New rifle for long range paper patch shooting

[BRUCE MOULDS]

it might be unwise to condemn groove diameter bullets too much.
the brits went down that path with great success, and shot dirty with accuracy at long range,
obviously such shooting requires a chamber to suit, and this would possibly include freebore.
patching to groove and breech seating might well suit some chambers with freebore.
some of the bullet would be engraved in the rifling and some would sit in the freebore.
lubing the patches with tallow and using a serious leverage seater could both help in this process.
keep safe,
bruce.

[BrentD]

Bruce, I don't think anyone is condemning anything, but I also think it is pretty misguided to say that the Brits (or anyone) has shot grease-groove, paper-patched bullets dirty with great accuracy. And certainly, no one is doing it today, Gert notwithstanding, and he is leading the list of contenders to do so.

Patching to groove will work of course. I killed my first couple of elk that way and the Europeans used groove-diameter, paper-patched bullets in cartridge rifles with some success (I wouldn't say great by any stretch of the imagination) as a military round, but that is a far cry from saying anyone can, or ever has, shot dirty with great accuracy in long range.

Today, if you want to be competitive, and I mean consistently in the top 5 or so, then you really need to wipe between shots. You may or may not want to shoot bore-diameter, paper patches, but no one is doing this with groove-diameter, paper patches. No one. There is always a chance that someone will someday but it hasn't happened, and not for want of trying. If it ever does happen, I am willing to wager, it will be done with a miracle blackpowder formulation that does no currently exist and probably never will.

[BRUCE MOULDS]

brent,
I choose to wipe and use bore diameter bullets as you suggest for the reasons you suggest.
however I cannot deny the plotsheet where George gibbs shot 50 consecutive shots into a 30" circle at 1000 yds using a gibbs/farquarson/metford rifle, shooting dirty.
the brits unquestionably mastered shooting dirty at long range, and I would like to know how they did it!
some of it might have been that the british climate is humid.
there also exist plotsheets of American shooters who shot better vert and worse windage than gibbs, but had a complete miss in the string.
possibly a dirt digger or a bad wind call?
for some reason most shooters go into denial when breech seating is mentioned, but reading suggests that this is how creedmoor shooting was done in its latter days.
possibly due to confusion with bison hunting techniques.
this technique has proven superior to fixed ammo when time constraints permit.
this with both 45 and 7 degree transitions.
current thinking is that the airgap avoids the transition entirely.
keep safe,
bruce.

[BrentD]

Bruce,
I can't agree with you on most of that. I don't know if the GFM rifle was a muzzleloader or a cartridge rifle, but either way, one or a few published groups says nothing about the norm and the average. The only time I know of where the brits "mastered" shooting dirty, was with muzzleloaders which, frankly, don't count since they are cleaned as they are loaded to a large extent (and when full cleaning was allowed, the American's generally beat them anyway). Meanwhile, a 30" group at 1000 yds is nice, no doubt but I've seen many such groups and even shot a few considerably better myself, but what is the norm and what is a "publishable/bragging sized group" is another thing.

Breech seating is fine. I haven't noticed an abundance of deniers about the topic, but I suppose there are some out there. It does have some minor advantages and someone could certainly seek to reinvent it for long range. I haven't seen anything about it "proven" per se, but then I have a bar for what constitutes "proof" when it comes to shooting and I don't see lots of topics clearing it. That goes both ways for breech seating though. No one has disproven it. Interestingly, a number of folks have tried and not succeeded with the method, perhaps giving up too easily. After all, I was told for years it was impossible to be competitive with paper patches. Kenny W. was one of the loudest in that camp. Oh how the times have changed.

In the end, for the experimenter, like Gert or he late DanT for instance, who like a challenge, then pursuing shooting dirty is certainly a worthy challenge for the sake of a challenge, and I'm all for that. But in the end, what do you end up with? I would wager the best that could be hoped for is something that is "as good as wiping". Actually, I don't think even that is attainable, but for argument's sake, I'll grant it, but it will never be better than a good clean bore.

[semtav]

Brian, are your bullets patched to exactly groove diameter, or do you go a tiny bit bigger?
Chris.

I measured a couple. My alloy for the black powder results in a 0.4590 dia patched bullet. My alloy for the BH209 gives me a 0.4592 dia.
I can't find my casting for the 45-90 yet, but I think it is 0.460 dia freebore and 0.459 groove. I've never cast the Shiloh 45-70 chamber.

[Gunlaker]

Thanks Brian.

