longbow
10-19-2013, 11:53 AM
I wasn't going to bother posting but I guess there is something to share in failure as well as success.
I loaded up some of my home made solid slugs with hot melt glue skirts (Brenneke style) along with some 0.662" RB's in the Uniwads Hogtamer sent me and some 0.678" RB's with attached glue skirts (AQ/Brenneke style).
Well, accuracy in all cases was dismal. Not sure why for the most part but thought I would share anyway.
The slugs and balls with skirts shot poorly which surprised me because they have done well in the past and I was quite confident that this was a good load. Hah! Not so apparently.
I had about 50 rounds loaded and ready to go. Most of them were the 0.662" RB's in Uniwads as the fit is very good and I was quite sure they were going to shoot well.
I started out with the 0.662" RB's and found I was getting sticky extraction which was a bit of a mystery and also poor accuracy which was also a mystery. I only shot 3 or 4 then decided something was amiss.
Recovered wads had sheared petals which really baffled me because these are a nice slide fit to the bore. Well, after looking a little harder and engaging the brain it occurred to me that the petals were sheared about 1/2 way down but the balls had been seated onto COW and with the middle of the ball just below the edges of the petals. It appears that COW compresses more than I thought it would allowing the ball to slide down the tapered petals creating a tighter fit, higher pressure and cause petal shearing.
Recovered wads from the slug and 0.678" RB loads showed little damage but accuracy was poor with large groups of 6" to 8" at 50 yards and some fliers. I should have kept targets I suppose but they were so bad I just stuck up a new target over the last one... these were not bragging targets!
Anyway, hulls, primers, powder and wads were all successful in the past with same or similar slugs for the most part. What I know I didn't do with the 0.662" RB's in Uniwads is to use a nitro card wad on the bottom and considering the obvious compression of the COW it would be better to space the ball up using nitro card wads then a small scoop of COW rather than use all COW to set ball height. Normally I would have done that but didn't have any nitro card wads that fit these small internal diameter wads.
I am thinking along the same lines for the other slugs and ball with glue skirts as again, I did not use nitro card wads under the slugs because the glue skirt is cast very nicely with sharp edges and flat bottom. However, while quite hard and solid the glue is "plastic" and does deform in the bore so I am thinking that without that solid nitro card wad support the sharp edges at the base got distorted so caused uneven drag.
So, now I have to reload and retry but using nitro card wads as that is really the only difference between these and previously successful loads.
So, what did I learn from this failure:
- I think that using the tall column of filler under the 0.662" RB was a mistake as the COW compressed allowing the ball to seat deeper which made for too tight fit. Also, I think the filler expanded to fill the chamber so had to re-compress going through the forcing cone which may or may not have contributed to high pressures but probably isn't a good idea anyway.
- since the recovered wads from slugs/balls with glue skirts were not dead flat as usual, the missing nitro card wad is probably the reason and skirt distortion probably occurred ~ re-testing with nitro card wads is about the only way I will prove it.
- Don't go loading up 30 or so hulls without testing the load completely because you just might wind up taking them apart! I now have about 26 loads to disassemble to get the 0.662" balls and Uniwads out. OUCH! These are likely scrap hulls now.
So, maybe there was something in the failure to save someone else some trouble.
Even though my results weren't good, it was a nice day and good to be shooting. You know what they say... "A bad day at the range is better than the best day at work!"
Longbow
I loaded up some of my home made solid slugs with hot melt glue skirts (Brenneke style) along with some 0.662" RB's in the Uniwads Hogtamer sent me and some 0.678" RB's with attached glue skirts (AQ/Brenneke style).
Well, accuracy in all cases was dismal. Not sure why for the most part but thought I would share anyway.
The slugs and balls with skirts shot poorly which surprised me because they have done well in the past and I was quite confident that this was a good load. Hah! Not so apparently.
I had about 50 rounds loaded and ready to go. Most of them were the 0.662" RB's in Uniwads as the fit is very good and I was quite sure they were going to shoot well.
I started out with the 0.662" RB's and found I was getting sticky extraction which was a bit of a mystery and also poor accuracy which was also a mystery. I only shot 3 or 4 then decided something was amiss.
Recovered wads had sheared petals which really baffled me because these are a nice slide fit to the bore. Well, after looking a little harder and engaging the brain it occurred to me that the petals were sheared about 1/2 way down but the balls had been seated onto COW and with the middle of the ball just below the edges of the petals. It appears that COW compresses more than I thought it would allowing the ball to slide down the tapered petals creating a tighter fit, higher pressure and cause petal shearing.
Recovered wads from the slug and 0.678" RB loads showed little damage but accuracy was poor with large groups of 6" to 8" at 50 yards and some fliers. I should have kept targets I suppose but they were so bad I just stuck up a new target over the last one... these were not bragging targets!
Anyway, hulls, primers, powder and wads were all successful in the past with same or similar slugs for the most part. What I know I didn't do with the 0.662" RB's in Uniwads is to use a nitro card wad on the bottom and considering the obvious compression of the COW it would be better to space the ball up using nitro card wads then a small scoop of COW rather than use all COW to set ball height. Normally I would have done that but didn't have any nitro card wads that fit these small internal diameter wads.
I am thinking along the same lines for the other slugs and ball with glue skirts as again, I did not use nitro card wads under the slugs because the glue skirt is cast very nicely with sharp edges and flat bottom. However, while quite hard and solid the glue is "plastic" and does deform in the bore so I am thinking that without that solid nitro card wad support the sharp edges at the base got distorted so caused uneven drag.
So, now I have to reload and retry but using nitro card wads as that is really the only difference between these and previously successful loads.
So, what did I learn from this failure:
- I think that using the tall column of filler under the 0.662" RB was a mistake as the COW compressed allowing the ball to seat deeper which made for too tight fit. Also, I think the filler expanded to fill the chamber so had to re-compress going through the forcing cone which may or may not have contributed to high pressures but probably isn't a good idea anyway.
- since the recovered wads from slugs/balls with glue skirts were not dead flat as usual, the missing nitro card wad is probably the reason and skirt distortion probably occurred ~ re-testing with nitro card wads is about the only way I will prove it.
- Don't go loading up 30 or so hulls without testing the load completely because you just might wind up taking them apart! I now have about 26 loads to disassemble to get the 0.662" balls and Uniwads out. OUCH! These are likely scrap hulls now.
So, maybe there was something in the failure to save someone else some trouble.
Even though my results weren't good, it was a nice day and good to be shooting. You know what they say... "A bad day at the range is better than the best day at work!"
Longbow