TargetTalk

Greetings,

Several folks have written me about the accuracy potential of the 32 WadCutter at 50 yards for NRA style shooting.

Well, a photo is worth a thousand words and I am attached several thousand words in the form of scanned targets from my last barrel project.

The barrel is a Shilen stainless steel, 0.311" six groove, with a ten twist.

Bon Tir,

Dave Wilson

Dave, what the heck is that shot in the 9 ring on the last target? :-) Kate

Greetings,

The flier on the last target is reality. It could be caused by a bad bullet, split case, erratic primer, etc.

These fliers also occur with the expensive commercial ammo.

The purpose of my test targets is to verify that the barrel is capable of shooting well. The next challenge is reloading ammo that has no variations whatsoever. I am not there yet.

I could send all the targets that shoot Ten-X; but, that, to me, is deceitful.

Cheers,

Dave Wilson

It is common for the .32 to throw flyers. In 100 shots the .32 will put 1 to 2 shots 30 to 50mm out of the group and in any direction.
The problem appears to be the thin wall of the case and variable case release neck tension.
One solution is shoot new cases all the time or neck anneal every time you reload.
If you shoot a revolver, using a button nose projectile with a heavy roll crimp in the crimp groove will help. The wadcutter auto is a problem.

Dave is that the Speer 98 gr bullet you are consistently using??

Greetings,

Yes, the bullets are Speer 98 HBWC. I go through the box one by one and select the ones that have the fewest defects. Sadly, they are not as well formed as the early ones with the wax lube.

I use Speer as they are readily available, made in the USA, and reasonable in price. H&N, in my brief testing, has performed much better. Unfortunately, they are rather pricey. Good news is that they are available in different diameters (0.312" - 0.315"). The Speer bullets vary in diameter from 0.312" to 0.314" in the same box with 0.313" being the average.

Dr. Darius "Doc" Young recommended and shot the H&N when he was shooting. (0.312" fired in a Hart 0.308" barrel) He sent me some test targets which were most impressive.

Looking at the Speer bullets I get the impression they are tumbled after swaging during the lubrication stage. I have a swaging die set of my own and my home made bullets come out exactly the same diameter with sharp edges. Also the weight is +/- 0.1 grain. (Very labor intensive process, I find it easier to sort out the Speer Bullets)

Hornady bullets seem quite uniform in diameter. I have not been able to get the small group size I would like. Perhaps someone out on the list can scan some 50 yard targets shot with the Hornady bullet and post them on Target Talk?

Dave,

I did test the Hornady 90gr HBWC while building up the recipe for your barrel. (As you know, the eventual winner was the .312 H&N bullet with 1.3gr of N310 which produces consistent 2" groups.)

I tried 3 or 4 different powders and numerous tweaks without much success. Attached are the 3 targets using VV N310 powder which are typical of all the combinations I tried. In addition, I found the white powdery lube they use a pain to keep out of the reloading machine's internals.

Thanks,
Keith