Because it is a little slow right now I thought I would post some controversy. The following is a copy of a letter (email) to a fellow BPCR Silhouette shooter who just got a CPA rifle last summer and is not shooting as well as I know he can. I have spotted two matches for him this month and I think from observing him, he can be a lot better rifleman than his scores reflect. He has a great deal of high/low trouble. In part, his vertical impacts are due to his loads. In addition his Starline cases are different lengths, most of which are short.
Please weigh in....
I hope to draw out a few more people than the regular culprits.
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Hey XXXXX,
I would do the chamber cast again if that is easy and you have time. But....
If not I would use the available time to create as many cases the same length as you can for shooting tests and then of course matches.
Sixty good cases would be fine to start. All at least 2.110" in length if not longer. CPA uses reamers that are full length and there is almost no chance you have a short chamber.
If you have extra time do the following....
If I can find a very long case I will set it aside and you should too to use it for fit and trim. I understand you have the case stretcher tool. Get a long case, 0.035' too long and expand it to cylinder and slowly fit and trim until you have a case that will chamber but not by much! Just keep trimming and feeling the rifle lever as you close the action.
Once the case length is found, do a second case to confirm. Maybe trim that by 0.005" and use that length until something causes you think you have a better measurement. ...like a chamber cast. But the trim and fit will work if you are among the careful types.
Once you have a bunch a long cases with square mouths you can really start the load testing.
We can go into the "get a good working load in one quick range session" on some other email - soon.
Things that work for me; Swiss powder; NO Compression; seat bullet into the rifling medium to kinda hard, pistol primers like Federal match pistol and Hard Bullets made out of Pb, Sn, Sb on the order of 97, 1.5, 1.5 of 96.5 - 1.5 - 2.0
The kind of bullets we are shooting - the long nosed Money type need a harder alloy. 20-1 or 30-1 that some people shoot will shoot well with older style blunt bullets but do not work for the long unsupported noses we are using.
Michael Rix