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A free shooting magazine. Target ShooterTRANSCRIPT
TARGET SHOOTERTARGET SHOOTERMAGAZINEMAGAZINE
NOW Read WORLdWIde BY OVeR 10,000 dedICaTed ReadeRS IN OVeR 100 COuNTRIeS eVeRY MONTH
WE GO TO las VeGAS
ARMALITE - THE AR10
HANDLOADING BENCHShooting News
SEB - A NEW Joy-Pod
PISTOL SHOOTING
NEW DOLPHIN RIFLE ACTION
SMALLBORE SHOOTING
NEW PRODUCTS FROM THE USA
FEBRUARY 2013
NOW READ IN OVER 100 COUNTRIES
SPECIAL ISSUE
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NOW Read WORLdWIde BY OVeR 10,000 dedICaTed ReadeRS IN OVeR 100 COuNTRIeS eVeRY MONTH
Welcome to the new look February 2013 edition of Target Shooter Magazine
Welcome to our special Shot Show issue. It’s difficult to convey
the immensity of this, the greatest of all shooting shows but we’ve
crammed in as many photographs as we can in an attempt to convey
what shooting in America is all about.
After a great week in Las Vegas, it’s back to reality with our very own British Shooting Show at the impressive Stoneleigh Park exhibition centre on February 9/10th and of course, Target Shooter will be there, so be sure to stop by our stand and say hello.
Fabulous as the Vegas Shot Show was, I’m really looking forward to the new Stoneleigh Park venue. The Shot Show and Germany’s IWA Show in March are of course trade only so, no matter how much you may envy the Shot Show and IWA, at least you can go to Stoneleigh and for an awful lot less!
Our UK Show is now in its fifth year and thanks to the tireless efforts of organizer John Bertrand, this year’s Show will be at least four-times the size of the original one. John is well aware of the importance of target shooting and his ‘rifle focus’ area will be crammed with accurate rifles and custom gun builders and honestly, you will see stuff here that wasn’t even at the Shot Show. This is your show – continue to support it and it will grow and grow!
See you at Stoneleigh...
Webitorial February 2013
Vince, Yvonne & Steve
Vince Bottomley
[email protected] Yvonne Wilcock
[email protected] Steve Thornton
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DisclaimerThe website www.targetshooteronline.com is part of Target Shooter magazine with all contents of both electronic media copyrighted. No reproduction is permitted unless written authorisation is provided. Information, prices and data is believed to be correct at the time of posting on the internet which is on or around the 1st of each month. Advertisements that are firearm related are from companies or individuals that Target Shooter magazine believes are licensed to hold such firearms and accepts no responsibility if companies or individuals are not so licensed. Letters and photographs submitted by members of the public to Target Shooter magazine will be accepted on the basis that the writer has agreed to publication unless otherwise stated. Target Shooter magazine has no control over the content or ownership of photographs submitted. The views expressed in this magazine are not necessarily the views of the publishers and relate to specific circumstances within each article. These are the opinions and experiences of writers using specific equipment, firearms, components and data under controlled conditions. Information contained in the online magazine or on the website is intended to be used as a guide only and in specific circumstances caution should be used. Target Shooter Magazine does not except any responsibility for individuals attempting to recreate such testing using any information, data or other materials in its electronic pages. Publishers of Target Shooter magazine.
Editor - Vince Bottomley [email protected]
Advertising and Office Manager - Yvonne Wilcock. [email protected]
Compiled, Designed & Web Production by Steve Thornton. www.thorntonconnect.com
Jeanette Whitney - Studio photography. Yvonne Wilcock - Equipment reviews
Stuart Anselm - Project gunsmithing. Les Holgate - Match reports
Contributors - Vince Bottomley - Laurie Holland - Ken Hall - Don Brooke - Chris Parkin
Tony Saunders - Vanessa Duffy - Liz Woodhall - Des Parr - Richard Utting
David Thompson - Mike Davenport - Peter Whormersley
Back Page Photography by Steve Thornton - ThorntonConnect.com
Cover Photography by Vince Bottomley
March SCOPESThe Choice of Champions
For UK & EU: marchscopes.co.uk - Call 01293 606901 or [email protected]
Push Button Illumination
Side Focus 10 yards ~ Infinity
1 Click 0.05 Mil Turrets
Tactical Turrets
NEW
This scope has the largest zoom ratio of any FFP scope ever made, additional feature is the 0.05 Mil centre dot, this was designed not to obscure the target on higher magnification. A feature of First Focal Plane (FFP) design, also known as Front FocalPlane, is the reticle scale value does not change over the entire zoomrange of the rifle scope. Also the POA does not change over the entirezoom range. This simplifies use of the reticle for ranging and holdover in conjunction with ballistic charts.
The Choice of ChampionsMarch FX 5 - 40 x 56.� The worlds most powerful first focal plane scope.�.�.�
For Australia & NZ: BRT Shooters Supply - PO Box 1124 - Springwood - 4127 Queensland, Australia. Phone. 07-3808 4862 - www.marchscopes.com.au
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Contents February 2013 Issue
Pages 6
Page 52
Page 68
Page 86The SEB Joy-Pod: An Introduction by Laurie
Holland. The F/TR shooters’ jungle drums are beating
out a message, quietly but insistently – there’s a new
generation of competition bi-pods on the way and they’re
joystick controlled. Mere rumours? Actually no, and
TargetShooter has the distinction to have prototype model
No. 1 on test. With the word getting round, opinions have
been mixed on US shooting forums, no comment that I’ve
seen here yet, as nobody outside of Diggle Ranges seems
to have noticed anything going on.
The Armalite AR10 by Vince Bottomley & Laurie
Holland – Pt 2. In our January issue, we started off the
Armalite project by installing a new barrel – chambered
for the 6.5 Hornady Creedmoor cartridge. The original
barrel was chambered for the 308 Win. and, although it’s
difficult to fault the 308 cartridge as a great all-rounder,
it did pose some extraction problems with our manually-
operated rifle.
THE HANDLOADING BENCH - 7.62x54R (Conclusion)
by Laurie Holland. It’s time to finish this look at our 120
year old, albeit anything but geriatric, cartridge and see how
it performed on the range. Reprising handloading processes
to date, Lapua brass was used throughout, although I now
have some S&B and PPU examples to compare against the
more expensive Finnish brand (Table 1). Note the large
divergence between the weights and capacities of the
Lapua and PPU examples. This is so great that a ‘warm’
load worked up in PPU brass would likely be too ‘hot’ in
the Finnish brand, QuickLOAD showing a near 5000 psi
chamber pressure difference.
The 2013 National Shooting Sports Foundation
Shot Show in Las Vegas. Once again your intrepid
Target Shooter team braved the temptations of Las
Vegas to bring you all the news from the NSSF Shot
Show! The Show was of course held in the shadow of
last December’s Sandy Hook school massacre and the
tragedy, plus the possible restrictions involving the
ownership of certain firearms, frequently came up in
conversation with stall-holders as they wait to hear
President Obama’s proposals.
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Page 92
Page 76
Page 100
Page 82
Contents Continued & More...
Dolphin Gun Company’s new CST Action. The British Shooting
Show just a week away and a host of interesting stuff for the target
shooter will be on display. I’ve just had a preview of one of the most
interesting - the new action that Dolphin Gun Company will be
displaying. Dolphin already build rifles on the New Zealand Barnard
and American Nesika actions and, this new action is also from the
USA.
The Long View – by Des Parr. The F-class World Championships
and the independent traveller The shooting highlight of 2013 for the
long-range target shooter will be the F Class World Championships,
to be held in Raton, New Mexico in August. If that wasn’t enough,
the USA F Class Nationals will also be held, immediately before the
Worlds. The GB squads have already been selected, however that
does not prevent any independent shooter going along to take part
and this month’s article is aimed at the independent traveller who
wishes make their own way to Raton in August for either or both
competitions.
This Smallbore Business by Brooksie.
Shooting standing on a Scatt machine, or
similar electronics. First let me state, that
before graduating to an electronic machine
of any sort, the basic training process must
be well in place before any attempt is made
to move to electronics to gain the finer motor
skills of standing shooting.
Latest News from around the world.
Disabled Shooting
The British Shooting Show
Ladislav Ninger - Obituary
Sportsmans Association
UKPSA News
And more...
Regulars & more
LATEST NEWS
Page 100
FROM THE BENCH
Page 66
THE LONG VIEW
Page 76
SMALLBORE - BROOKSIE
Page 82
DISABLED NEWS
Pages 104
UKPSA NEWS
Page 105
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VISIT THESHOT SHOWLAS VEGAS...
by VINCE BOTTOMLEY & LES HOLGATE SPECIAL ISSUE
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VISIT THESHOT SHOWLAS VEGAS...
by VINCE BOTTOMLEY & LES HOLGATE
The 2013 National Shooting Sports Foundation Shot Show in Las Vegas
Once again your intrepid Target Shooter team braved the temptations of Las Vegas to bringyou all the news from the NSSF Shot Show!
SPECIAL ISSUE
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The Show was of course held in the shadow of last December’s Sandy Hook school massacre and the tragedy, plus the possible restrictions involving the ownership of certain firearms, frequently came up in conversation with stall-holders as they wait to hear President Obama’s proposals. British shooters are well used to knee-jerk reactions by well-meaning but vote-seeking governments in the aftermath of such tragedies - where the gun is held to blame rather than the perpetrator. Who blames the car when a fatal road accident occurs?
Yup – it looks like a summer’s day – bright sun, clear blue sky but boy was it cold!
Media Day...
