gleason.chapman

Why not have your son shoot the load in (varying the load up or down until he get an excellent group) and then you adjust it to your eyes?As for the Noslers or the Barnes, both are excellent bullets whichever groups the best in your rifle go with them. I tested 8 differentbullets in my Savage only 2 of them groupedexcellent, results are here:

http://www.the-gleasons.com/this_is_my_savage_10_ml_page.htm

You (or your son)may have to experiment with with different sabots, and you want it to load tight but not impossible, I find the crushed rib sabot works in my Knight and TC Omega, but it is too loose with Noslers in my Savage, with .452 bullets the MMP 12 work well in the Savage.

Chap Gleason

Bigtimer

Sorry it took me so long to reply but my son is only 10 years old. He shoots 70grns of T-7 with a 240 grn bullet using open sights and his personal maximum shot distance is 75 yds. He's a crackshot with his .243 but I don't think that he's capable of zeroing in my rifle.

sabotloader

Bigtimer

Those sabots that I promised hit the mail system today - should have Tuesday/Wednesday..

Good shooting... when you get them.....

Bigtimer

Bullets arrived yesterday and MMP 24s should be here tomorrow. Thanks for the other sabots sabotloader.

dmurphy317

Bigtimer,
Where do you live? Do you know anyone in your area that has experience with ML'ers that can help out? Maybe someone on the forum lives in your area and can help out.

As for loads, if your going with something in the 250 to 300 grain range, 90 to 100 grains of powder should put you into the 1700 to 1800 fps range which should be enough to give you a 5" point blank range around 150 yards with enough energy to get the job done. In my 14yo son's regular Optima shooting 80gr of Pyro P and a 250 Shockwave he gets around 1650fps. With it zeroed at 125 yards he is 2.5" high at 75 yardsanddown 3" at 150yards. Energy at 150 is over 870fp.With a 300 grain SW and 100 grains of powder it's around 1750fps, it's about 2.5" high at 75 yards and down1.5 at 150 yards. Energy at 150 is over 1200fp. I prefer the 300 myself but the 250 may be better for your back.

Good luck on your load and your hunt.

Bigtimer

Thanks for all the help guys, everything that I ordered has arrived. We're going to do some shooting early in the morning before it gets hot. I have a good variety of bullets to try so we'll have to take our time and see if we can put a group together. I hope to have some good news to share tommorrow.

God Bless,

whitetailcrazy

Bigtimer----- I too have had problems with Hornady SST's and XTP's, sounds very similar to what had happen to me. Some years back I had shot 2 nice bucks exactly where I had been aiming, 1 heart and 1 double lung. I had been using Hornady XTP's, in which both had not passed through. Both shots were approx. 50 yards, each had shed there copper jacket with decent mushrooming. Both bucks had ran much further than i had expected. To say the least I was a little disappointed with the performanceof the bullets. You want the bullet to tranfer its kinetic energy (the mushrooming of the bullet), but what you don't want is the shedding of the jacket, which deminishes the amount of energy transferred. This had also happened to me this year while harvesting a doe with a Hornady SST. With the Bucks I had been using 100gr. of pyrodex, with this doe I had been using 130gr. of Pyrodex and the shot was 60 yards. The bullet had not mushroomed at all, it had shattered into a bunch of little peices..... very disappointing.....

I have changed over to Barnes in which I have witnessed only 1 bullet being removed from a doe which was shot from the right rear, just in front of the right rear leg ( hard quartering away shot ) and removed the bullet just under skin of front left shoulder. The mushrooming in that bullet was like it was shown in magazines (unbelievable) and it retained almost 100% of it 's weight! Awesome bullet!!

I've also seen Noslers in Partion Slugs and their expansion was also excellent.....


I think you can't go wrong with either bullet, pick the one which flies the best out of your gun and I can garantee no more shedding jackets!!

Good luck this year!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Limbhanger

Bigtimer - I too experienced the same problem with my CVA Optima Pro (.50 cal), but finally, after alot of trial and error, e-mails, and reading posts from other hunters experiencing the same problems, I found a cure. As far as bullets, I found that my rifle would consistently group the 295 gr. Powerbelts, w/ (2) 50 gr. T7 pellets. Lighter bullets were all over the paper.Note the word consistently. The groups were always in the 3"-3.25" range @ 100 yds.. Obviously I wasn't satisfied. I felt like there was something else other than changing bullets, that would help.
Guess what - I was right. After a tip that I read on the net, I felt like I found the extra"trick" for MY rifle. This turned out to be a mixture of 50% Windex / 50% rubbing alchohol, used for cleaning between each shot. The Windex would clean the barrel (not spotless, I wanted a small amount of fouling left over),while the alchohol would help dry it out.After each shot I would run a patch, soaked with this solution, down the barrel once (w/ breech plug removed), turn the patch over and run down once more ( one direction, both times). Before, I was using bore cleaner.Since I had the breech plug out, I would go ahead and clean off the face. Replace plug, reloadand shoot.
I attribute this one step,to tightening my groupsconsistently to.50"-.75" @ 100 yds.It's the only thing that I did different. As for the Powerbelt bullet's performance on deer - I don't have a single complaint. Out of 5 deer shot w/ this rifle and load, the longest recovery was 55 yds. Three were a pass through, and the other two were just under the hide on "exit" side. I am assuming that the two destroyed shoulder bones oneach of these two deer, slowed the bullet down enough to prevent a pass through. The key to a short recovery is shot placement, ratherthan bullet type. All 5 deer were in the 170 lbs.+ range. Distances were 85 - 165 yds.
Like stated on other posts- what works for me, may not work for you and your equipment, but I hope it helps. Good luck.

Bigtimer

We got in a little shooting today and things look very promising. A band of thunderstorms put the brakes on us before we could start getting "acceptable" groups. The Nosler's grouped well but I have some tinkering to do with the load. I have several different bullets to try so I'll just take my time until I find out what she likes.

wabi

Bigtimer,
Sounds like you're on the right track to figuring out an accurate load combination. Good luck on your upcoming hunt!