PPCBoo Lee Enfield Varminter - Ideas?

[303Guy]

Having a few too many Lee Enfields, I've decided to dedicate one of them to Varminter status. This could be challenging, specially since I have no idea how to compensate for boolit drop and wind drift. (You can see the fun, right?)

http://i388.photobucket.com/albums/oo327/303Guy/MVC-685F-1.jpg

I have begun developing a load for this rifle. I'm starting off with my existing 208gr hollow nose sized to two-diameter and patched with printer paper over 42gr AR2209/H4350 using PPU cases. This gives me a load density of 91.6%. When seated to an OAL of 76.25mm the boolit is pushed back to an OAL of 75.0mm. So my idea is to size the core 2 mm deeper into the die. I fired the first test round and pressure was a little higher than I wanted but still at the low end of 'normal'.

Here is the fired primer.

http://i388.photobucket.com/albums/oo327/303Guy/MVC-682F.jpg Test load.

Compare that a factory fired primer.

http://i388.photobucket.com/albums/oo327/303Guy/MVC-683F-1.jpg Factory load.

I found one small fragment of clean patch that has followed the boolit through the wet rags and into the sand. It must be a piece of the first wrap from near the nose. It's small enough to make me think pressure is high enough. The boolit itself is pretty mangled but still quite heavy at 119grs - acceptable considering the boolit was stopped in fine sand after a fairly short travel through wet rag. I would say that no medium sized critter, let alone a small one, would survive that blow!

I only fired that one shot so the fact that the bore is prestine clean and shiny does not mean that much.

So, I have a bore-ride PPCBoo that seats against the throat taper - not the leade taper. The throat rifling impresses quite firmly into the patch. Looking at the spare powder capacity and the fact that the boolit sits quite far into the rifling, I figure I could reduce the boolit weight and length and increase the powder charge quite a bit to get a respectable MV and a much flatter trajectory. I have a scope with external turret adjustment (BDC turrets) which could make longer range shooting a bit easier.

Any suggestions and ideas would be welcome.:drinks:
(Just the solutions, not the problems! :mrgreen: I'm doing this for fun, remember. Trouble is, the varmints available to me are pretty damn small - magpies :roll:).

[longbow]

303guy:

Did I miss something or did you say you are using your 208 gr. boolit? If so it seems heavy for varminting ~ especially magpies!

I have made two casual attempts to shoot lighweight boolits in my No. 5 ~ one using a 100 gr. PP boolit and one yesterday using the NOE 0.314" x 129 gr. spire point.

Both attempts have produced mediocre results but I really have not worked at it much yet.

The 100 gr PP boolits were loaded over a fairly large charge of IMR 4320 at the bottom end of the "J" bullet loads. All holes through the target were nice and round so no yaw but a rather large group at 50 yards.

Yesterday I tried out my new NOE 0.314" x 129 gr. SP with homemade gas check over 40 grs. of IMR 4064. The first two shots were low left then three went into less than an inch at 50 yards. I decided to shoot another 5 shots and wound up with six out of 10 in 1" x 1 1/4" but two more fliers. Looks like it has potential but needs work.

My feeling is that the short boolit has a long jump through the throat so should be a snug fit to the throat.

I am going to retry the PP boolit but at around 120 to 130 grs. and also do some more work with the NOE. I am also going to seat them out a little further and size as close to throat diameter as I can and get them to chamber..

I would like to have a good high velocity load with a light boolit.

That probably didn't solve any of your problems but if we both keep working at it and sharing then maybe we can get there from here faster and easier.

Longbow

[303Guy]

Yes, the 208gr is a little heavy and slow. I plan on making the boolit lighter by shortening it some and by giving it a healthy hollow nose and perhaps using a stronger alloy (or just heat treating) to take the spin of the 1 in 10 twist of the LE. The throat has an interesting shape with a 'forcing cone' before the rifling leade. My two-diameter sizer sets the boolit shape to suite, so altering the length only reduces the bore-ride length.

I'm not sure that too high a velocity and too light a boolit will produce any worthy accuracy. It might. Have to try it to find out. But first I want to establish a base-line. That is to say, to get this rifle to shoot tight groups, then try the lighter boolit. I suspect there is going to be a 'no-go- zone' in which the boolit hardness and design won't work too well. That is to say, a bore-ride needs to be soft enough and a harder, faster boolit needs to be non-bore-riding so inbetween will be mediocre.

I have an idea that a tight bore-ride will set the boolit spinning so as to avoid rifling shear caused by boolit jump. For non-bore-ride, the boolit nose will have to be seated against the rifling leade as well has the 'forcing cone', making ogive shape critical.

I still have a sample of a boolit I shortened with this idea in mind when I first started out. That was before I had my sizer and I was still using a g/c as a mold base plug. I haven't made and adjustable mold for the 303 as I prefer nose pour. I've made some progress with nose pour molds. I've also done some swaging which closes up the hollow nose opening for a better BC.

[303Guy]

Finally made a little progress with the PP Varmint load for my Lee Enfield.

Here is a 125gr and a 147gr boolit.

http://i388.photobucket.com/albums/oo327/303Guy/MVC-778F.jpg

Here is the 125gr patched and loaded.

http://i388.photobucket.com/albums/oo327/303Guy/MVC-768F.jpghttp://i388.photobucket.com/albums/oo327/303Guy/MVC-765F.jpg
http://i388.photobucket.com/albums/oo327/303Guy/MVC-769F-1.jpg

and fired

http://i388.photobucket.com/albums/oo327/303Guy/MVC-771F-1.jpg

I did the 125gr first then found it too light to burn the powder properly so now I'm trying the heavier and longer 147gr.