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EWMedia DayThe one thing that separates the US Shot Show from all the others is Media Day. The day before the indoor show opens, members of the media are bussed out to the 1000 yard Boulder City Gun Club range, which is about half an hour from Vegas. At this time of the year, the ambient temperature should be around 58 degrees F but, this year, something went horribly wrong and it was hovering around freezing for the whole day. Yes, it was sunny with a clear blue sky but a stiff breeze meant that we were all teetering on the brink of hypothermia after just a few hours - but not before we had shot some pretty interesting stuff.
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Target Shooter’s Yvonne shooting a pistol on Media day...
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Media Day is where we actually get to not only meet the manufacturers but also use their products – i.e. we spend a day shooting guns – of all types. It’s a great commitment for a manufacturer to put their products up for test and rifles and pistols will typically fire hundreds of rounds over the course of Media Day – hopefully without a malfunction.
It gives us a unique opportunity to speak to firearm designers in person, learn more about their products and the thinking behind those products. Of course, it’s not just firearms - designers of accessories like bi-pods, scopes, stocks and of course ammunition all bravely put their kit not only on show but on test as well.
We couldn’t visit everyone and mention every product but we are pleased to list all of the 150 or so vendors who were represented:
3 Gun Nation 511 Tactical Action Target AimpointAlliant Powder Alpen Optics American Tactical Ares Defense Armalite Ashbury PO Battenfield BennelliBeretta Bergara Barrels Birchwood Casey Black Rain Blackhawk Blue Force Gear Browning BurrisButler Arms Cabelas Cabot Guns CaldwellCaracal Carl Zeiss Cassidian Optronics CCI SpeerChiappa Firearms CMP Colt Command ArmsComp Tac Victory Gear Crimson Trace Cutting Edge Bullets Dallas safari ClubDaniel Defense Darex Del-Ton Doublestar Corp
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Vince Bottomley on Media Day...
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DPMS EOTech Ergo Grip ESS Eye ProFausti USA Federal Flir FNH USA Fostech Outdoors Freedom Hunters Galco Gunleather Gamo USAGlock Harris Publications Heckler & Koch
Kel TecHornady Houlding Precision Italian Gun Grease IWI USJARD Kahr Arms Kalkomey KawasakiKestrel Meters KodaBow KRISS Kroll IntKWA Performance Lansky Lasermax
Lasermax LeupoldLewis machine Maglula Matthews McMillanMeopta Mission First Tactical MyTopo NRA Youth ProgOtis Para Parabellum Armament Phil PhillipsPOMA
Promatic Propper RAAC FirearmsRedring USA RCBS Remington Rock Island ArmRocky Mtn. Elk Found Ruger Sako SAR Arms USASavage SCI Foundation Sig Sauer Silencerco
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Stuart Anselm on Media Day...
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Birchwood Casey Blackhawk ChampionCrosman DOA Tactical Benches Funker TacticalGSM Outdoors Honda Generators Mule Deer FoundationPromatic Slide Fire Solutions Sure Shot Game callsProfessional Outdoor Media Association
I’ve never been mad about shotguns but now that my home club is running Practical Shotgun comps. I’m a bit more of a fan. Practical shotgun is all about rapid fire, plenty of mag. capacity and steel targets. Most shotguns fire from a under-barrel tube mag. but AR style guns with detachable mags. are now beginning to emerge. Unfortunately, the one I was about to shoot had fallen victim to sand and grit after several hours use but I did get to shoot an interesting pump, the super-short Kel-Tec KSG with two tube magazines giving a 15 round capacity.
Simunition Sisk Rifles Slide Fire Solutions Smith & WessonSOG Knives Springfield Armory Steyr StreamlightSure Shot Game Calls SureFire Swarovshi SWORD IntlSWR Suppressors TenPoint Crossbow Ten-X Ammo The Mako GroupSafariland Tikka Tracking-Point TrijiconUSFA Vanguard Viridian Laser Sights WaltherWeaver Winchester WingOne WR Case & SonsXs-Products Zippo ZMB IndusriesgNationa. Shooting Sports Foundation
And the following companies provided equipment to make the day run smoothly – such as targets, ear and eye protection, vehicles etc:
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EWThe 1911 pistol in its original 45 ACP chambering is my personal favourite but when you get around to shooting the Glock in either 9 or 10mm you realise just what a good pistol this is and why many professional users choose it – including the British Army.
In this pic I’m shooting the new 45 ACP Glock - no, I don’t like plastic pistols but you can’t deny - it’s a great ‘concealed carry’ gun. Glock have used a single-stack mag. to keep down the width of the pistol grip and fitted a slimmer slide to make the gun more suitable for concealed carry. Springfield Armory have gone down a similar route with their XDS 45ACP Micro, holding just five rounds in the single-stack mag. again to keep down the overall size. Sig Sauer have followed
the same route with their P250 and in spite of very short barrels, they don’t kick as much as you might think.
The AR15 is currently in the media spotlight for all the wrong reasons. ‘Why does anyone need an assault rifle’ they ask. Shoot one and you will want one! It can be anything from a fun plinker to an accurate competition gun and was well represented at Media Day in all its variations and it doesn’t take long to realize just what a superb rifle this is. Although it is now available in a wide assortment of chamberings – including 338 Lap. Mag. I think it handles best in the 223/5.56 NATO. This rifle is so easy to shoot well.
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Target Shooter’s Yvonne shooting a semi-auto assault rifle on Media day...
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EWNow for something really naughty! The Slide-fire. This is a simple plastic replacement stock which converts a semi-auto AR15 to full auto! It has no moving parts – which is why it’s legal in the USA. It cleverly relies on recoil to do the job. Difficult to explain but by holding onto the pistol grip and pulling forward with your hand gripping the fore-end, the rifles goes full-auto! I found it difficult to control initially but it scores 100% for fun-factor!
One of the most amazing things at Media day was the Tracking Point scope – ‘bringing jet fighter lock-and-launch technology to shooting’. Now before you get too excited, this is not in the price-range of the civilian market but for a military/police sniper or wealthy hunter it could be a sound investment.
What does it do? It makes it difficult to miss for one-off long shots!
Apart from reading the wind, this scope really does do everything! If it did that, it would make competitive target shooting pointless. The Tracking-Point (after you’ve inputted your ballistics) allows for range, temperature, barometric pressure, spin-drift, cant and inclination.
Wind input is down to the shooter. (See display page 22). This is the display you see when looking through the scope, which I got to try at 1000 yards. After placing the aim-point on your target, you then ‘spot’ your target by pressing a small button inside the
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Stuart Anselm firing an assault rifle on Media day...
trigger-guard. The display now ‘drops’ and you must raise the rifle back onto your target – thus compensating for range. Back on your aim-point and…. pull the trigger – nothing happens...Why? Because you are not exactly on your chosen target and the Tracking Point won’t let you fire – and miss! Adjust the aim and... bang! You can’t help but hit it! Wow – what a piece of kit!
We are looking at $20,000 if you want one now but, in five years... ?
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EW The top right diagram shows... just how complicated it is! But, it works – I tried it and I’ve got the T-shirt to prove it! If your curiosity is aroused, have a look at the website at www.tracking-point.com A more affordable version of a ‘do-everything’ smart scope in a similar vein is also offered by Laxco www.laxcoinc.com but it is no where near as sophisticated.
As always, new ammunition was hot at Media Day – particularly the brand-new 17 Winchester Super Magnum Rimfire. With a tiny 20gn bullet zipping out at 3000 fps this will obviously appeal to varmint shooters. It appeared to be very accurate at 100 yards but it could make an interesting ‘out to 300 yards’ range cartridge. Can’t wait to test it. We should get the Savage B-Mag bolt-action rifle from Edgar Brothers later in the year.
Winchester were also displaying their new 338 Lapua round. This cartridge is becoming ever more popular and it was very pleasant to shoot in Savage’s braked tactical rifle and very accurate too.
Although the AR15 is a great ergonomic platform for a tactical rifle, you can always go the bullpup route and
Israeli Weapons Industries were displaying their new TAVOR assault rifle.(See image below)
Is there an advantage to the bullpup configuration? “Try double-tapping” said the IWI guy. I did - so much easier to stay on target with elbows tucked-in. An awesome rifle.
Of course, there’s much much more and Media Day is all about shooting but let’s go indoors for the real Shot Show and see what else is on offer.
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INDOORS!Media day was fun as always but, it was freezing and I was glad to be in the warmth of the enormous Sands Expo exhibition space for the next few days.
One of my ‘must see’ products was the new15 to 55 zoom target scope from Nightforce,...
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The Shot Show is massive and it has
almost outgrown its venue with many
stands looking quite cramped, especially
with the large crowds, which can make
photography quite challenging.
How do we review the Shot Show?
The official Show guide runs to 200
pages with each exhibitor having only
a paragraph so how can we hope to
convey what’s on offer over a couple of
dozen pages? Obviously, we can’t so we
must cherry pick a few interesting items –
bearing in mind the restriction in exporting
firearms related products from the USA,
which is a real pain for the rest of the
world. OK, where do we start?
ScopesWhat about scopes? One of my ‘must see’ products was the new target scope from Nightforce, offering a 15 to 55 zoom range. Nightforce must be aware that March are stealing their customers and much thought had gone into the design of this scope, taking care to keep the weight down. At 28 ounces, it’s half a pound lighter than the NSX or Benchrest models which should
please the F/TR shooters and, the body-tube stays at 30mm so no need to buy new mounts if you upgrade. It comes with a nice fine cross-hair/dot reticle which I like but, if you must have more dots and lines you can spec. the new DDR. Turrets adjust in eighth-minute clicks which some long-range target shooters prefer. The one at the Show was silver with black adjusters – looked OK – but all black is an option.
