is 80.5 grains of swiss 1-1/2f under a .025" milk carton wad compressed .030", under a BACO jm443530 slick wrapped in papermill 9# onion that drops @ 528 grains with 1:20 alloy. the ppb sits about 1/8"+ in the case. the ppb/starline brass gets a very slight tapering from a lyman die to keep it from falling out, but it easily twists around in the case and can be pulled out. i don't like neck tension. i don't anneal brass. brass is loaded fire formed and chamber oriented.

    i'm using the BACO bore wipers, w/straight water wet twin felts. a few flip shakes of the wiper to get off excess water, pushed down past the chamber with steve's delrin rod, then an arsenal patch to dry the chamber and meet the wiper and push the wiper out into a pan of water and the patch onto the ground. the bore appears shiny clean between shots. after shooting for the day, i also get that crusty drool under the muzzle from the wipers, but it cleans up pronto with most any water/oil solution like LVL or MM or even break-free.

    anyhoo, there are *LOTS* of combination of loads and fouling control processes to address. i'm still a pilgrim to the PPW ("paper patch way", as brent labels it), but i'm sure hooked on it, it's the only way i load and shoot these dayze. life's still good.

  4. #64
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    rfd, sounds like you are doing well. The 80 gr of 1-1/2Fg Swiss seemed to shoot as closely as the 1Fg for me, although the shots consistently went higher. I'm going to reload a couple Silhouette matches' worth of that load and really wring it out.

    My #3 Paper Patch gun is a Shiloh that was rebarreled with a barrel taken off another Shiloh, and of course it had to be run in slightly and the chamber recut. I have no idea how the rechambering job compares to an original Shiloh; my loads were simply developed in it to work in it. It appears from what I read that a true Paper Patch chamber, or even one of those 7-degree chambers, would make load development more of a mechanically logical operation, without the ordinary chamber's individual idiosyncrasies.

    My first trial with 1Fg Olde Eynsford didn't go so well, but some of that was me. I got impatient and commenced operations at the Pig line. Should have started out closer, as I never seemed to be able to settle on a sight setting. (I did get a fairly promising group on the lower part of the target frame, smashing it up good, but I don't know which load it was.) My shooting abilities seem to vary from session to session also.

    The OE is less dense than Swiss, so it is rather a heroic effort to get 80 gr 1F in the case, if it's full-length sized. If it's anything like OE 1-1/2, it will need a few more grains than the equivalent Swiss charge, with a fair amount of compression, but at the same time will need the boolit barely in the case mouth, as you describe. I'm thinking on a compression die that can hold extra powder above the case mouth, with a plunger that will compress it down into the case. (I'd rather use more powder than a complicated stack of wads, if I can.) One of Swiss' excellent qualities is that it doesn't necessarily need compression, but will stand it if you need to do it. OE seems to need some "finagling" to get up there with Swiss, although after that, it seems to perform well. At least, that was the story with 1-1/2 Fg and Grease Grooves.

    I bought some of those felt Bore Wipers from Buffalo Arms' tent at the Quigley this year, but my homemade ones worked well enough that I didn't use the felt ones. I notice the majority of Grease Groove shooters at Silhouette matches wipe out their bores between shots any more, so it isn't really extra work with Paper Patch. I'm one of the few holdouts still blow tubing with the Grease Grooves.

    More paper patch shooters are showing up at the Quigley now, although we are still a distinct minority, noticed and talked about in awed whispers by the other shooters. After a particularly good practice session (not, unfortunately, duplicated during the Match) another Paper Patch shooter remarked on how well they were doing, and asked for loading and cleaning data. Wow. Seems like only yesterday I couldn't hit my hat with the things if I hung it over the barrel, and now I'm a Grey Eminence, dispensing wisdom. Is this a great Country, or what?

  5. #65
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    I used the aforementioned Steve Brooks 548 gr boolit with 1.5 thousandths Strathmore Tracing paper over a 1/16" cork wad and 80 gr Swiss 1-1/2 Fg today at the local BPCR Silhouette match. Fired my third AA Score, and I got moved into the AA Class. Nowhere to go but up, now!

