Well as far as that goes, for all intents and purposes, I was using a purpose built rifle. The Felix rifle was built to be a solid test bed of known accuracy that I could use to prove the accuracy of barrels that I install on rifles. If I build a rifle and it does not deliver the accuracy I expect, it's just really handy to be able to screw the barrel into a solid bench rifle and see if the problem lies in the barrel or in something else. For the record, if a rifle does not shoot, it has never failed to be the barrel that is the guilty party. Every time without fail. A good barrel gets you sub MOA no matter what. All the other stuff matters if you want to shoot tighter than that.
Anyway, I wanted to dip my big toe in the 35XCB, so I figured I would just screw my 30" medium Palma barrel into the Felix rifle and voila!
The thing is, I'm not so sure about the results now. Yeah I was hoping for better, but there were several things about this last outing that were severely sub standard when compared to the typical XCB process that the other members of the team and I adhere to. Here's a list of things that could have made it shoot less than it's potential:
1. I was using an unproven barrel. This was the first time I have shot this Shilen barrel, so I really don't know what its accuracy potential is. I need to fix that.
2. The bullets were my very first run with the new mold, and I shot all of them with no culls. Typically, I have no problem doing this if I have run the mold through several bell curve exercises and I know precisely how to cast with it for optimum results. As it is, I didn't weigh but maybe 5-6, and I saw over a grain of differance in that handful. I know I wasn't running it the best way, but I didn't have time to really rag it out properly like I have all my other molds. It could be that I had voids, or the bullets were being dropped too hot causing them to be warped etc etc etc. Who knows?
3. I reloaded the brass that had been formed and fired in a rifle I previously built for Bjornb. I have not pulled the funds together for my own 35Whelen set of dies that I can modify to 35XCB, so all my loading was done with my 358 WCF set. This is no problem for neck sizing, but the bullet seater was definitely not able to insert the bullets into the necks with the same precision that I can achieve with my inline seater made from a piece of barrel blank that I made for the 30XCB. I think that seating the bullets in a more supported scenario will improve things greatly. There is absolutely no guarantee that my bullets were getting started straight into the barrel. I need to find a better solution for that.
I think I need to take a step back and work on holding the same standard for excellence that we have developed for the XCB project. I keep hearing my old boss's words ringing in my ears: "we have a very good system for success here. Don't defeat the system!"
Tonight I cast another run of 35XCB bullets. The mold has calmed down and is throwing very well. In the coming weeks, I'll learn what it needs to produce superb results as I demonstrated in the "consistency applied" thread. I cast exactly the same way I did last time, but this time I'll measure and make one correction at a time and pull the accuracy together in a scientific manner.
Also, I will find a better solution for seating the bullets correctly.
Once I get the new 35XCB rifle built correctly, I'll prove it's practical accuracy with jacketed bullets and continue on, armed with that information.
As it is, I really have no business being disappointed with the design till I have given due diligence to loading it correctly.
The good news is that I gathered a plethora of load data with yesterdays range session, so next time I can cut right to the chase and start working up from there.
The last thing that I considered is the fact that even though I only shot 2MOA at 2550 FPS, the fact is that I actually shot 2MOA at 2550 FPS!!! if you had told me that a couple years ago, I wouldn't have believed it. I think it's a good practice to do a sanity check once in a while and keep in mind that it wasn't too long ago that I was spraying the target backer with holes at less than 2400FPS with the 358 Winchester. If I make a few small logical changes to my loading procedure, I might very well be able to take the groups to less than 1.5MOA @ 2600FPS with this bullet design. Time will tell.