Judging from their other new model – the BEAST (Best Example of Advanced Scope Technology!) they obviously fear competition from Schmidt & Bender as well. At two and a half pounds, weight saving clearly wasn’t a design priority with the Beast and this is a really rugged 5-25 tactical scope embodying every feature you could possibly want, offering a massive 120 MOA of adjustment with its 34mm body tube. First focal plane of course as this has now become the fashion with military spec. scopes though personally, with the range-finding equipment now available, I still need to be convinced on the need to estimate ranges with a reticle.
Leupold did have a new VX6 target scope on show but at 3-18 it won’t attract any serious long-range shooters although a 4-24 is also in the making but it’s just not big enough. Most serious F Class shooters will be looking for at least 32 power for 1000 yard work and the success of March and Nightforce should be a wake-up call to all scope manufacturers.
At least Kahles have seen the light with their new 10-50. All the quality German optics companies have the ability to make fantastic long-range scopes for target shooters but for some reason, don’t see the market but, like Schmidt & Bender, Kahles have now woken up! Kahles have given some thought about the things that we, as target shooters, need. You can reach your windage and elevation knobs from the prone position with your right hand but then, to (side) focus you need the right hand. Kahles have addressed this by putting
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EWthe focus ring on the elevation turret and they’ve added a rather large wheel to do this – a bit like the side-focus wheels used by air-rifle field-target shooters.
With a rested rifle, using either hand to adjust is not really a problem but, with a supported rifle, I can see the advantage as the right hand is the ‘free’ hand so to speak and, in field-target, range-finding adjustments are constantly required. It’s a great idea but it looks naff – but you can remove it if you are an F Class Shooter! It also has a little pop-up ‘reminder’ button on the top of the turret so you don’t forget which revolution (of three) you are using. The Nightforce scopes and the Kahles are what we would call ‘high end’ optics both in quality and price
but lower down the scale I found an interesting scope from Millett/Bushnell in their tactical series. The scope is in the 6.5-25 magnificantion range and has a 35mm body tube – so plenty of adjustment, with big target-turrets, side-focussing and a superb tactical camo finish. OK, I’m sure the origin will be Chinese and it’s difficult to assess optical quality in a show environment but the picture looked very good and I’m sure the price will be right.
There is now a move to offer ‘smart’ scopes which ‘do everything’ - mainly for the hunter market. The Laxco ‘auto targeting digital riflescope’ is one such beast and offers bullet-drop compensation, built-in range-finder, tilt compensation and the like but, the daddy of them all is surely the Tracking Point scope offering ‘jet fighter lock and launch technology’ turning your rifle into a ‘precision guided firearm’. We were able to try it on media day and it does exactly what it says on the tin!
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Now, don’t get too excited – it’s way beyond the price-range of all but the professional or serious hunter.
RiflesUnless you have visited the Shot Show, you just would not believe the number of companies now making the AR 15 rifle – for every application – military, target, home defence, plinking etc. If you were in the market for one – just how would you choose? All are bristling with pic-rails, levers, handles etc. Any colour you can dream of is available from bright pink to camo. Traditionally chambered for the 223, almost any caliber is now possible and my particular favorite was the one milled from solid titanium and chambered for the 300 Win.Mag Top that! But, AR15s aside, what else?
Armalite, that legendary AR manufacturer now offer a bolt-gun chambered for a variety of cartridges from
the 308 to the 50BMG. Naturally, the rifle is all-black, mag. fed and sports a military-style brake. Not cheap but presumably built to mil.spec.
More affordable are the tactical-style rifles from Remington and Savage. Savage have ‘face-lifted their 10 and 110 BA tactical models with more pic-rails and improved butt. They are also offering other bolt-guns with detachable magazine, decent stocks from HS Precision and McMillan. Remington’s tactical rifle also comes in the PSS stock, (green) with a detachable AI magazine, longish medium-weight barrel and brake.
The Ruger 10/22 is probably one of the world’s most popular rifles – who hasn’t owned one? They are
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EWused for a variety of competitions and the number of aftermarket accessories available is second only to the AR15! Everyone offers upgrades to make this a better, more accurate rifle so what could Ruger do that no one else has done? They made it into a take-down that’s what! The rifle can be simply split into two parts in seconds making it fit easily into say a rucksack. There’s an excuse to buy another!
The advent of CNC machinery continues to inspire the production of the aluminium rifle chassis. Remington’s is still one of the best, followed by Accuracy International but there are endless other examples. The Whiskey 3 version is unusual in that it is made for the Tikka T3, Sako M995 as well as the Remington 700 footprint. It comes as a folder option and starting at $919 it’s good value.
Traditional fiberglass stocks seem to be on the wane - Manners and McMillan were exhibiting but I didn’t see much I hadn’t already seen but Kelbly’s did have a new stock, the KTS. It was billed as a tactical stock but
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EWdoesn’t follow the traditional McMillan A5 style being somewhat larger but looked fine with their big new repeater action designed to use cartridges like the 338 Lap Mag.
Incidentally, Accuracy were showing their AX PSR - a three-barrel tactical rifle kit all neatly contained in a Peli case and offering 308, 300 Win Mag and 338 Lap mag. options needing just one Allen Key to swap barrels.
Other Stuff One thing I really wanted to see at the Show was the new press from RCBS. The press represents some lateral thinking from RCBS – by moving the die rather than the cartridge-case. It is very compact with a massive ram. My old Rockchucker was bought when I started shooting 30 years ago and it was second-
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hand then! This new press will definitely be finding a place on my reloading bench as soon as they become available in the UK.
Lyman were showing a compact version of their reloading combo. Hopefully the simplified format will lower the price. They were also showing some new electronic scales.
Forster have a new measuring tool for re-loaders which appears to be well thought out. In addition to measuring and comparing the cartridge overall length, it can also measure case-bump. This is something which has confused some shooters and this tool should simplify things – it will certainly be on my shopping list.
Of course, at any show, there are vendors out to make a buck by selling you a good idea that you don’t really need – snake oil! Cleaning fluid and gun-oil tend to fall into this bracket and obviously many shooters clean their rifles a bit like you clean a car – if it looks nice and shiny it’s clean. If you are a competition shooter, I don’t need to tell you the importance of proper cleaning and I’m always on the look out for genuine products which do the job. Last year, we discovered Swab Its which are now stocked by Fox Firearms in the UK and, if you haven’t tried Swab Its, you should.
This year, my cleaning discovery was Boresmith. This company make a range of useful products including some nifty cleaning brushes but what caught my eye were the patches. If you stuff a square patch up your bore and then open it up when it comes out the other end you can see how the patch has scrunched-up in the bore. In fact, sometimes they sometimes get stuck – fast. Boresmith have addressed this and come up with an ‘ideal’ shape patch – which is a modified triangle. OK – not earth-shattering but, if you can get it the right shape – why not? I have a few samples to try so a full report in a later issue of Target Shooter. Currently Boresmith don’t have a UK distributer but anyone wishing to become one could e-mail [email protected]
In some respects, a barrel is the most important part of an accurate rifle and, most accurate rifles – be they F Class or benchrest will have a very heavy barrel.
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However, most competition classes are limited by weight so there is a limit to how heavy or long our barrels can be. The carbon-fibre wrapped barrels from Christiansen Arms once looked promising but I know of no one using one in competition but what about this – take a heavy barrel, turn it down to a a slim profile and spray it with titanium to bring it up to heavy profile again – result, a stiff barrel which is lighter. Could it work? Well, I saw examples of it on the stand. Cost? Well, it’s not going to be cheap is it? But, the process is used in the jet engine industry and if a barrel manufacturer took it on... Check outwww.gunwright.com
Whilst on the subject of barrels, Fred Feddersen was very enthusiastic about his 10/22 rimfire barrels, claiming benchrest accuracy. Difficult to assess a barrel without shooting it but the internal finish on these barrels was visibly excellent and could be an alternative to the usual 10/22 aftermarket barrels.
ShotgunsPractical Shotgun is certainly on the increase in the UK and there were lots of tactical shotguns and accessories at the Shot Show. I got to shoot the amazing Kel Tec KSG bull-pup tactical which holds 14 rounds in two mag. tubes. Mesa Tactical, who exhibited at Media Day, have an amazing range of practical/tactical shotgun accessories. Unfortunately, bits of plastic are subject to ITAR export restrictions and it would be good to get a proper importer for shotgun accessories in the UK – I’m sure there would be a good market.
In addition to the AK47 shotgun, the AR15 platform is now becoming popular and it will be interesting to see how these impact on the UK PSG scene.
We’ve only covered a handful of the exhibits but hopefully the accompanying photos will convey something of what is on offer out there. Photographs
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Shot Show View from a Vegas Virgin
by Les Holgate
This year, we took along Target Shooter columnist Les Holgate – it was his first visit to theShot Show and Vegas! Here’s Les’s take on things.
When you arrive in Las Vegas, at McCarron airport, it
is just a short drive to ‘the strip’, home to some of the
largest and most luxurious hotels in the States. Again
this year, one of those hotels, the Venetian, which is
attached to the Sands Expo Centre, would be hosting
the Shot Show. To give you some idea of the size of the
show - if you’ve been to the NEC at Birmingham, the
halls at Shot Show 2013 could easily be comparable in
size. What you have to remember though is the NEC is
an out of town, purpose built exhibition centre but, walk
out of the Shot Show and you are in the corridors and
lobby of the Venetian hotel... it is immense!
