35 Whelen-Project Completed

[brasshog]

This poor lass was a pawn shop find. She was in sad condition with a busted synthetic stock and a broken fore bolt. She sports an 18" 1 in 14 twist barrel (made by C.R. Pedersen & Son) and a Bold trigger on her Carl Gustaf Swedish Mauser M96 receiver made in 1919. I added a Bell & Carlson synthetic stock with aluminum bedding block and rear pillar. The barrel is now free floated and the channel glass bed. The scope is a Vortex Crossfire II illuminated model 3x9x50. The mounts are Burris extra high rise so that the bolt handle just barley clears. The scope mount pattern was a very old pattern that was almost impossible to match with a set of rings so I had Murphy Precision build me a stainless steel picatinny 0MOA rail and coat it black. They did an excellent job. Of course I replaced the broken fore screw. She loves Federal 225gr Trophy Bonded Bear claw factory ammo. Cast 202gr HP rounds are gentle to shoot at 2000-2500 fps.

Note-She likes all of the miscellaneous brass that I have converted. She dislikes both factory and converted Federal brass completely except the factory Federal nickel brass. She will not grab yellow Federal brass out of the chamber for some reason. In a post about this rifle in the "Military Firearms" on this site it was suggested that the weight of the federal brass was around 200gr and that might be an indicator of the issue somehow. I don't fully understand it yet.

Total weight of rifle is 8.5 lbs

Before
312808

312810

Now
312809

312811

312812

[brasshog]

I loaded up 50ct 202gr cast solids from my MP mold using IMR4198. The higher I went in velocity the better the groups started to tighten. My buddy tossed the target before I got a chance to take a picture of it or measure the groups but all of the rounds were good enough for deer at 100 yards. The chronograph info is listed below. This is for the initial firing and needs to be tuned in order to get better groups. It looks like 39.0 grains (+1/-1gr) might be the sweet spot. The Federal TBBC ammo shot at or under an inch at 100 yards.

Here is the hard data:
Barrel Length-18"
Barrel Twist-Approximately 1/14"
COAL:2.992"
Formed 30-06 Brass Trimmed To 2.484"
Powder: IMR 4198
Solid Crimp
Exterior Temp:79°F
Humidity:34%
Approximately 100' Above Sea Level
Primers: CCI NO.34 Large Rifle
Boolit: Mi-HEC clone of RCBS-35-200 (202gr) cast from 94-3-3 (BHN-11) with homemade aluminum .014" gas check

Charge/Average Velocity/Mean Spread/Comments On Remaining Shots In Group
37.0gr-2046fps 253fps spread/9 shots (six errors on chrony)
38.0gr-2105fps 178fps spread/4 shots (one error on chrony)
39.0gr- 2139fps 33fps spread-5 shots
40.0gr- 2252fps 115fps spread-5 shots
41.0gr- 2302fps 162fps spread-4 shots (one misfire/dud)
42.0gr- 2392fps 117fps spread-5 shots
43.0gr- 2400fps 110fps spread-5 shots
44.0gr- 2484fps 230fps spread-4 shots (last shot not recorded)
312813

312814

312815