The 7.5x55 Swiss

[Bob S]

I've played with most all the varieties (in unmodified form) of the Swiss rifles since 1978 and know what they'll do with various boolits and loadings. Some folks do get into it farther than you have.

Really??! You have no clue as to how much I've "gotten into it". But since you're the expert and I'm such an inexperienced idiot, you can field the K31 questions. I'll keep my mouth shut here, and just keep winning matches with mine.

Have a nice day.

Resp'y,
Bob S.

[FAsmus]

45/2.1;

( Isn't that the designator for the 45/70? )

Well now, seeing you back on the thread is interesting ~ but a little too late to get into the real exchange of ideas about tooling up for sights and ideas for the feeding of this particular K31.

My particular rifle ( as mentioned ) is now shooting about as well as I can hold it over our cast bullet range that begins at 350 yards for the Offhand, on out to 834 yards where we kind of play in the wind.

Member Coyotebait was instrumental in providing, first, some of his RCBS 30-165-SIL bullets that I tested in my K31 with excellent accuracy and then by selling me the tool where-in I am enabled to make them myself as related in my post about proving the K31over all our long range targets the day before yesterday. His particular tool makes the "magic" bullet for this particular rifle of mine .. wonderful stuff!

I am humbled by the way the membership has corresponded with me regarding my understanding of the K31 ~ Its accurazing and feeding, particularly BobS who told me of its unique bedding design and how to tune it.

As for feeding it, sure: I've been there casting the bullets and feeding them into some semi-serious rifle-needs over the years; I believe I understand the basics. Pretty much the Swiss holds no mystery regarding bullets, diameters or powder charges: We all know what works ~ its only a matter of putting the components together ~ and doing the accuracy testing .. My accuracy testing just happens to be over longer ranges than anyone else’s I’ve read about recently .. and as for a minimal charge of Unique for long range shooting - I don't think so; I wouldn't even try it.

At this time, all I want to say more is thanks to all of you who have posted in the interests of accuracy and marksmanship ~ we are all members of the same brotherhood.

Good evening,
Forrest

[FAsmus]

Madsenshooter;

I'd have to seriously dis-assemble the rifle to provide you with that speicification! And, since I've just now arrived at what appears to be "the answer" for tuning the rifle's bedding I'm pretty reluctent to do that.

Take a look - you might just like what I did to the issue sight leaf for considerably less trouble. I mean; who cares much about cutting up a Lyman 57?

Good evening,
Forrest

[35 Whelen]

Try sizing to 0.310" or 0.311" depending on your rifle and useing either 11.3 gr. or a top level charge of Unique or slightly less with a boolit no harder than air cooled WW.

Mmm....I'm with Bob on this one. I recently received my 6th...or is it 7th K31. NONE of mine have had a groove diameter of .308. All have been under .308 with the newest (to me) being close to .306 although I forget the exact measurement and my notes are out in the shop, and I'm too lazy to go get them. Anyhow, I've never sized any of my cast bullets over .309" and have never seen a need to. Also, as Bob S said, they have NO throat.
35W

[madsenshooter]

Madsenshooter;

I'd have to seriously dis-assemble the rifle to provide you with that speicification! And, since I've just now arrived at what appears to be "the answer" for tuning the rifle's bedding I'm pretty reluctent to do that.

Take a look - you might just like what I did to the issue sight leaf for considerably less trouble. I mean; who cares much about cutting up a Lyman 57?

Good evening,
Forrest

I've got one of each, don't take your rifle out of its bedding. I'll figure it out myself, just thought there might be someone who knew off the top of his head, or that had a rifle apart whilst producing a target rifle like the ones Bob builds. I can see that the Madsen sight is about the right length. I also have a few Lyman 57 gallows arms laying around, so your way might work for me too. I have found a boolit that fits the throat of the K31 very well, it's the Eagan MX3-30AR, much like the RCBS 165 sillywet, but already a tapered boolit. I bought the cherry off ebay and had Bernie Rowles make a mold with it Checked and lubed it comes in at 170.2gr in the harder than lino alloy I'm using, for a pic go here: http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=46938 or better yet: http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=43159 Thanks for the reply!

[Bret4207]

Really??! You have no clue as to how much I've "gotten into it". But since you're the expert and I'm such an inexperienced idiot, you can field the K31 questions. I'll keep my mouth shut here, and just keep winning matches with mine.

Have a nice day.

Resp'y,
Bob S.

Ignore him Bob. You've been providing outstanding information freely for years with the groups and awards to back it up. Bobby is just an abrasive personality, it's just the way he is. Please don't let that stop you from continuing on here.

[FAsmus]

Madsenshooter;

Good fortune on the sight work you have in mind.

OK ~ I went there and saw some of those bullet designs.

For the record let me say that I've never been impressed by LEE's 312-155 bullet. I have one, purchased for my SKS and it never proved out for anything much in the long oversize throat of the issue barrel. I went to an old oversize Ideal 311466 that does very well indeed .. but that is another story.

The deal on the mold I bought from Coyotebait is one of those fine things that happen now and then. His mold casts 0.3000 on the noze and 0.3080 on the body. I do not have a sizing die smaller than 0.3105 so I used that to size on the GCs.

This technique allows me to shoot "as-cast" but still have a GC. By the way, I view "sizing" as just another word for "damaging" bullets ..