Brent and Bruce, it seems to me that it would be difficult to have a more consistent bore than a clean, dry, one. I suppose that it wouldn't hurt to buy a little extra time by shooting dirty, but I don't think a lot will come out of it. Maybe with rifling that doesn't have tight corners like modern barrels do. Interestingly, a while back there were some old magazine reprints ( forest and stream ? ) in Lee Shaver's magazine and the topic was shooting dirty. One article had a fellow who claimed i worked well, and another article had a fellow who said it didn't work. I suspect that much of it has to do with each shooters definition of acceptable accuracy. This was a hundred years ago, but it sounds no different than the conversations of today. And they had the mythical "moist burning" powders. I'm not certain how that can happen.

I imagine that it would be more easily achieved in the UK though. The climate where I live is much like the UK in that the temperatures are mild and the humidity high. In summer on humid day, black powder residue will actually liquify after a few minutes as it pulls moisture from the air. I first noticed this when reloding a single case at the shooting bench. The residue from the fired case gets scraped into a paper cup and it's very interesting to see how it behaves on humid days vs. dry days.

Chris.

[BrentD]

You know, the humid/dry issue sounds really logical, but when I open the breech, what I see in the bore is mostly smoke, and thus gases produced by the powder, not air from outside the barrel. I find the fouling gets worse when the barrel gets hot - regardless of humidity. If I had the bore open for long periods between shots, or if there was a good breeze blowing when I open the chamber, maybe that would render humidity more relevant, but frankly, I think it is 90% about temperature, and when there is a lot of that, there generally aint much humidity, thus the apparent correlation.

[BRUCE MOULDS]

brent,
the gibbs/farquarson/metford was a breech loading falling block, using the farquarson action.
the brits banned wiping after a date not remembered, and this was part of the end of the great international matches.
50 consecutive shots is a fairly good statistical suggestion of potential.
of course that would not be average shooting, as wind control for is usually much harder.
by deniers, I mean that any mention of breech seating meets a stony silence. people are not interested in thinking about it.
there does however exist an interview with a major hinman who stated that it was most common in America at the end of the era.
people today have an unfounded fear that the airgap used to tune the load will ring a barrel, but it is only about 1/8" for 40 and 45 cals, and less for 38s.
breech seating has the same problem as pp shooting at the moment, namely a lack of statistics in its favour.
I am slowly pursuing shooting dirty, but keep coming up against the heat/humidity issue.
there is no question at the moment that as chris says, a clean dry barrel gives the best long range accuracy due to consistency achievable.
this is what I do for long range, in conjunction with pp bullets.
you mention dan t and Kenny w re experimenting with pp shooting, but you are up there as well.
keep safe,
bruce.

[BrentD]

Bruce, I think you missed a couple of my points, but good luck with shooting dirty or breech seating, etc.

[Don McDowell]

Bruce I think a lot of the reason we don't see much breech seating , is because it's just one of those "undiscovered" gems from the past (a few Schuetzen puritans the main exception). Look at how long the stuff about paper patch bullets had to be from pure or very soft lead has floated about, and is still "common knowledge", but yet we're starting to learn from a number of historical documents, hard lead ruled the day back in the day. In Perry's book there were a number of the shooters at that 1880 Creedmoor match that both breech seated and muzzleloaded their cartridge rifles.
Bodine made reference to shooting dirty in a letter he wrote to the Sharps Co.
Lot's of stuff folks can and do try, just the vast majority find it easier to shoot grease grooves. I do know a pretty good handful of the "top" shooters that have and do dally with patched, but to date have not found the accuracy they can get with grooved bullets, so unless someone is shooting a match for the fun of it, or for the historical bit of it, the shooter is going to take the load that works the best , and in the large majority that turns out to be a greaser.

[Gunlaker]

I imagine that the reason that breech seating is not more popular is time management. I suspect that in the original days of Creedmoor shooting that shooters had much more time between shots. Today you have a small, but sufficient amount of time in BPTR matches. Any time spent on loading/bore prep, etc is time that could perhaps be better spent waiting on a condition change. So it's tradeoff of accuracy vs. time. Would you want a 1/4 or 1/2 moa potential accuracy improvement, or an extra 60 seconds to watch the wind over a string of 10 shots plus sighters. I think that this is the jist of it.

I do really like shooting PP bullets though, even though thy cost me a bit in shooting time. I also like breech seating them in schuetzen rifles, but I don't know if I'd shoot a BPTR match that way or not.

In Farrow's book he mentions breech seating, and it's not 100% clear whether he was referring to all rifle shooting or just schuetzen as he shot all types of competition. He more or less said it had to do with chamber configuration as to whether the benefits were significant. That is another indication that it was used in the late 1800's for PP bullets as he was a big advocate of the patched bullet.

Chris.

[Don McDowell]

Good point on the time Chris.