The Target Shooter crew were billeted at the Trump International hotel, yet another huge and very impressive Vegas hotel. (Before anyone asks we paid for it out of our own pockets, treating the trip as a holiday as much as a trade fair!). One reason for using the Trump was Jim Kelbly of Kelbly Precision Rifles and manufacturer of the famous Stolle action was exhibiting at the Shot Show and had kindly included us in his entourage, so we could enjoy a discounted rate - thanks guys, much appreciated.
The Shot Show opened Tuesday but Monday was Media Day. This is where the manufacturers, both large and small, took over Boulder City Shooting Club range to let the media see and shoot their wares (a tough job yes but someone has to do it!).
Coaches had been laid on with various hotel pick up points and not knowing what to expect, I was surprised that the coach was full and this was just one of many coaches. It was only a 30 minute drive
45
REVI
EW
to the range and this was when I first realised the scale of the show and shooting in general in the US. The massive car park was full with hundreds of people milling around.
The range consist of several pistol ranges, shotgun facilities and a 1000 benchrest range with each
manufacturer taking their part of the range (it is hard to say but there must have been close to 150 exhibitors on display). The one down-side to the day was the weather – although sunny, it was extremely cold and very windy, not what you would expect for the middle of the desert near Vegas but it was now or never so we just had to get out and live with it.
We decided to work our way from one end to the other, playing with as much as we possibly could (err...... I mean testing and evaluating!). The variety on show was amazing, every conceivable variety of AR 15 derivative as well as pistol, shotgun and rifle. When you think of what we are allowed to shoot in the UK, it was hard to take it all in and we shot revolvers, semi-auto pistols, normal rifles, AR 15s and even a machine gun (I shot an AK74 with the unusual but excellent Slide-fire system that turns a semi-auto into full auto! A simple sliding butt-stock lets recoil do the trigger-pulling - hard to comprehend and hard to shoot but, once you get used to it, an extremely fun idea). Range targetry was anything from conventional paper targets to steel plates, with the odd zombie thrown in for good measure! (Don’t ask - but basically a fun rubber/plastic target).
I now started to realise why the AR15 is so massively popular in the US – who wouldn’t want one? I don’t
know how many rounds would have been fired over the course of that day from 223 to 338 and everything in between but it must have run into the tens of
thousands, all for free (I wish I could have brought the brass home and weighed it in!)
By about 4.30 we had
had enough, not of the shooting, we could have gone on for hours but the cold was starting to be too much and the poor guys on the stands who had been there all day must have been frozen. We had tried a huge array of handguns, rifles and machine guns but now it was time to go. We didn’t try everything, there wasn’t time but
we had sampled a good cross section and I had now seen at first hand how huge the sport of shooting is in America.
So with the shooting over it was back onto the coaches and back to Vegas - just in time for a free lesson in a casino on how to play craps but that’s another story!
These AR15s are fun!
46
REVI
EWThe Show itself ran from Tuesday through to the Friday and covered five halls in the Venetian Hotel and the Sands Expo centre. Unlike shows in the UK, this was a combination of civilian, military and police exhibitors and access was available to all. The two largest halls contained most of the names you would be familiar with such as Glock, Smith and Wesson, Remington, Leupold, Savage etc. (there are far too many to list but you get the picture). Three smaller but still large areas were mainly police and military with various brands I had never come across but also hosting companies such as Nightforce.
The thing that struck me on day-one was the huge number of exhibitors - stretching from one extreme to the other in the shooting world. To give you some idea - on one stall you could look at ladies underwear made for concealed-carry pistols then, a couple of stands
away you could be looking at infra-red night-vision sights to be used on the machine gun on a helicopter gunship.... this show is vast!
The other thing that struck me was the number of visitors. I have attended many trade fairs in connection with my day job but this was something else. When you consider this was just a shooting show (OK, visitors from all round the world but it still just a shooting show) the number of attendees was immense. It was like trying to get on a tube in rush hour and yet again showed how big shooting is in the States.
Despite the availability of a Shot Show app to help plan your route between your favorite exhibitors, we decided the only way to tackle it was to go up and down each aisle, in turn, or we may miss something. Product variety on display was vast, some new products which I am sure you will soon see in the UK such as new cleaning products - set to revolutionise your cleaning regime with one product that can severely cut down on carbon fouling by cleaning the bore and also leaves a film on the inside to protect the barrel. Unfortunately there are also many things we will never be able to have in the UK, such as the new range of pistols from Walther or the stunning titanium AR15 chambered in 300 Win Mag! Even though the exhibitors had realised that, as Brits, we could not have some of their products, it made them no less helpful when demonstrating their goods.
By the end of day one we just managed one hall and not the largest - handgun after handgun and I never knew you could have an AR15 in so many colours! Want a gun safe you can walk into like a walk-in wardrobe or a rifle-display cabinet that automatically drops into itself if tampered with thus making it impossible to steal from (something straight out of a Bond movie), well they have it.
Day two and we needed to get round a bit quicker or we would run out of time. We went for breakfast to the Peppermill - just down from our base at the fabulous Trump Hotel - on the advice of a local - “One meal may be enough for two!” he said. He wasn’t kidding – the pancakes were the size of pizzas!
Day two was also busier - which I didn’t think was possible, today we went into the largest hall, the hall with all the household names. A small contingent of British stands were in here with Eley in prime position with Team USA on the stand wearing their gold medals from the Olympics.
Celebrity endorsement seemed to be the norm on some stands as queues formed to get autographs. Most seem to be ‘pay per view’ TV stars from the American shooting channels. Again, an indication on how many shooters there are in America when the ‘pay per view’ TV hunter on the Remington stand has people falling over themselves to get a picture, yet the Olympians at Eley have plenty of time to talk to you.
Mmm…careful – you could get more than you bargained for!
47
REVI
EW
Stock manufacturers, amongst many other things, seemed to be popular in here with several on display. Some new and interesting innovations here as well with some nice folding stocks, a carbon fibre wrapped forend which dissipated heat so as to avoid mirage and an ingenious attachment for your shooting kit from Eberlestock which you put on your bag to make a shooting-stick cum rest when out and about in the field (difficult to describe but, if you hunt, try to get to see one, it is very clever and neat).
As mentioned previously, the mix between military and civilian was clear to see, body armour, helmets, tactical gear all evident and it was obvious some of the shoppers were looking not from a sport perspective but more as a matter of life or death in some far flung country. Want some CS canisters or gas pellets, grenades for underneath your M16, we can find them in here, or how about what looked like a VW camper with a grenade-launcher on the roof!
By day three I was starting to flag, there are only so many M16/AR15 rifles and handguns you can handle -
when we Brits are not allowed to own them. One final spin around a few stands and that was it, or least that was the plan - we still stopped for another five hours! At one point we also bumped into a shooter from the European F Class circuit who had come over from Spain - Eduardo Abril de Fontcuberta - he was promoting his new book on military snipers and training of snipers via Paladin Press.
There was still another day to go but I was going to leave that to the other guys - now it was time to sample the bright lights of the town that America calls Sin City and see how long it would take to lose a few dollars at the casino (I am not going to say ‘win’ as the only ones that win are the casinos!) and of course, no trip to Vegas would be complete without a visit to the Grand Canyon.
Pictures and explanations of new products I will leave to more senior scribes in this magazine as this is more of an overview from a first timer. Suffice to say, this is really the most amazing variety and display of shooting equipment I have ever seen or fired. Like Vegas itself, you have to see it to believe it, it is almost too much to take in. So, with all the travel, jet lag, cost, would I go again...? Don’t be ridiculous! Of course I would - I have only been back two days and I am saving up again already!
Vegas breakfast - three pancakes, eggs, bacon & maple syrup!
Olympic medals won by American shooters.
Need a VW camper with a grenade-launcher on the roof!
Only in Vegas...
Les Holgate your - Vegas Virgin
Now in Now in
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52
THE HANDLOADING BENCH7.62x54R (Conclusion) by Laurie Holland
THE HANDLOADING BENCH - 7.62x54R
The Conclusion. By Laurie Holland
It’s time to finish this look at our 120 year old, albeit anything but geriatric, cartridge and
see how it performed on the range. Reprising handloading processes to date, Lapua brass
was used throughout, although I now have some S&B and PPU examples to compare
against the more expensive Finnish brand (Table 1). Note the large divergence between
the weights and capacities of the Lapua and PPU examples. This is so great that a ‘warm’
load worked up in PPU brass would likely be too ‘hot’ in the Finnish brand, QuickLOAD
showing a near 5000 psi chamber pressure difference. It also means that mixing makes
of brass in your handloads will have an even greater – worse – effect than normal on
precision, especially as the M1891/30 shifts its point of impact substantially at even 100
yards as pressures and velocities change.
53
THE HANDLOADING BENCH7.62x54R (Conclusion) by Laurie Holland
All Lapua case weights fell within a 1.5gn variation over a 25-piece sample, over half within a mere half-grain. 20 PPU cases covered around 3.5gn and S&B consistency fell between the other two. The maximum allowed length for the 7.62X54R case is 2.114-inch with a trim-to value of 2.105. My Lapua cases were all well under either figure when new and did not need trimming at any stage despite some being loaded and resized three or four times, still under the 2.100-inch mark on their final resizing. The others were longer, S&B almost maximum after firing factory rounds and before sizing, PPU approaching the ‘trim-to‘ figure. A set of Lee dies was purchased and cases were full-length sized on each firing, only laterally backing the die out in the Redding T7 press turret to reduce the amount of shoulder set-back. Four 0.310-311-inch dia. bullets were loaded within a 123-186gn range but, I concentrated on two 174gn models, Hornady’s FMJBT #3131 and Sierra’s HPBT MatchKing #2315. 25 examples each were loaded with smaller diameter 30-cal bullets, Lapua’s 185gn D46 FMJBT and Sierra’s 180gn HPBT MatchKing to see how these slightly undersize models would perform in what is really a 303 calibre rifle despite its 7.62mm designation.