    This is the load that was shooting well, but high, at the Quigley. It recoils noticeably more than the 80 gr 1Fg Swiss load, but the hits came just as often, and, more to the point, the little thumbtacks on the animals on the cork board were almost always right where the crosshairs had wobbled on the actual animal (or its environs) when the gun went off. The few that were a little wider than my calls were still within the general parameters of the directive to "know thyself." No dirt diggers or weird misses.

    Rediscovering lost technology is certifiably Cool, like finding lost cities or other lost treasures. I'll still shoot grease grooves in matches with my other rifle now and again, but, for some reason, this PP business is a lot more Fun.

    Strathmore Tracing has unaccountably disappeared from the shelves of the local Wal-Mart and Hobby Lobby, replaced by some other brand. But it's beginning to look like anything 1.4 or 1.5 thousandths thick that is reasonably hard and crinkly will work. It took a lot of sweat and skullduggery to get the paper patching to work right, but loading that way now it just seems to be a standard routine.

  6. #66
    Boolit Grand Master Don McDowell's Avatar
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    Good deal
    Long range rules, the rest drool.

  7. #67
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    Quote Originally Posted by Bent Ramrod View Post
    ... but, for some reason, this PP business is a lot more Fun.
    my sentiments, exactly!

  8. #68
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    I took the Paper patch loads and the No. 3 to the Boulder City “Bragging Rights” Gong Shoot the other weekend. To say I did not do well is an understatement; I tied with the second-lowest score, but he got more centers.

    No fault of the rifle and loads that I could see—I just couldn’t get it together. Sitting or Prone, the rifle kept twisting in my hands, throwing wide ones. I’m still doing a good impression of a beached walrus wiping between shots prone, so more practice there is definitely needed. But, leave us face it, I’m not a serious competitor, I just like to play around with guns and loads and am glad to have a place to shoot these rifles at targets and distances worthy of them. “Better next time,” I hope.

    The Boulder Rifle And Pistol Club has a fantastic range, with the Bear out at 950 yards and the Offhand Square at 150, but it seems to be built on one of those Mystery Spots they used to have in the vacation maps. Everybody on my end of the Line was having trouble; three minutes’ Windage would give six minutes’ Elevation, or vice versa. The Walking Buffalo was supposed to be 200 yards or so from the Standing Bear, but it looked more like twenty paces ahead. The white centers were the fattest parts of both targets, but the black edges had the most hits. There were breezes, but also a lot of zero-windage calm, which often didn't seem to help much. Weird. The “No Whining” rule was honored more in the breach than in the practice. Everybody had a ball!

    But the interesting thing was that the per capita of Paper Patch Boolit shooters was the highest I’d ever seen in a match. There was a satisfying drift of paper shreds all along the edge of the firing line when the match was over. Although Pat Taylor won overall with Nekkid Boolits, Al Sledge was right behind him with Paper Patched, getting High Master. Several Paper Patch shooters got trophies. Many used grease cookies, whether patching or bore-pigging. Everybody wiped between shots; I didn’t see a single blow tube.

    I was told the Boulder Shoot was “good Quigley practice” and it is all of that and more. “Conditions” can get even crazier than in Montana. Kudos to Bruce Kuveke for reserving the range, organizing and running the event, and providing lunch both days. I don’t know how he found time to shoot. A mighty effort, and well done.

    I’ll be back next year, if I’m still mobile.

  9. #69
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    Quote Originally Posted by Bent Ramrod View Post
    But the interesting thing was that the per capita of Paper Patch Boolit shooters was the highest I’d ever seen in a match. There was a satisfying drift of paper shreds all along the edge of the firing line when the match was over. Although Pat Taylor won overall with Nekkid Boolits, Al Sledge was right behind him with Paper Patched, getting High Master. Several Paper Patch shooters got trophies. Many used grease cookies, whether patching or bore-pigging. Everybody wiped between shots; I didn’t see a single blow tube.
    Way to go Al!!!

  10. #70
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    It's great to hear that paper patching is spreading. It will not be that long before it becomes as common as grease grooves. The tide is finally beginning to turn.

