I have a really good smokeless powder load that's been tested to 200 yards (max available range) <3 inch group off the bench. BUT I'm having the devil of a time finding a black powder load equally as good. What I'm asking of the group is your loads. While I've found loads for other twists, etc. to be interesting I would appreciate responses limited to the factors I'm dealing with. Important information:
- The barrel is 6 grooves, twist is 1:12 (checked, rechecked and confirmed), Length = 30 inches, Bore = 0.3725 inch (I have the necessary blocks and another shooter has confirmed 0.373 inch), Groove = 0.379 inch (again, checked and confirmed by another), Neck case region of chamber = 0.399 inch (chamber casting).
- Bullets immediately available - Lyman 378-674, 1.312 inches long, 0.379 inch diameter as cast. BACO380-360 M4, 1.465 inches long, 0.380 inch diameter as cast.
- Alloys - pure lead, 20:1, Lyman #2
- Sizing dies - 0.379 inch and 0.380 inch
- Lubes - SPG, Darr's, Terpstra's Special
- Powders - Swiss 3Fg, Olde Eynsford 2Fg, Olde Eynsford 3Fg, Goex 2Fg, Goex 3Fg (anything else is available. I even have a can of Goex Cartridge.)
- Primers - CCI Large Rifle preferred, Federal 210 available.
- Cases - Starline, 2.125 inches, fire formed, trimmed, beveled and chamfered.
I found a wonderful article on the rifle by Dick Trenk with loads and exciting results. But when I tried to duplicate I found that you can't fit 52-53 grains (by weight) of Swiss 3Fg in a case and not compress the powder more than the recommended 0.06" limit. For that compression limit only 41.5 grains of Swiss 3Fg will fit.
I wipe between shots using the BACO VFG Bore Wipers soaked in Moose Milk.
So any help would be greatly appreciated. The smokeless load is fun, but I'd really like to get a BP load going. But I've tried so many combinations with inconsistent results that I'm just frustrating myself at this point. Thanks in advance.