LengthsBefore moving onto primers and powders, there was one other decision to be made – COAL, or how deep to seat the bullets. The official overall length is 77mm (3.031-inches) putting it into the same bracket as many of its late 19th / early 20th century military contemporaries, 7.5X55mm Swiss (77.7mm), .303 British (78.11mm), 7.92X57mm Mauser (82mm), and .30-06 (84.84mm) but, as with the others this was partly determined by the early use of long round-nose 200-220gn flat-base bullets seated to the bottom of the case-neck.
Try to load the aforementioned 174s out at three-inches plus and their parallel shanks are barely in the neck. I loaded the Hornady at 2.98 in., the Sierra MK around 10 thou’ longer and the bottom of the bullet shank/boat-tail junction was around half way down the case-neck in both loadings. The short, little 123gn
Lapua was seated with only around a tenth of an inch of neck grip. The Hornady reloading manual doesn’t give a COAL for its 174gn FMJ loads, whilst Sierra’s quotes 2.975 in. for the MatchKing and I could have just as easily have adopted Sierra’s setting for both.
There was no science in my choosing slightly longer lengths as I simply seated the bullets with what looked enough grip, measured what I got and checked that the result didn’t put the bullets into the rifling. Consequently, I’ve no idea of what actual bullet-jump was from case-mouth to rifling leade, probably a lot as you find most military ordnance authorities didn’t upgrade chamber dimensions when they moved from round-nose to lighter pointed bullets in their standard ball rounds way back in 19-oatcake. (Unlike loading for precision rifles, there’s usually little or no benefit to be obtained in setting COALs to give 10 or 20 thou’ jumps in most military rifles anyway, even if it proves physically possible and you accept the hassle of single-loading the resulting over-magazine length rounds. These old soldiers rarely respond noticeably to precision-loading tricks).
Fortunately, Hornady’s and Sierra’s bullet designers knew just what sort of firearms their products are likely to be used in and these relatively blunt tangent ogive jobs will jump half an inch into the leade if need be and still perform well if the barrel and its throat are in good condition. At these COALs just under the three-inch mark, there was loads of spare room in the magazine box and I did all range testing loading five-round batches into the mag and treating the rifle as a repeater, the feed proving to be 100% reliable and very smooth. (In fact, with the Nagant magazine’s inbuilt cartridge interrupter system and the cock on opening bolt combined with the sniper rifle’s longer and turned down handle, the rifle was very easy and pleasant to operate on the bench – far better than a Lee-Enfield, P’14/M1917 or early model Mauser would be with their cock on closing systems.)
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THE HANDLOADING BENCH7.62x54R (Conclusion) by Laurie Holland
The Load testing set-up on the bench with the essential spotting scope alongside.
Lapua brass was used in all test loads. Capacities varied considerablybetween PPU and Lapua cases.
55
THE HANDLOADING BENCH7.62x54R (Conclusion) by Laurie Holland
Two P’sThat leaves the other consumables – primers and powders. Brazilian CBC Magtech 9½ standard Large Rifle models were used throughout seated by one of Lee Precision’s recently updated hand tools, the Auto-Prime XR. This latest version of the venerable tool is instantly recognisable by its square primer holder/flipper/magazine and is in my humble opinion superior to the fancier and more expensive ERGO model. Anybody who’s used the Auto-Prime – I have for more than a quarter century and worn out/broken I don’t know how many over the years – will feel at home with the newest model but it really is much improved. It provides a more positive feel as primers go in, the magazine incorporates a primer feed channel that stops the old problem of a gaggle of the wee beasties hanging up together so you had to tap or shake the tool to get them to move down into the tool head.
Perhaps best of all, there’s a secondary rod above the tool body that runs parallel to the seating plunger and lifts one primer at a time out of the feed channel prior to dropping it under the shellholder as the operating handle is released, thereby isolating that being seated from those in the magazine. This should eliminate the double-feeding of two primers that happened occasionally with the original tool and if God forbid, you do something really unfortunate or suffer some weird static electricity effect or similar that causes primer detonation during seating, it should be limited to that one example between the case and seating punch with no chance of a chain reaction spreading to those in the magazine.
Not many shooters have come across Magtech primers. I’ve used them on and off for years having first discovered them through the late David Shaw who traded as ‘Reloaders’ from a terraced house in Scunthorpe around 20 years ago. They were much cheaper than the American models, so much so at that time that David said he had trouble selling them, his customers dubious that they could be any good at the asking prices.
We don’t see much of CBC products here but this is a huge ammunition manufacturing operation and they made the only 62gn SS109 bulleted 5.56mm ammunition (M855 type to American readers) I ever found that would shoot well to 600 yards in my SSR-15 straight-pull ‘black rifle’. I used the company’s #7½ Small Rifle Magnum primer in my 223 Rem handloads for this rifle too and never saw any difference in results between them and much more expensive CCI and Federal products. Viking Arms is the UK distributor for CBC products.
ChoicesThat leaves powders. With a case capacity falling between those of the 303 and 30-06 allied to 30-calibre, you’d expect the 7.62X54R to be a flexible number, and it is. Throw in the variety and choice of powders available to the handloader in that ‘middle burning rate band’ between Viht N135 on the fast side and N160, IMR/H4831 on the slow side, all likely to work at least reasonably well and I could probably have tried around 15 different propellants. In the event, N135 was chosen for the little 123gn Lapua FMJs and gave over 3100 fps with fairly good groups, otherwise everything was in the N140 to H4350 range. With my N140 supply nearly used up, I switched to the Commonside Firearms’ distributed Swiss TR140, a powder whose behaviour is so close to the Finnish number that I regard them as clones. Even before I get into results, I’ll say that if you want to keep things simple in this cartridge choose a good quality 174gn bullet and load it over Vit N140/TR140 – it’s all you need to keep your Mosin-Nagant happy.
Three ‘obvious choices’ were discounted on purely selfish grounds – Hodgdon’s 4895 and VarGet, Alliant Reloder 15. With limited stocks, all three of single production lots, dedicated to my long-range 308 Win and 223 Rem F/TR loads, there was no way I was going
56
THE HANDLOADING BENCH7.62x54R (Conclusion) by Laurie Holland
to consume any of these precious powders in the ancient Soviet clunker! Hodgdon still got in on the act though with its H4350, the slowest burning powder tried.
Let’s move onto another ‘obvious’ choice’, that which I confidently expected to be THE star performer with its mix of apparently ideal burning rate and specific density. QuickLOAD predicted Viht N150 would achieve or better 50,000 psi at a near 100% case fill-ratio allied to complete charge consumption. In practice, it performed superbly with the Sierra 174, but not quite as well with the same weight Hornady – you win some, lose some!
I tried three propellants that many readers will either be unfamiliar with, or only have a vague recollection of – Lovex SO62 and SO65 and IMR-4007SSC. The Lovex duo comes from Explosia, a large propellants and explosives manufacturer in the Czech Republic via Westlander Limited, a small UK outfit located in the West Yorks/Lancs border region. The range is known to some British shooters under different designations from when Explosia supplied many Accurate Arms products under the latter’s name.
Accurate was taken over by Western Powders, which packages and distributes the all ball powder Ramshot
Four of the six bullets tried, all 0.310-311-inch dia. The two 174gn models from Sierra andHornady in the centre were mainly used.
57
THE HANDLOADING BENCH7.62x54R (Conclusion) by Laurie Holland
range and there was obviously some falling out subsequently as this American company switched suppliers away from the Czechs for its acquisitions. We still get the Czech manufactured powders here though, although they’ve reverted to the Lovex brand name and the maker’s European designations which are ‘SO..’ for extruded stick numbers, ‘DO..’ for double-base ball types. (I’ll look at these and other new powders in a future issue.)
SO62 is what used to be sold as Accurate Arms-4064, a single-base tubular number with a similar burning rate and characteristics to that most flexible of the traditional US IMR powders, DuPont IMR-4064 (still in production but now in Canada and part of the Hodgdon group). 4064/SO62 has lots of applications in mid-size cartridges from 22-250 Rem/220 Swift up to 30-06 class numbers and even 375 H&H Magnum. It was a ‘standard powder’ for mid-range accuracy loads in 308 and 30-06 for decades in M1A/M14 and M1 Garand service rifles when combined with 168gn or 175gn Sierra MK bullets.
Whilst this suggests it’s an old product, SO62/AA-4064 is a recent introduction here – I used to regularly ask Westlander Ltd’s Chris Pearson if he could acquire it as I was sure it would prove a very useful addition to our powder ranges. (You can buy genuine IMR-4064 too these days as Edgar Brothers imports it, but SO62 is cheaper if you can find a retailer who stocks Lovex powders). For those unfamiliar with 4064 - that is most British shooters - the burning rate is similar to that of Hodgdon H4895 and of the long gone and much missed Alliant Reloder 12.
SO65 is another and in this case, newly introduced, tubular job which allegedly has the same burning rate as VarGet, a characteristic which the importer is understandably keen to capitalise upon given the
popularity of and huge number of applications for the latter. QuickLOAD suggests real-life use doesn’t support the manufacturer’s specifications though as it generally needs noticeably heavier charges to achieve VarGet’s pressures and velocities. With it being a relatively bulky stick type too, this means you’ll run out of room in the case or run it heavily compressed in applications where a case-full of VarGet just produces full velocities as in 308 Winchester, especially when the COAL is restricted so the bullet is seated on the deep side.