  11. #71
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    Oops, memory failed (again). Bruce sent the score list out.

    Dick Savage first master, Al Sledge second. But Al got a 72, Dick a 76 and Pat an 80, so the good shots were very close together. Possible was 96; most of the rest of us were in the 40 to 60 range.

    No overall load details, like the Quigley, but I’d say the Paper Patch shooters were a solid third of the group anyway. Total was 25 shooters. The only unCool part was when the wind switched to 12:00, and the shreds and smoke came back in the shooters’ faces. They’re OK with the smell of the smoke, but the confetti shower takes getting used to.

  12. #72
    Boolit Grand Master Don McDowell's Avatar
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    Jeff F, said he shot well there on Saturday but fell plumb apart on Sunday, and he's still trying to figure out what happened, but he's suspecting something unseen in the conditions.
    Was Dick running his 110 with paper patch? He's done right well with that and his hiwall shooting patched for several years now, hoping he's at Alliance this next weekend.
    Long range rules, the rest drool.

  13. #73
    Boolit Master Lead pot's Avatar
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    Yes Dick said he used the 110 with the BACO MB .444 patched to .450 with 9# onion skin from Paper Mill
    Powder was 105 grs of KIK 1.5 F
    he also did well at the 16 and 17 Q using it.


    Dick has been scrounging all the 2F KIK he can still find.
    Last edited by Lead pot; 04-27-2018 at 06:37 PM.

  14. #74
    Boolit Grand Master Don McDowell's Avatar
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    If you talk to him again, tell him if he's going to Alliance let me know. We can make a deal on some KIK 2 and 1 1/2
    Long range rules, the rest drool.

  15. #75
    Boolit Master Lead pot's Avatar
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    Don the last time I talked to him he said he going. But I will tell him you have some.

  16. #76
    Boolit Grand Master Don McDowell's Avatar
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    I lost his cell number when my phone crashed, and his email. I know the last time I was in contact with him about maybe shooting at Phoenix he said he was planning on Alliance, but I hadn't heard from him since then.
    Long range rules, the rest drool.

  17. #77
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    BR, check your PM’s

  18. #78
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    Well, they announced a bunch of winners at the Quigley this year and promised to post them on the Web site when they got their Computer squared away, but I would say that the big winner this year was a guy named Jupiter Pluvius.

    Here was the firing line on Thursday. A glorious day for practice.

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    And here it was Saturday, the first day of the Match. A good day for ducks.

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    It rained Friday afternoon, most of the day Saturday, and was threatening to do so Sunday evening. Accordingly the Match was reduced to one day, four shots per target, and all targets fired upon. The weather cleared enough to paint the targets, but spotting misses was tough because a mud splash is much harder to see than a dust puff. Rangemaster duties were a little hectic, even though a lot of people didn't show up to shoot. Some of them were reportedly in their campers at Quigleyville and simply elected to stay there. I can't imagine driving 1000 miles and more to a match and then not going the 1000 extra yards, even in the wet grass and mud.

    You could see why those Western towns had board sidewalks and stepping stones across the streets. Also why the carts, wagons and ordinary bicycles had shoulder-high wheels. You need that circumference to move on the old-time excuses for roads. A couple hours' rain turns the dusty grassland to mud. Two people walking in line turn the mud to glue. Two vehicles driving in line turn it to grease. However, when the rain stops and the wind blows and a little sunlight shows, the whole process might reverse to dust again in a few hours.

    My car was stuck out there overnight Saturday and wound up being stuck Sunday in one of the few remaining wet spots in Quigleyville. The Anti-Skid device on the modern automobile is a marvelous thing to prevent one from getting out of a mudhole. But for the kindness of a nice couple who gave me a push to firmer ground, it would probably still be stuck out there.

    The best people in the world go to the Quigley. After a year of toxic news stories, a trip to Forsyth MT will restore your faith in Humanity.