I should be able to drive the 147grainer to 2700fps if the patch survives. I'm thinking it will shoot flatter than the 125grainer (over longer range) due to a better BC.

These are the base plugs and the mold I used for the two weights (Hollow point nose pour).

http://i388.photobucket.com/albums/oo327/303Guy/MVC-779F.jpg

Lots of developement ahead still.

[longbow]

I am hoping to get my No. 5 out for another round of shooting with the NOE 0.314" x 129 gr. and also some PP boolits of about 125 gr.

The 100 grainers I made up did not shoot well at all though holes through the target at 50 yards were perfectly round so they were stable and no leading so no patch shredding in the barrel. I am thinking a little longer body will help and also will be easier to paper patch. We will see.

So far I have been using IMR4227 with the NOE 0.314" x 129 gr. and IMR4064 with the light paper patched boolits.

I plan on loading up some more IMR4064 or IMR4320 for the upcoming trials of about 130 gr. PP boolits.

What powder were you using with the 125 gr.?

Longbow

[303Guy]

I'm using '4350' - 28 to 30grs. I just fired the 147gr boolit with 30grs plus wheat bran filler packed in quite tight. Only the base band of the boolit is readable and there was no patch pailure there. Some of the nose patch came through in quite a big piece. Pressure is just high enough to actually burn the '4350'. With the 125gr and 28gr charge with filler, there was a bit of unburned powder and a few spots of smoldering powder kernal burn on the 'patch catch cloth'.

http://i388.photobucket.com/albums/oo327/303Guy/MVC-784F-1.jpg

I'm thinking I should pursue the 125grainer in this rifle with faster powder and a wax wad - the neck is long enough for it.

[303Guy]

longbow, (and anyone else who might be interested) have a look at this link. See how how our fellow BP 45-70 shooters are doing it.

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=84713

This particular fellow - and he is not alone - was hitting the steel gong at 1000yds!

Now I know they use a different powder - one that requires swabbing the bore between shots but a patched boolit is a patched boolit. Perhaps we should be looking at those principles with out light 303 Brit loads? We can comfortably use half the neck length for wads and lube things. That would allow us to seat our tiny (as in short) boolits properly into the throat of our Lee Enfields.

I suspect that some of our problems come from the patch and core upsetting into the case-mouth/throat transition. If we can get our boolits fully into the bore before any appreciable pressure develops, we could just have it made with no base cupping and whatever other deformation occurs there.

http://i388.photobucket.com/albums/oo327/303Guy/BaseCupping.jpg
See the pattern on the seated area and the base cupping?

http://i388.photobucket.com/albums/oo327/303Guy/Two-GroovePP28grAR220910grBran2.jpg
And the training edge drag feathering?

Both have patch tail crimp impressions. That can't be good for accuracy. That displaced metal has to go somewhere.

These are much heavier boolits but with the lighter ones we have boolit jump to the leade.

[longbow]

I was thinking the same thing about seating out a bit and that is also why I was thinking of a nose bore ride PP boolit for heavier weights.

Some poo poo'd the idea but I still think it has merit. It works with GG boolits so why not.

[longbow]

Success! Well, vast improvement anyway.

I loaded up some more of the 100 gr. PP boolits from my home made mould since I was heading to the range and I had about 2 dozen more of these laying about.

This time I loaded over 11.8 gr. Unique and seated out some so not much boolit in the case neck. Patched boolits had been previously sized to 0.314" to suit my groove diameter.

These shot not badly at all.

Out of a 10 shot group 6 went into 1" wide x 2 3/4" high group. One I pulled and knew it, two had slightly wrinkled patches at seating (maybe affected them, maybe not). This certainly not tack driving accuracy but it is a big improvement.

Considering my old eyes using stock military sights and the two stage trigger, I am not disappointed with this.

I actually wanted a boolit of about 125 gr. but when I made up my spacer the boolits were a little short and came out almost exactly 100 gr. so I thought I would try them. Last two times accuracy was very poor but this time out using Unique they are showing some promise so I will shorten my spacer so I get the 125 gr. with longer bearing surface and give this a more serious trial.

I also shot some more of the NOE 0.314" x 129 gr. boolits over Unique and also got much improved accuracy. I am thinking the faster powders are better under these light boolits.

Assuming I determine I can get god accuracy from these little PP boolits then I will try some more medium burn rate powders to push velocity up some. If I can get them to around 2000 FPS with accuracy I will be a happy camper.

Longbow

[303Guy]

That's good news! I find open sights are not the easiest to aim with, specially the old vee and inverted post. Horrid!

One defect with my lighter boolits is that I nose pour so shortening the casting results in an undersize shank. But now that I am using brass (or bronze) for mold bodies it is that much easier to make a mold to exact desired dimensions.

I was hoping to drive a boolit to around 2800fps but that might be a bit optimistic. But it's for varminting so a very hard alloy might do the trick. My latest alloy, whatever it has in it is pretty hard and self hardens rapidly. It doesn't frost and it doesn't 'pluck' and it doesn't shatter in sand.???

[longbow]

The Lyman Cast Bullet Handbook claims that velocities of up to 3000 FPS are possible with good accuracy.

I have no intention of pushing that far with my old .303 but 2000+ would be nice... maybe 2500.

I am thinking that 125 to 130 gr. should give decent bearing surface. These little 100 gr. pills are awfully small and short bearing surface.

I will be casting later this week with any luck.

Longbow