Originally Posted by
newton
I had a thought a minute ago that may sound simple, but it sounded logical in my head.......
I hear a lot of talk about doing this and that to the brass, the gun, particular loading techniques, etc. All are solid as far as reducing group size. But the thought was, I don't do ANY of that and I get sub MOA from my factory gun with jacketed. So, the ONLY difference is the projectile. Newton may I politely tell you that is were you are wrong. The reason is the jacketed bullet is much stronger, harder, and tougher then the cast bullet. Think of pounding a steel rod into a tighter hole for it and at an angle. Then thing of the rod being made of wood. The wood will be chewed up before it straightens itself out. At least, it is the only thing that separates a known good load/high velocity from what your trying to achieve with another kind of projectile. Of course, I am assuming that you would use the same kind of powder for both. When I try my hand at it I'll be doing that. I get good results with H4895 and jacketed bullets.
Maybe just me, but I think I would put all my focus on the boolit. Again, I know it sounds simple, but I would focus on things like how the boolit is different than the jacketed, and how these differences effect each one. There is nothing at all wrong with focusing on the the bullet "alot".
Here is my thought on it all in general. I think that when guys decided to use jacketed projectiles they were looking to up the speed over that of the lead. *yea, I know, brilliant thought there newton.....* Anyways, they might have tried a few different things to improve the lead, but how much did they try.........but more important what did they not try?
To honestly believe that they tried everything has to be the most optimistic thing I have ever heard. Now, they might have tried just about all they could, with what they had, at that time. But the point of this, is the pursuit was left alone after just figuring they found the cure in jackets. I'll agree that since then many have come along and worked on it, but its hard to focus on something all the while having a solution staring you in the face - in this situation it would be the jacketed bullet. Tried and knowing what you are doing are two different things. Now if you tried something a known superb caster and cast bullet shooter told or showed is different.
So for me, its not about my loading technique(unless cast boolits dictate otherwise - flaring mouth and such), or my gun, or anything else. I know, it sounds dumb and too simple of an approach, but its what I will do when I pursue this. Technology has come a long way since they developed the jacketed bullet. There may be something out there that lets us take our cast boolits and shoot them like jacketed.......except without the jacket. :) I bet if you would have told a person less than 100 years ago that they could pick up a device and instantly communicate to someone on the other side of the world.....without any wires.......they would have thought you were insane. There was one guy (possibly more) that you could have told and he wouldn't have thought you were crazy but gave you ideas on how to do it and that was Tesla. It was even longer than that when they figured out the copper jacketed bullet, at least we now believe that lead boolits can perform near copper ones....or does doubt hold us back?