Doggone it! I need patience! Right now!

[Ricochet]

First time out testing my 1943 Izhevsk M91/30 (with fixed bayonet) with the NuJudge 200 grain semi-spitzer, cast of something like 20% wheelweights and the rest soft scrap, checked, sized to .314", oven treated and quenched, coated with Lee tumble honey, and loaded with 37 grains (a 3.1cc Lee dipper struck off with a knife blade) of IMR 7383, with a CCI #34 primer. First 5 shot group was all over the place as I was finding the proper elevation for 100 yards. (It's 200 meters.) Second was about 3x4", third was 4 in 2" with a flyer to the left (wind blown) to 4". Then I got a rare still moment and shot 4 quick. Wasn't watching through the spotting scope. Wind picked back up. Dang! I wanted to get back home. Knew I ought to wait till the wind quit again to fire that last shot. Waited a couple of minutes till there was a lull and shot it. Wasn't the same condition.

http://i56.photobucket.com/albums/g166/SlidePicker/M-NTarget5-6-7.jpg

Still not too bad for an old run-of-the-mine WWII vet Mosin, with a half-blind old guy shooting cast boolits in Wolf Gold cases pulled out of the range trash barrel. Guy next to me with a tarted up scoped heavy barrelled AR-15 was bragging over a group that wasn't a bit better.
:mrgreen:

[grumpy one]

Ricochet, I admire the group but I don't understand why the last one should have gone somewhere else just because of a two-minute delay. The practices of my local range officer are such that I often shoot groups partly before and partly after a fifteen minute target-change break, and I never foul the barrel before starting my first group, but I haven't seen either circumstance change my group size. Not that my groups are anything to write home about - but it seems to me you need to know why that last shot went to the left, unless the wind caught it.

[Blammer]

sometime, hold and rhythem have a lot to do with group size

[Blammer]

BTW, NICE shooting!

[Ricochet]

That's exactly what I mean. The wind caught it, because I wasn't patient enough to wait till it died down like it was when I shot the other four. [smilie=b:

[Freightman]

You can always call a Mulligan

[Ricochet]

I suspect the first three shots were the ones clustered in that tiny group in the lower left, because I resettled everything after those. If I'd known that was going on, I'd've quit, said a three shot group was what I intended to shoot, and waved it all over the place!
:mrgreen:

[MT Gianni]

If you were a gunwriter you could cover the flier with 4 spent cases. Gianni

[Ricochet]

"But that would be wrong."
-- Richard Nixon
:mrgreen:

[montana_charlie]

I'm betting that something caused the bayonet to vibrate at a different frequency ( probably a fly sitting on it) during the first four when the wind was down. Then the fly was blown off...allowing your shot to go wide.

Always fire when the wind is high, if shooting with fixed bayonet.
(Or, is that...don't fix your bayonet if it ain't broke...?)
CM

[1Shirt]

Montana Charlie might have been right about that fly, but it would all depend on if the pig sticker was extended or folded. Have a problem doping wind myself, and in Ne. we always it seems have wind, and most often they are cross rathen than tail winds. My theory is that when the wind came up, it blew the fly off and that shifted point of impact. Got to admit they are fun rifles.
1Shirt!:coffeecom

[Ricochet]

Now I'm playing with the Lee CTL-312-160-2R boolit, with not quite as good results, but I'm seeing the same aggravating tendency to have 4 shots cluster in a pretty decent group with one flyer. Keep the excuses coming, I need all the help I can get!

Since I started with the same 3.1cc or 37 grain charge of IMR 7383 that worked so well with the 200 grain NuJudge boolit, I think I need to go up a little bit. The lighter (nominally 160 grain) Lee boolit isn't building up enough pressure for the powder to burn stably. Some shots today made a bright orange flash and loud report compared to others. Some had a good bit of partially burned powder grains remaining in the cases and others were quite clean. The impact point on the target was about 3" lower at 100 yards than with the 200 grain boolits. I wasn't using my new Chrony today. Time to go up to the 3.4cc level. 3.7cc works well under the 185 grain group buy boolit in the 8mm Mauser and will likely be a practical maximum with this Lee boolit seated long in the Roosky as well.