I reckon SO65 will turn out to be an excellent choice where there is a bit more case capacity available and a burning rate between that of VarGet and H4350, (or Viht N140/N150), suits – older roomy cartridges such as 7.5 Swiss, 303, 30-06, the various Mausers and suchlike. I’m sure there are lots of more modern
The much enhanced Lee Auto-Prime XR hand priming tool and cheap Brazilian CBCMagtech 9½ LR primers were used throughout.
58
THE HANDLOADING BENCH7.62x54R (Conclusion) by Laurie Holland
cartridges where it’ll work well too. ( This may prove to be a winner in the 6.5mm Hornady Creedmoor with 120-130gn bullets mentioned elsewhere in this issue).
That leaves IMR-4007 SSC, a fairly recent introduction from Hodgdon/IMR but one you only rarely see mentioned even on the US shooting forums, suggesting it’s not yet found many outstanding roles in the cartridges that are currently ‘in’ and generating posts. Starting at the ‘end’ and working back to the ‘beginning’ of its name, SSC = Super Short-Cut, it having very short stubby tubular stick kernels allowing high case fill-ratios and providing consistent charges from mechanical powder measures. It’s a single-base propellant with a burn rate filling the large gap between #4320 and #4350 in the IMR range (so why ‘4007’, not something logical like ‘4335’?) – that
Six of the eight powders tried (Viht N135 and N140 missing).
puts it somewhere close to Viht N540-N150 and the aforementioned Lovex SO65, slightly slower burning than N140, VarGet and Reloder 15.
It’s a very versatile powder suited to a huge number of cartridge/bullet-weight combinations. However, apart from proving ideal for the stubby Winchester Super Short Magnums and some .22-250 Rem loads, it doesn’t seem to have caught on and rarely gets a mention in loading manuals – probably because it rarely produces top velocities in any particular cartridge/load combination. I’ve read it also works very well in the WSM and SAUM short magnums, but Alliant Reloder 17 has taken all kudos and interest here with its outstandingly high velocities (and barrel wear!).
I’d bought my stock as it looked like it might be ideal for heavy bullets in 308 Win F/TR loads and, whilst
Bullets were seated fairly shallow to just under 3-inches COAL. Hornady 174 FMJBT left andSierra 174 MatchKing on the right. 59
THE HANDLOADING BENCH7.62x54R (Conclusion) by Laurie Holland
60
THE HANDLOADING BENCH7.62x54R (Conclusion) by Laurie Holland
groups were good, the velocities fell short of what I needed in this application. As an IMR powder, it’s manufactured in Canada under Hodgdon ownership and Edgar Brothers is the UK and European distributor. 4007 turned out to be the big discovery in this cartridge producing the smallest group and suiting the 174gn Hornady very well.
On the BenchBefore I give the results, I’ll say a little about testing these loads off the bench. I thought this would be an ‘interesting’ but probably deeply unfulfilling exercise – I’m spoiled by too many top grade custom rifles with precise and light triggers, heavy stainless limited-production precision barrels and high-power scopes with 56mm objective lens diameters. Here was this piece of Tsarist/Soviet junk with its horribly non-ergonomic stock, tiny 3.5X PU scope, trigger creep and pull-weight so great that other people could shoot whole matches while I waited for the rifle to make its first round go ‘bang’. Actually, against the odds, I really enjoyed the experience! The rifle was shot rested throughout, my Sinclair front-rest having its adjustable ‘All-Purpose’ rest-top installed and positioned way back compared to normal use so the bag-sides gripped the widest part of the forend not that much ahead of the action – not ideal but still more stable than using one of these large bag front-supports, range box, or similar.
Targets and aiming-marks had to be rather different from my usual practice because of the 3.5X scope and its reticle form. I usually print A4 sheets consisting of a one-inch grid with superimposed half-inch dia. Aiming-marks onto card for my load testing targets, before cutting the sheets in half crossways to give A5 size target sheets. I then shoot four to six groups on each. In this case, I obviously needed MUCH larger aiming-marks and pieces of card, so shot two groups only per A4 target, sometimes only one.
The choice of aiming-mark was important and took some experimentation – black circles and squares were tried trying to leave a small white gap between the pointed tip of the vertical post reticle and the bottom of the mark in the aim, as in shooting with a blade or partridge iron-sight. That didn’t work. I eventually found the best option was to stick a pair of two-inch dia. - better still three-inch diameter - self-adhesive Birchwood Casey orange targets onto the grid. The orange was light enough to just see if the rather indistinct reticle tip overlapped the bottom of the mark – even so, I’m sure aiming errors added a bit (lot?!) of vertical into some groups leaving me with the situation of wondering whether some 4+1 groups were truly that shape and size, or I’d injected one to inches into the group size. Most load combinations comprised 25 rounds, of five by five-round batches. They’d initially cover a 2.5 or 3.0gn charge weight spreads, but as I became more familiar with the cartridge’s characteristics, that was narrowed to a two-grain spread incorporating four half-grain steps. (The RCBS ChargeMaster 1500 automatic dispenser is a boon here!). Many lowest charge groups consist of only two or three shots as re-sighting was almost often needed – a change of load usually seeing the 100-yard POI move by up to six-inches and, in extreme cases, nine to twelve inches vertically and three to six laterally – so a clean backing sheet tacked to the target frame was usually essential at this point to find the first hole in a new set of rounds. (Within 25-round batches, each half-grain charge weight increase would see the mean POI rise an inch or two, and after a certain pressure/velocity was reached, charge increases moved the POI rapidly to the left as well.) This also means that you really need to test and zero your M-N handloads under such conditions – trying out a new combination at 500 or 600 yards in a competition or practice shoot is likely to be a frustrating experience. Talking about seeing holes, a spotting scope and stand was another essential accessory, as there was little chance of seeing shots through the low-power PU riflescope.
61
The target set-up. Two, more often three, A4 sheets mounted transversely, two groups shot on each sheet. The point of impact changed considerably as charges rose, the final group here (bottom right) moving nearly three inches to the left of its predecessor (bottom left) for a half-grain charge increase.
CommentsAs always, the results speak for themselves but a few comments are in order. First and foremost is the issue of what is ‘good’, ‘bad’, or ‘indifferent’ when judging group size in this sort of rifle. Talking about the Nagant to a top GB F/TR shooter during the European F-Class Championship meeting at Bisley elicited the response he’d owned three of these rifles in ‘sniper’ form over the years and couldn’t get any of them ‘to shoot at all’ - by which he meant produce sub three or four-inch groups. So, my example is obviously a very lucky find.
Quite frankly a lot of these rifles – and I include our own 303 Number 4(T) and the German 8mm sniper Mauser amongst them – struggled to achieve two-MOA groups when new, never mind after suffering unknown amounts of military ammo down their barrels with an equally unknown but probably inadequate cleaning regime by today’s standards. So I regard three-inch 100 yard groups as acceptable, ~2-inches as very good and 1-1.5-inches as being in the ‘I’ve fallen really lucky with this example’ category.
So far as velocities go, I only obtained a handful from early testing thanks to the miserable weather we had in the north of England over most of 2012 allied to the bulk of the work being done during the back end of the year with short dark days that killed my chronograph’s functioning. I’ll just say I wasn’t looking for any high-speed loads. Despite the M1891/30’s 29-inch barrel, 2450 – 2600 fps with 174-180gn bullets was more than good enough. The best groups generally came with pressures in the 40,000 – 45,000 psi range (QuickLOAD estimates) and, I doubt if anything I used hit 50,000 psi (against a CIP allowed maximum average of 56,565 psi).
Certainly nothing showed anything approaching high pressure indications in terms of flattened or cratered primers and hard bolt lift. As previously noted, full-
62
THE HANDLOADING BENCH7.62x54R (Conclusion) by Laurie Holland
length sizing was an easy task and that would be only partly down to the efficacy of the big Redding T7 press and use of Imperial sizing wax as the case lubricant – the cases were simply not being stretched very much at these pressures and I’m sure would give a life of many loadings and firings.
So far as low pressure symptoms go - the classic one being sooted-up cases due to poor case obturation in the chamber - this only happened with Lovex SO62 where for some reason or other I chose a rather low range of charges at 43.5-45.5gn, the lower end only expected to produce some 39,000 psi according to QuickLOAD. All charge-weights produced this ghastly symptom (I hate filthy cases, chambers and bolts!) bar the top one so, I had a second attempt with the powder raising charges to 47gn in smaller steps, that weight producing 10,000 psi more than my original starting load as estimated by the program, 49,108 psi for 2743 fps. That’s for the MatchKing by the way, not the 174gn Hornady as actually used on the range, since QuickLOAD doesn’t have Hornady’s #3131 in its database.
Perhaps because test shooting took place on my coldest load-testing outing of 2012 where temperatures didn’t rise above minus-four C, these
Both lots of factory ammo performed well. (Three-inch aiming mark / one-inch grid.)
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THE HANDLOADING BENCH7.62x54R (Conclusion) by Laurie Holland
higher charges burned dirty too. Or.... maybe 7.62X54R and SO62 simply don’t get on that well but I doubt that for two reasons: it burns very cleanly in the not dissimilar 308 Winchester cartridge; I shot five groups in the Nagant that cold day that ran between 1¼ and just over two inches despite my trigger finger feeling like it had died from hypothermia.
