Friday, June 11, 2010

Friday Range

I went to the range this morning and had the rifle line all to myself. I spent a couple of hours working with the Handi in .30-30 Winchester and the .223 Handi.

That .223 doesn't like any factory ammo I feed it. I guess I'll have to start reloading for that caliber if I want to find a load for that little rifle. Factory ammo is shooting into about four inches and I'm not satisfied with that.

I had done a ladder test last week with the .30-30 Handi, using three powders, IMR 4895, IMR 3031, and Reloder 15. The 4895 and RL15 showed me some interesting targets, so I had loaded some rounds with the recipes that showed me the most consistency.

I used the Hornady A-Mas 155 grain bullet as a test bed. This bullet shows good accuracy in most .30 caliber rifles I've used it in, and I keep a supply on my bench.



That target was shot at 100 yards with a cold barrel. I haven't put it over the chronograph yet, but the manuals tell me that it should be running somewhere between 2200-2300 fps. I'll do that next week, while I adjust the scope to the load.

It's not MOA, but this is a a 7.8 pound single shot hunting rifle. I'm very pleased with this load in this rifle.

The range I'm using has a gong at the 200 yard line, a 1-foot square piece of metal dangling from a sawhorse. I took the last two rounds of this load and shot that going, hitting it two times.

It'll be interesting to see what the chronograph says.

2 comments:

Buffboy said...

Dang it's been so long since I traded my 223 HR that I don't remember what I did to make it shoot ity bity groups but it did finally. It wasn't as bad as yours with factory ammo but nothing special. IIRC it needed the bullets set out quite a ways as it had the long throat of the .556 spec chamber.

Old NFO said...

It's still shooting well enough to take down a deer! :-)