Hi guys, I've been playing with the 450 Bushmaster, Ruger AR, trying to get a cast load that will shoot well. I think I'm getting close.
This is the rifle, except it is wearing a Vortex 1-4 scope now.
I had previously tried some 405s subsonic with great results at 1089fps, but when I tried to go faster they went all over the place. I also tried the Lee 300 from 1600-1800fps with very bad groups.
I was digging through my stuff and came across a mold I must have bought a few years ago and promptly lost. It's the MP 45 Ruger Only LFN style plain base.
I cast a bunch from WW + tin, and powder coated them with Kawasaki Green. They came out at .455" and I did not size them.
I seated them out to 2.230" to just engage the rifling, but still allow me to extract a live round without pulling the bullet. A trip through Quickload gave a starting point of 36gns of IMR 4227. I loaded 5 rounds at .5gn increments along with a couple extra at 36gns to warm up the barrel before shooting groups.
At 37 grains and 1749fps, things started looking good with a group about 2" at 75 yards. 37.5 grains, 1777fps, looked even better with 4 grouping fairly tight and one flyer that opened the group to 1.90" . 38 grains gave 1808fps and the group opened up to around 4".
While casting, I dropped some in a bucket of water to try hard vs soft boolits. I powder coated the water dropped ones with Harbor Freight Red to keep them seperate. I went back and tried 37 to 38 grains with 37 grains giving a nice cluster of 4 shots and one flyer that opened up the group to 1.75".
I realize that they were only 5 shot groups, not 10 shots, but it gave me some hope and a place to start fine tuning the load.
My intended use will be for pig hunting in southern Arkansas where most of the shooting is from 50-100yds. So I don't need the most accurate load, but would still like to get them all to snuggle closer if possible.
Does anyone have a good heavy cast load for the 450 in an AR platform?
|
   
   
|
|
Reply With Quote