The 0.3090-inch Lapua D46 load produced a couple of respectable efforts, the 0.3083in. Sierra MatchKing was poorer than the norm with everything above three inches. Moral – stick to 0.310-311-inch bullets despite what the American manuals say, unless you’re loading for a Finnish 7.62X53R barrelled rifle.
Two factory rounds were tried from Sellier & Bellot and Prvi-Partizan. Both did well with most shots going into two-inch groups but the occasional flyer taking some out to three – see comments above on aiming difficulties though! That leaves the little 123gn Lapua FMJ flat-base with its deeply concave lead core - when you look up its rear end. I’d worked a couple of loads up shortly after I bought the rifle some years ago and eventually settled on 51.0gn Viht N135 as a short-range (up to 300 yards) combination. It gave some impressive groups in this original range-test but, I’m sorry that I can’t say exactly what, as I mislaid my targets and notes.
Anyway, I had most of a 50-round box left over and started this series off by carefully shooting five groups with it after using the others to sight-in and reacquaint myself with the vagaries of shooting the military Mosin-Nagant. Perhaps because I hadn’t got the aiming-marks sorted out at this stage, or perhaps because they’d been sitting in a cabinet for a couple of years, or perhaps because they weren’t as good as the original tests suggested, the five averaged out at 2¾-inches, nothing under two. Anyway, who knows why and I wasn’t going to work up a new lot.
If you’re interested in trying these little bullets, but worried about 51gn of slightly fast burning powder and 3100 fps plus MVs equalling risky pressures, rest assured my friends – QuickLOAD predicts a modest 42,011 psi peak pressure for an impressive 3117 fps MV, gratifying close to my chronographed 3143 fps. As a last and final comment (yes really, I promise), this is not a cartridge and rifle combination for those who must have small extreme spreads – 40 to 60 fps is common for five shot strings.
The 174gn Sierra MatchKing over Viht N140 / Commonside’s TR140 is always a good bet in this cartridge. (Two-inch aiming mark / one-inch grid.)
The winning combination in the writer’s Nagant was the 0.3105 174gn Hornady FMJBT over IMR-4007 SSC – a sub MOA group is outstanding in this age and type of rifle. (Two-inch aiming mark / one-inch grid.)
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THE HANDLOADING BENCH7.62x54R (Conclusion) by Laurie Holland
Table 1Case Weights and CapacitiesMake Fired/Empty Plus Water Water Capacity QL MV QL PMaxLapua 180.4gn 243.3gn 62.9gn 2695 fps 49,088 psiS&B 174.0gn 238.1gn 64.1gn 2677 fps 47,279 psiPPU 152.0gn 218.2gn 66.2gn 2647 fps 44,446 psi
Notes1 - Fired cases were un-sized and still had spent primers in situ. 2 - QL MV = QuickLOAD estimate of muzzle velocity in fps with 174gn Sierra MK over 46.0gn Viht N140 in that water capacity case. 3 - QL Pressure = QuickLOAD estimate of peak pressure in psi with 174gn Sierra MK over 46.0gn Viht N140 in that water capacity case.
Table 2
RESULTS (100 yard 5-shot groups)Factory RoundsPrvi Partizan (PPU) 182gn FMJ: Average 2¼-inch 2615 fps / 80 ESSellier & Bellot 180gn FMJ: Average 2½-inch n/r Handloads (FL Sized Lapua brass + CBC Magtech 9½ LR Primer)
Powder Charges Groups Comments
123gn Lapua FMJ (0.310”) p/n S405Viht N135 51.0gn 2¾-in (average) 5 x 5-round groups. 3143 fps / 68 / 13 (ES/SD)
186gn FNM FMJ Flat-Base (0.311”) Viht N140 45.5-46.5gn 2-2¾-inch 2580 fps / 48 ES (46.5gn)
180gn Sierra MatchKing (0.3083”) p/n 2220IMR-4007SSC 47.0-49.0gn 3.1 – 4-inch Undersize bullet
185gn Lapua D46 FMJBT (0.3090”)IMR-4007SSC 47.0-49.0gn 2¼ – 3½-inch Undersize bullet 174gn Sierra MatchKing p/n 2315 (.311”)TR140 44.0-46.0gn 1.1 – 3-inch 2493 fps / 12 ES (46gn) 3 ex 5 groups 1.1-1¼-inch IMR-4007SSC 47.0-49.0gn 2¼ – 3-inch Viht N150 45.0-47.0gn 1.1 –2¼-inch 2 ex 5 groups under 1½-inch
174gn Hornady FMJBT p/n 3131 (0.3105”)Viht N140 44.0-46.5gn 1¾ – 4½-inch 2577 fps / 40 ES (46.0gn)Viht N150 45.0-48.0gn 2½ – 4½-inch 2635 fps / 40 ES (47.0gn)IMR-4007SSC 47.0-49.0gn 0.95 – 2.1-inch Small group. QL estimates 2693 fps/47,413 psi for 49gn.Lovex SO62 43.5-45.5gn 1¾ – 2½-inch Sooted cases.Lovex SO62 45.8-47.0gn 1¼ – 2¼-inch Sooted cases (very cold). Outstanding combination. QL estimates 2759 fps / 50,656 psi for 47gn.Lovex SO65 47.5-49.5gn 1¾ – 4½-inch Hodgdon H4350 49.0-51.0gn 1¼ – 2¾-inch
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IMPORTANT NOTICEThese components and loads performed safely in the author’s rifle: this cannot be guaranteed for other firearms. Good handloading procedures should be used working loads up from low starting levels while looking for signs of excessive pressure. Note comments on the large variations in case-make capacities which will affect pressures.
Czech Lovex SO62 (the old Accurate-4064) worked very well in the cartridge despite producing sooted-up cases. (Three-inch aiming mark / one-inch grid.)
Table 2
RESULTS (100 yard 5-shot groups)Factory RoundsPrvi Partizan (PPU) 182gn FMJ: Average 2¼-inch 2615 fps / 80 ESSellier & Bellot 180gn FMJ: Average 2½-inch n/r Handloads (FL Sized Lapua brass + CBC Magtech 9½ LR Primer)
Powder Charges Groups Comments
123gn Lapua FMJ (0.310”) p/n S405Viht N135 51.0gn 2¾-in (average) 5 x 5-round groups. 3143 fps / 68 / 13 (ES/SD)
186gn FNM FMJ Flat-Base (0.311”) Viht N140 45.5-46.5gn 2-2¾-inch 2580 fps / 48 ES (46.5gn)
180gn Sierra MatchKing (0.3083”) p/n 2220IMR-4007SSC 47.0-49.0gn 3.1 – 4-inch Undersize bullet
185gn Lapua D46 FMJBT (0.3090”)IMR-4007SSC 47.0-49.0gn 2¼ – 3½-inch Undersize bullet 174gn Sierra MatchKing p/n 2315 (.311”)TR140 44.0-46.0gn 1.1 – 3-inch 2493 fps / 12 ES (46gn) 3 ex 5 groups 1.1-1¼-inch IMR-4007SSC 47.0-49.0gn 2¼ – 3-inch Viht N150 45.0-47.0gn 1.1 –2¼-inch 2 ex 5 groups under 1½-inch
174gn Hornady FMJBT p/n 3131 (0.3105”)Viht N140 44.0-46.5gn 1¾ – 4½-inch 2577 fps / 40 ES (46.0gn)Viht N150 45.0-48.0gn 2½ – 4½-inch 2635 fps / 40 ES (47.0gn)IMR-4007SSC 47.0-49.0gn 0.95 – 2.1-inch Small group. QL estimates 2693 fps/47,413 psi for 49gn.Lovex SO62 43.5-45.5gn 1¾ – 2½-inch Sooted cases.Lovex SO62 45.8-47.0gn 1¼ – 2¼-inch Sooted cases (very cold). Outstanding combination. QL estimates 2759 fps / 50,656 psi for 47gn.Lovex SO65 47.5-49.5gn 1¾ – 4½-inch Hodgdon H4350 49.0-51.0gn 1¼ – 2¾-inch
THE HANDLOADING BENCH7.62x54R (Conclusion) by Laurie Holland
66
Competitions Whilst many shooters were sleeping off the effects of Christmas, 600 yard benchrest shooters were back on the benches the day after Boxing Day for round three of the UKBRA 600 yard winter series.
For December, we couldn’t complain about the weather and sure enough we had some decent groups. Chris Gleave shot a remarkable sub. two-incher with his 308 Accuracy International – off a bi-pod and put one over on Darrel Evans and Sean Broxham who normally dominate the Factory Class.
Overall winner was Light Gun shooter, Ian Dixon shooting his 6-6.5-47 Stolle and Gary Wrighton won Heavy Gun in his first outing with his 6.5-284 built by Callum Ferguson of PRS in Scotland.
Results: Light Gun: (av. of four, 5-shot groups)1st - Ian Dixon. 6x47 TGP Stolle. 3.281”2nd - Bruce Lenton. 6BR TGP Winchester. 3.655”3rd - Steve Barrett. 6XC Wadsworth. 4.041”Small group: 2.45 inches. Ian Dixon
Heavy Gun:1st - Gary Wrighton. 6.5-284 PRS Nesika. 3.655”2nd - Bob Nicholson. 6.5-284 Barnard. 4.281”3rd - Dale Almond. 308 Barnard. 4.836”Small group: 2.727 inches. Gary Wrighton
Factory Class:1st - Chris Gleave. 308 Accuracy Intl. 4.339”2nd - Sean Broxham. 6.5-284 Savage. 4.364”3rd - Darrel Evans. 6.5x47 Accuracy Intl. 5.001”Small group: 1.883 inches. Chris Gleave
In January, we should have been back on the benches for round four of our 600 yard series but, we were thwarted by the weather, with snow making range access impossible. Next shoot – 24th February. If you’d like to try 600 yard benchrest, just turn up at Diggle for 10.00am with your rifle and ammo. E-mail me on [email protected] for more details.