    I used the #3 Shiloh again with the 80gr Swiss 1Fg load and the Brooks 543-gr 0.443" boolit patched dry with Strathmore Tracing paper, 0.0015" thickness. I had a new shooting partner, and we managed to sight in and practice on all the targets Thursday and get to all but the 530 yd Rectangle again on Friday before it started raining. Good thing, as Thursday was bright, Friday was overcast and Sunday alternated between the two. Most elevations, except for the Buffalo, were close to the sight-in/practice averages; the Buffalo needed three more minutes, for some reason.

    I started poorly, with one hit on the offhand Bucket (my usual performance, one or two for eight) and a first miss on the Buffalo that my spotter couldn't find. The second was to the right of him, then I got a hit, and then I flinched. I got on the Octagon and got all four hits, then three on the 530 yard Rectangle, four on the Diamond and three on the Postage Stamp. I finished the match mud-encrusted, but stoked!

    My new shooting partner was very good at picking up the Scientific Consensus of Windage settings from the other shooters, then adding his own judgement as the breeze switched around, waxed and waned. My first-shot hits are all his doing. Flinching and raising my head off the stock prematurely were my contributions to much of the score. If Shiloh had an aftermarket dead-man switch and timer inletted into the cheekpiece, with a shock collar for the shooter, I might be broken of that bad habit after a while. On the other hand, High-Tech stuff on the Firing Line is not countenanced by the Quigley range staff.

    If the Match had gone on two days, and I had kept up the averages I would have got one point over my Personal Best with grease-groove boolits. I've been in a slump at BPCR Silhouette most of this year, and as a result was bothered overmuch by minor changes in ammunition. Even though I was using the same boolit, my latest lot of Swiss 1F is ever so slightly less dense than the previous lot, which meant that an 80-grain charge, even drop-tubed, would overflow a full-length resized case. I made a powder funnel/holder/ram device so I could overfill the case and press the powder and a wad down 1/16" below the case mouth, but a few granules would escape nevertheless. A neck-sized only case would just hold the 80 grains, so now I had a mixture of FLS and NS cases at the Match. My homemade mouth reducer was used, and worked well, although I worried about varying neck tension, since I use the thing in a loading press with the lever. I did anneal all the cases. Two or three boolits came out of the cases, but they were easily re-inserted and then I could worry about the others being too tightly held. My recent scores at Silhouette and the Boulder Shoot might have indicated that something indeed had gone off the rails in the loading.

    I fired 98 shots total this time, of each type, and none of these nuances seemed to make any difference, either in practice or the Match. If I hit the Diamond four times in a row, that is prima facie ipso facto proof that any problems reside with the shooter, not with the gun and load. I need more practice, and better follow-through on my shots.

    I'm now sitting back home in our 103 degree weather, wondering if it was ever possible that I walked through slippery mud in soaking wet grass with soggy leather boots, wet socks and frozen feet. Must have been nice, if I did I'll be back again next year, if I'm still mobile, and will bring along the Cement Worker knee-high rubber boots that sat uselessly in my closet at home.

  19. #79
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    Bent Ramrod, thanks for the heroic description of an epic event!

  20. #80
    Boolit Master Lead pot's Avatar
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    I was one of those that wimped out. I did not feel like dragging my new cart through the mud. I have a hard enough time just walking the long shooting line during dry conditions.

    Between the Q and the two weeks shooting the fine shoots at the Big Hill at Baker Mt. I did empty 1000 + rounds not counting the .22 rimfire silhouette matches at Big Hill. I was gone for over a month and enjoyed every moment.

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Abbreviations used in Reloading

BP Bronze Point IMR Improved Military Rifle PTD Pointed
BR Bench Rest M Magnum RN Round Nose
BT Boat Tail PL Power-Lokt SP Soft Point
C Compressed Charge PR Primer SPCL Soft Point "Core-Lokt"
HP Hollow Point PSPCL Pointed Soft Point "Core Lokt" C.O.L. Cartridge Overall Length
PSP Pointed Soft Point Spz Spitzer Point SBT Spitzer Boat Tail
LRN Lead Round Nose LWC Lead Wad Cutter LSWC Lead Semi Wad Cutter
GC Gas Check