What the #*#*????

[ENFIELD303]

OK, so I started running trial loads in the .303 no.4 and I amvery close to giving up. I am using the 314299 mould and IMR 4064, started at 30 grains and my 50yrd group was unmeasureable due to not knowing where they were hitting. so i went to 33 grains and nothing changed so then i tried 36 grains and achieved a 5 inch group at 50 and 1.5 foot group at 100. now i am going to try 38 grains and i refuse to go any higher than that for safety reasons. my bore is dreamy at .312 and my casts are sized to .314.

am i just wasting primers or will this go somewhere?

[docone31]

Once I paper patched them at .314, I could put a quarter over five at 100. 40.4gns of 4895.
Yeah, it is going somewhere.

[leadman]

What alloy are you using? Have you tried Unique or another pistol type powder? How are you determining boolit seating depth?

[MtGun44]

Probably WAY too hot. Try 10 gr Unique. Your approach of INCREASING the
powder charge when the groups are poor is unconventional, to say the least.

With lead you need to start real slow and work your way up. Also, 3 gr increases
is pretty huge jumps between loads. I would not expect 4064 to be a top choice
powder for cast in .303. Try 2400 at about 14 gr, increase in .5 or 1 gr incriments.
Expect good results around 15 -16 gr or so. Try H4198 or IMR4198 if you have
them. Faster powders at moderate vel (maybe 1600 or less to start with) are likely
to work better. High vel with boolits in rifles is an advanced subject. Learn to
walk before trying to run, you will enjoy it more.

Try water dropping or heat treating the boolits, esp if you intend to drive them hard,
which it sounds like. Boolits are different than jacketed.

Bill

[beemer]

I have used a good bit of 4064 in the 303, it is not my favorite. The best load was about 28 -29 grs. and a dacron filler and the Lee 312-185, I think it shot about 3-3.5 in. at 100 yds. My best results is with IMR 4198 at about 20 grs.

Does the bore riding section fit the bore?

beemer

[Buckshot]

Does the bore riding section fit the bore?

beemer

..............Perzactly what I was gonna ask :-)

Are you using any kind of filler with the 4064? What kind of accuracy do you get with jacketed slugs? Have you tried ANY other loads? If not, then as MtGun44 suggests, try Unique just to see what you get. If you don't have any Unique maybe you have some Red Dot? If so try 11.0grs to start.

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

[ENFIELD303]

with sierra 150 soft points and 42 grains of 4064 i get 1.5" at 75 and 2" at 100

as for the bore riding, can you explain for a newb?


i do have 700x and some poly fil but wouldn't that limit me up to 100 yards?

[303Guy]

I started running trial loads in the .303 no.4 and I amvery close to giving up.Two-groove barrel right? I'm working on a 180gr g/c design boolit without the g/c and paper patching. That at least eliminates the heel distortion. Now to get the paper patch part to work! (There is sign of promise - just to get the right paper I think).

[Bret4207]

with sierra 150 soft points and 42 grains of 4064 i get 1.5" at 75 and 2" at 100

as for the bore riding, can you explain for a newb?


i do have 700x and some poly fil but wouldn't that limit me up to 100 yards?

Take a sized boolit and see if it has an interference fit at the muzzle. IOW, it shouldn't drop in the muzzle to the drive bands. That's a rough way to see if it is even close to workable, that the nose section will ride on the lands.

Limited to 100 yards? Most cast shooters find a "sweet spot" between 14 and 1800 fps. Those velocities and those up to the hotter 2K-2.2K fps sort of limit your hunting ranges to around 100 yards anyway due to drop. The way to get around that is to learn your drop at longer ranges and to use a rangefinder.

So far, with what we know today, it's the rare man who can develop workable loads in the 2200 fps+ category. Those able to exceed 2500 fps are pretty darn rare.

[9.3X62AL]

What Buckshot and Bret said. Fit is everything--drive bands to grooves, and bore rider nose to land tops.

If hunting is your goal and velocity is the route taken, re-think that a bit. A flat-nosed or soft-pointed casting running 1600-1800 FPS will make meat just fine. As for trajectory flatness, this is another example of Ammohead's wise words concerning lead boolits on game animals, with context varied.

"Have you seen many buffalo lately?"

[runfiverun]

you want the lands to lightly engrave on the boolits nose try 26 grs of 4895 to start
i would bet somewhere between 28 and 32 you will find a happy spot.
some rifles demand more bearing surface to shoot good and not really do well with that long nose.
but i just ordered the 314 for my 303's so i hope one of them like it.

[JeffinNZ]

Try this. Set you 'stop' on your sizer so that the top punch does not contact the top fo the sizing die when you run a bullet into the sizer. Then, very carefully....I said CAREFULLY, apply force on the bullet until the top punch contacts the sizing die. This will allow you to 'bump' the bullet nose to a large diameter. Shoot and see if it makes a difference.

You are using a gas check, right?

[atr]

I'm going with Bill (MTgun44) on this...way to hot

I had a very similiar experience, self inflicted of course.....I was getting 1.5x1.75 groups at 100 yds pretty consistantly with both Unique and 2400 at the lower velocity levels (1600-1700 fps)...just for kicks I ramped the velocity up with 748Win and again with IMR3031 (pushing it up to 2000+ fps).....the spread at 100 yards was more like 12"x12"....yikes...

[dbldblu]

I second everything mtgun44 said. With a new to me rifle, I always start with 10 gr Unique or something like that and later I will try the "real" rifle powders.

[TAWILDCATT]

Ed Harris recomends 13 gr red dot in military loads.I shoot 1903 with 311291 and it groups almost touching at 100.the person I got it from said it is good at 200 but using 600 yds sight reading.I use 300 for the 100 yrd.the lee 312-160 TL also does the job.:coffee: [smilie=1:

[KCSO]

First how is the throat? You might have to go up to 314 to get good accuracy with a heavy load. I have tried IMR 4064 in the 303 and was not impressed, for some reason IMR 3031 and IMR 4895 were much better preformers with cast. If your rifle is a 2 groove you will need a larger bullet than the 4 groove barrels a lot of the time. Don't give up I had one that I ended up shooting 317 bullets and COW before I got to the magic load and then it went to tack driver at 100 yards.