[Idaho Sharpshooter]

maybe a little too much lube and the rough barrel is purging...?
Might try filling one less groove.

Rich
DRSS

[Ricochet]

Not an option with tumble lubing. :-D

Could be happening, though, for sure. I am coating these rather lightly with LLA, actually. It shows up right away as black tarry goo in the muzzle crown. Man, that stuff smells great mixed with 7383!

I've been trying to understand this lube purging thing. Don't see how a whole lot of buildup and purging could be going on in the bore proper, but the throat's another matter if it's not completely full of boolit. Is that the way it happens, lube scrapes off the boolit as it enters the rifling and builds up around the next boolit in the throat, then the accumulated lube finally gets shot down the pipe after a boolit and then starts building up again?

I think my problem with the Lee boolits is more likely one of alignment/concentricity, as when I seat them long enough to touch the lands there's not a lot of boolit left in the neck. It's pretty easy to get them tipped a little, and I can see that with studying the case necks where one side will be slightly bulged at the base of the gas check. I'm going to have to pay more careful attention to getting them started perfectly straight down the neck, and they may work better seated a little deeper in the neck to help hold them that way with more neck tension to hold them, even if they're farther from the lands.

[FallRun]

Rick
Just tell people you let me try one shot and that's the flier they're lookin at

[Trapshooter]

I wonder if cutting the liquid Alox a little thinner (more mineral spirits or other solvent of choice) would have the same effect as not lubing all the groves using a conventional lube / sizer. I haven't had an occasion where I thought i needed less lube, so I haven't tried it myself.

Trapshooter

[scrapcan]

are you shooting five from teh magazine? Is the last one with an empty magazine? put an empty in the mag and see if there is some need for tension in teh mag to make things stay up to par. Who knows what some of these old guns will want you to do to play nice.

Or shoot them all single from teh mag and see if your group becomes a nice group that ends up in a differnt location.

Hey excuses are good, but the best is that you just did as good with your surplus beater as some bloke with a grand and a half in his new pet AR. Way to go.

[Ricochet]

Yeah, I liked that, too. :mrgreen:

The newest iteration of the load with the Lee tumble lube boolit and 41 grains of 7383 burns the powder much more cleanly and consistently, cracks 'em out of there with a bit more authority (it's back up 4" higher on the target), but isn't grouping well enough yet to make me happy. There are other things to play with like seating depth, crimp (I'm not using any, instead seating out against the rifling now), etc., but the next thing I'm going to do is go back to the 200 grain NuJudge boolit and 3.1 cc (37 gr.) charge of 7383 that grouped so well before, seated out against the rifling, this time instead of tumbling in Liquid Alox I'm going to dip the grooves in my molten mixture of waxes/lanolin/Alox, and scrub out the residue of the previous Alox-lubed shots from the bore thoroughly. I think this last batch left just a trace of leading near the muzzle.

Hey, thanks for the suggestions about magazine feeding differences. Yeah, I've been feeding five from the mag. That just may be significant.

This is a nice diversion, running out to the range after work, tacking up 4 targets and sending 20 rounds downrange with the Mosin. Then I get back home, load the cases back up with a slightly different recipe, go back and do it again. Doesn't take a lot of time or work.
8-)

[JRParrish]

I read in a 1930something Rifleman about a test of all the major service rifles of the day. The Rusky was after debate shoot with bayonet on the barrel because they didn't issue scabdards. I know folding is different. Wish I had my old Rusky back. Not elegant but tough. Safety took some learning but I bet it would work no matter how cold it got. Seems it was a Remington manufacture.
Whats the bore slug? My Lyman Cast Bullet Handbook indicates .310" bgroove dia. Old near .30s varied.

[Ricochet]

With an impact slug from the throat, an inch into the rifling the bore is .303" and the grooves are .314". A slug driven all the way through and out the muzzle comes out .312" x .313". It's got a couple of tight spots down toward the muzzle. The lands and grooves are very sharp, the throat showing little apparent wear. The muzzle's good, not badly worn or counterbored. No rust or pitting anywhere. Pretty good for a $59.95 rifle.

[Ricochet]

...has three shot potential:

http://i56.photobucket.com/albums/g166/SlidePicker/M-NTarget5-11-7.jpg