[BRUCE MOULDS]

where I have 15 or 17 minutes for 10 to count plus 2 optional sighters (which are almost always needed) I shoot fixed pp ammo due to the time issue.
that said, breech seating is nowhere the issue that wiping is for using valuable time.
why pp and not gg bullets?
the pp have proven to have about 60% wind deflection of gg bullets, probably due to reduced drag.
this translates into higher scores.
long range shooting that continued at sea girt until 1912 maintained the use of pp bullets, possibly for the same reason.
we do not know whether the odg shot strings or went round robin shot for shot.
shooting against muzzle loaders would suggest that they might have gone round robin, as some of the breech loaders were also shot loaded from the muzzle at the creedmoor matches.
confusing the issue is the fact that the military was totally against shooting clean for obvious reasons.
most of the events shot on the creedmoor range were more military oriented and must not be confused with the long range matches. the gatling match for example.
after hyde's disastrous trip to Britain, and the political outcome of that, the military virtually took over the nra and that was the beginning of the end for the old ways.
keep safe,
bruce.

[Don McDowell]

The paper patch is more sensitive to fouling left in the bore, than a grease groove bullet that is likely .001 or more larger than the groove diameter. The lube grooves on a grease groove bullet soak up a lot of the ills the bullet might find on it's trip down the tube, while the patched bullet can only push the stuff off the base or slump the nose.

[Gunlaker]

I'm not sure how they shot the matches, but I think it could be determined by careful study of a few books. It is unfortunate that the old accounts were not more clear. Probably the best one I've read was in "Irish Riflemen in America".

I am sure that they had much more time that modern shooters. The author of "Irish Riflemen in America" noted that the Americans cleaned their bores with painstaking care. It would be difficult in todays matches to clean in that manner between shots. I think the best evidence though is when he writes of the Benett match held sometime after the main Match. It was 15 shots at each of 800, 900, and 1000. There was break after 800 yards for lunch. The Canadian team did not finish the match before dark and the match caried into a second day. I guess my countrymen are a bit slow

Chris.

[BRUCE MOULDS]

chris
the americans made no secret of their wiping techniques.
they openly admitted to taking up to 5 rods to the range for different wiping tasks, in order to make the job more efficient.
some finished by wiping with an oily rag followed by a dry rag.
that is 2 rods, then one had a fisher brush making 3.
still 2 other rods for 2 different processes.
maybe the other teams were the slow ones, crowding the Canadians for time.
oh for a time machine!
keep safe,
bruce.

[Don McDowell]

I think they shot those matches something like we shoot gong matches. Each team had their target and each team member took his turn shooting the target. In one of the accounts there was mention of the Scottish team didn't fire a shot on the 1000 yd target until late in the day and it started raining. Then they got down to business and fired some excellent scores, as the weather conditions present were more to what they were used to at home.
It was definetly a pretty laid back affair compared to how we shoot today.

[EDG]

I an occaision to work on an original Remington-Hepburn in 40 - 2.5" Sharps Straight.
That about about 30 years ago when there was no brass except RWS 9.3X74R that was close.
The owner was not interested in paper patch bullets. He had a mold for grove diameter bullets but he could not get them to chamber due to the tight chamber neck. To get a loaded round to chamber he turned the necks to .003 thick (about like brass foil) but most of them collapsed when he tried to seat his bullets.

So he brought me the barrel and a long skinny boring bar and asked me if I could bore the chamber neck out.
I got the chamber dialed in dead nuts and made a pass to barely clean up the chamber neck. After checking it he wanted neck clearance with his bullets to be .005. I told him .003 might be a little more accurate if he was shooting smokless but he insisted on .005. I said ok and dialed it out .005 knowing it would not cut that large. The chamber wound up at .004 oversize. He decided to take the .004 and live with it.

The rifle shot well after the chamber neck was enlarged even though the bore was very crooked. Once the chamber and muzzle were dialed in I rotated the barrel at about 50 RPM and the bore flopped around like a jump rope.
But that chamber was definitely not the same as a groove diameter grease groove bullet chamber.

[BRUCE MOULDS]

don,
what you say ties in with the way the brits and I think the Canadians now shoot fullbore.
it is called "bisley style", where a number of shooters on the mound take it in turns to use the same target,, as opposed to each shooter shooting a string.
interestingly when it starts raining, the wind often drops, at least here in Australia..
edg,
what a sad thing to do to an original rifle.
many such rifles were ruined in the same way.
keep safe,
bruce.

[Gunlaker]

Don and Bruce I think you guys are right. I like the idea of taking turns, but it would sure slow the day down. For people that live in hot places I can also see the desire to get the matches done by the time the day reaches it's hottest. Mind you, sitting in my little trailer with no A/C isn't a whole lot better than sitting in the sun. Except that the fridge holds cold beer .

I wonder how windy it was back east for those matches. I'll bet it was a lot more calm than Wyoming .

Chris.