The as-cast SIL bullet's noze as seated shows the mearest witness marks on the very end of the ogive/noze portion of the bullet. The body is just exactly the right size to engage the origin of rifling. I keep them soft, so that I may press the first band slightly into the bore with the closure of the bolt. The 0.3080 bullet is pretty much perfect for this to work as the groove diameter in my K31 is 0.3075.

All for now, good morning,
Forrest

[45 2.1]

Ignore him Bob. You've been providing outstanding information freely for years with the groups and awards to back it up. Bobby is just an abrasive personality, it's just the way he is. Please don't let that stop you from continuing on here.

Thank You for Bret, you have reassured me of your old personality. You haven't changed at all. As for BobS, you also have not changed from your Swiss Rifle forum posts. I assume yours is the only way to do anything. No one else has any idea other than you..........................

Forrest, yes, that is the old Sharps Co. designation for the more common 4570.

[45 2.1]

Mmm....I'm with Bob on this one. I recently received my 6th...or is it 7th K31. NONE of mine have had a groove diameter of .308. All have been under .308 with the newest (to me) being close to .306 although I forget the exact measurement and my notes are out in the shop, and I'm too lazy to go get them. Anyhow, I've never sized any of my cast bullets over .309" and have never seen a need to. Also, as Bob S said, they have NO throat.
35W

Come on now, if they had NO throat, the beginning of the lands would have to be square to the chamber and they're not like that (thats from throat slugging a few dozen of them, but maybe Bob has done more and found differently. He will have to tune in and tell us what is really true). The throat is quite abrupt though. This rifle was set up differently (for a specific jacketed bullet) than the previous series of Swiss rifles.

[madsenshooter]

There is a bit of leade, but it's teeny, check out the post for the NOE K31 boolit. http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=61977 It's there, like you I found it in mine by measuring the nicely engraved Eagan MX3 30AR boolit. I don't know if I'll go for the group buy boolit or stay with the Eagan, a HP option would be nice...

[FAsmus]

I went and looked over the dimentions of the "Group Buy" design; it looks quite good!

In fact the dimentions come very close to the RCBS 30-180-SP sizes once I ran them through the Wosika Coaxisizer .. the only difference being the Coax bullet noses went 0.3005 which worked in my rifle but would (no doubt) be too big for many others.

This K31 of mine has a "lead" ahead of the chamber all right, about 0.050 long and it goes right at 0.3075, as I think I mentioned before. This must have been the Swiss' answer for the spitzers they loaded into their rifles.

Good afternoon,
Forrest

[madsenshooter]

Groove diameter on mine is .3065, bore .295 I think. I've seen some for sale that were tagged in MM as smaller than the norm and I guess I have one of those barrels on mine. I think the Eagan has a 2 degree taper to it, so it fits quite nicely without any additional bumping and I don't get lead shavings blown back onto the case neck like I did when firing the Lee TL boolit sized to .308. I haven't done any shooting with the 308329 spitzer bumped down yet, but plan to sometime soon.

[Bret4207]

Thank You for Bret, you have reassured me of your old personality. You haven't changed at all. As for BobS, you also have not changed from your Swiss Rifle forum posts. I assume yours is the only way to do anything. No one else has any idea other than you..........................

Forrest, yes, that is the old Sharps Co. designation for the more common 4570.

Was I supposed to have changed somehow Bob? You certainly haven't.

BobS has freely given information with out strings, caveats, secrets or anything else connected to them. And he's posted the pics and awards to prove he has at least some vague idea of what he's talking about. I think you should take your own advice you gave to Bob- "I assume yours is the only way to do anything. No one else has any idea other than you.........................."

[mto7464]

We seem to have some big Ego's on this board.

[Bret4207]

Yeah, and old wounds that people keep scratching at for no good reason.

[rvpilot76]

'seems to me there was this one saying of more than one way to skin a cat. I'm sure if there are any anti-gunners out there who are reading these forums, they are getting quite a laugh reading about the bickering going on in some threads. I sincerely hope that nobody here would intentionally step on anyone's (let alone another shooter's) toes. I think there are just some mannerisms that cannot be conveyed through text that get misconstrued, and people's feelings get hurt and defenses go up. Come on, guys. We're all on the same team here.

Respectfully,

Kevin

[jack19512]

We seem to have some big Ego's on this board.

Well, not me anyway. I don't know crap and will be the first to admit it. I can easily prove I don't know much, all I have to do is show you some of my cast boolit groups.

[FAsmus]

Buckshot;

I take it back - that link you gave me wasn't what I had in mind.

Here is the 4-page thread I began last September about the K31 I got at Quigley 2009.

So long,
Forrest

[Buckshot]

..............Glad you found it!

..............Buckshot

[FAsmus]

Gentelmen;

I bought a digital camera and this is the first time for me to paste pictures on-line. Here are the pictures of my K31s modified sight as noted way back there when the work was done.

The first one is of the K31 and my modified sight with extension for the peep aperture in place. Here the elevation screw is also in sight. Note that there is an additional hole for it on the other side of the peep. This is because at long ranges the elevation screw will obscure the sight picture when the wind is strong enough to move the sight over enough to compensate for the condition. When this happens I move the elevation screw to the other hole and the sight picture is OK again.



In this picture the peep is in the normal position. The angle of the shot is such that my "white-out" windage marks are clearly visible.



I hope these pictures are of interest to you all.

Good afternoon,
Forrest