Other StuffObtaining benchrest quality bullets in the UK is becoming ever more difficult. American bullet makers can no longer ship to us unless they have the necessary paperwork and, for the small custom manufacturers, it’s not really worth it for the tiny UK market. Whilst over in Vegas for the Shot Show, I got to visit Don Lahr of Precision Ballistics, a cottage bullet maker who does have an arrangement with a shipper for overseas orders and, in addition to the range of 6mm bullets, Don also makes a range of 6.5 bullets. Next month we’ll have a closer look at Don’s custom bullet making set-up but meanwhile, check outwww.precisionballisticsllc.com
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The Armalite AR10 by Vince Bottomley
and Laurie Holland.
The Armalite AR10 Part 2By Vince Bottomley&Laurie Holland
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The Armalite AR10 by Vince Bottomley
and Laurie Holland.
The Armalite AR10by Vince Bottomley &Laurie Holland.Part 2
In our January issue, we started off the Armalite project by installing a new barrel – chambered for the 6.5 Hornady Creedmoor cartridge. The original barrel was chambered for the 308 Win. and, although it’s difficult to fault the 308 cartridge as a great all-rounder, it did pose some extraction problems with our manually-operated rifle. We are hoping that the Creedmoor will provide similar – if not better – ballistics with slicker operation. Laurie now takes up the story...
Well, Vince has handed the AR-10 back in its new guise, and I must say it looks just right with that length and profile barrel and neat muzzle brake – probably more bling than function with this fairly heavy rifle and relatively mild 6.5mm cartridge.
The question is of course - will it perform? This has two parts: precision (will it produce small groups?); function (will fired cases extract easily?). I’m very relaxed about the first as the 6.5mm Hornady Creedmoor has quickly built up a good reputation in the USA in both bolt-action rifles and gas-guns in its short life and the AR-10 platform is capable of excellent results. In fact I’m so confident about how the cartridge will perform in the precision role that I’ve commissioned a Stiller Predator based bolt-action tactical rifle from Fox Firearms in the chambering which will be completed as soon as Brian
Fox gets his next delivery of 6.5mm barrel blanks from Bartlein Barrels in the USA. (Sod’s Law – when Brian had barrels, we couldn’t get a chamber reamer; we now have the reamer, but no barrel!)
Getting an answer to the second part of the question is more problematic. Thanks to the post-Hungerford ban on semi-automatic centrefire rifles, few British shooters have experience of modern semi-auto type target and
sporting rifles, whether in gas or UK-legal manually operated versions, so I’ll describe the issues.
Both versions function identically except that the latter lacks a gas port in the barrel and the associated feed to an operating piston, or in the AR’s case the bolt carrier and bolt as it employs ‘direct impingement’ gas operation. Fire a round and the semi-auto version uses a tiny part of the propellant charge’s gas production to unlock the bolt, move it back the length of the receiver
Smallest 6.5s. Left to right: 6.5x47 Lapua, 6.5 HornadyCreedmoor and 260 Rem.
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The Armalite AR10 by Vince Bottomley
and Laurie Holland.
against mainspring pressure, reset the trigger hammer to the cocked position and extract/eject the fired case. Brit-ARs see these operations effected by manually pulling on an external operating handle bolted to the bolt carrier assembly - arm and shoulder-power doing the job that the trapped and carefully directed gas does automatically in the original ‘pure’ version. Once the bolt is fully back at its maximum travel, a common
operating mode reappears, the mainspring pushing the bolt forwards into battery, stripping a new cartridge from the magazine and chambering it on the way.
So far, so straightforward. The problem arises from the lack of cam-powered primary extraction in semi-auto designs. When you lift the bolt handle on your Remy 700 or similar turn-bolt action, its base is forced backwards by a curved section of receiver acting as a mild cam. When the handle reaches the top of its stroke, and before you start to pull it backwards, that
movement has forced the bolt and attached fired case rearwards - only marginally but enough to break the cartridge-case to chamber interference-fit to allow easy bolt opening and case removal – or to use the proper jargon ‘has effected primary extraction’.
A gas-gun also turns the bolt to unlock it then simply applies sheer brute strength to yank the case out of the chamber – a brutal process. The force applied is so great and its build-up so rapid, that if the cartridge’s load is too high for the rifle leaving a super-tight case to chamber fit (or other problems exist such as rough and/or very dirty chamber walls) the extractor will tear through the back of the case leaving it stuck. Apply this setup to manually-operated derivatives and what you’d think was an everyday task now sees the human operator grunting and cursing as he (or she) struggles with an apparently locked-up bolt. Once enough force is applied to overcome the chamber’s hold on the case and get it moving at all, the resistance disappears and the bolt flies open.
The little 223 Rem. cartridge generally works well in this set-up until you try using RG 5.56mm NATO surplus in your straight-pull, or really stoke your home-loads up. My experience with the cartridge in straight-pull AR-15s is that loads that generate up to an estimated PMax of ~58,500 psi according to QuickLOAD work fine. Exceed somewhere between that figure and ~59,000 psi and the primary extraction issue rears its ugly head, the required effort rising rapidly with each subsequent 100 or 200 psi increase in chamber pressure.
Use a larger case with a much greater case/chamber contact area and life inevitably gets harder even if you don’t increase pressures. The 6.8mm Remington SPC case extracts sweetly with factory ammunition pressures – I’ve yet to try handloads with this cartridge. The 308 Win. is hard work, sometimes almost impossible to get the bolt open unless pressures and hence MVs are kept well down. I don’t know how this trio compare in surface area but, if you take their internal capacities as measured by the weight of water they hold, the 6.8mm Rem SPC has a value of 117 and 308 Winchester 193 where 223 Rem. has a base value of 100. The 6.5 Creedmoor is a little smaller than the 308 at around 180, but still massively larger than the 223 Rem.
AR cartridges. Left to right: 223 Rem. and 6.8mm SPC(AR 15); 260 Rem. and 308 Win. (AR 10)
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The Armalite AR10 by Vince Bottomley
and Laurie Holland.
When the rifle was still in its 308 Win. form, I found that primary extraction ‘stiction’ would appear with loads that QuickLOAD estimates produce somewhere between 50,000 and 53,000 psi. There is no hard and fast ‘dividing line’ as the brass and powder used have an effect. I tried four or five makes of case and found Lapua seemed less prone to hard bolt opening – a shame as I intended to keep this brand for my long-range F/TR rifle loads and use R-P, Winchester and old Norma examples I had spare for the SSR-10! The Krieger barrel liked Lapua’s old 170gn B476 FMJBT ‘Lock-Base’ design (now discontinued) and 44gn N150 grouped consistently under half-MOA at 2650 fps MV with easy bolt opening at an estimated pressure just below 50,000 psi and that was adopted as my standard load.
A combination used in a bolt-action FN Special Police Rifle factory job – 175gn Sierra MK over 43.0gn IMR-4064 in Lapua brass with a PMC (Russian) standard primer – gave inch-size groups, just over 2700 fps and very hard initial extraction when tried in the ‘10’ (QuickLOAD PMax estimate: 56,882 psi).
Conversely, some very expensive Federal Gold Medal 168gn Match (Sierra MK bullet) rounds performed superbly grouping into 0.3MOA at 100 yards and at 2729 fps from the SSR’s 28-inch barrel with easy extraction. It’s said Federal uses Alliant Reloder 15 in this loading and if this is so, QuickLOAD estimates 43.5gn would produce that MV at 50,243 psi PMax. Another factory load, a box of ancient Winchester 200gn Silvertip hunting rounds grouped well and extracted easily too.
I should say there is no sharp dividing line between easy and hard extraction – it’s a graduated process whereby an initial but easily overcome check on bolt-opening appears at a particular charge weight with a particular load combination, resistance then increasing noticeably with each subsequent step of 0.2gn in 223 Rem., double that in 308 Win., until it becomes a real struggle to open the bolt at all with maybe 0.8 to a full grain higher charge in 223, half as much again in 308.
When resistance first appears, five cartridges in a batch will often display different behaviors too with maybe four giving easy bolt opening, one proving to be significantly tighter, demonstrating clearly how smallarms cartridges produce a considerable range of pressures even with match grade components and good handloading practices.
At this point, you’re probably asking two questions. First, why bother with the ‘big AR’ (the 10) at all when the smaller, lighter AR-15 works so well in 223 Rem and 6.8mm chamberings? Secondly, having foolishly bought a ‘10’ why bother rebarrelling it from 308 Win to the only slightly smaller case 6.5mm Creedmoor
ball powders that
can produce erratic
pressures and velocities,
severe muzzle flash and
blast at the sort of
pressures I’m looking at.
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The Armalite AR10 by Vince Bottomley
and Laurie Holland.
that produces similar pressures – they share identical 60,191 psi MAP (Maximum Average Pressure) values under SAAMI regulations?
The answer to the first question is that most people don’t! Speak to Southern Gun Company’s Bob Clark, Mark Bradley (Bradley Arms), Dave Wylde (Valkyrie) and others who love the AR and build them and you’ll learn that sales are overwhelmingly skewed to the smaller ‘15’. Loving my ‘15’, I’ve always fancied owning a bigger version alongside it, which is why I now have one. However, I have to admit that it’s been a bit of a
disappointment, far less satisfying to shoot than its little brother, all down to the functioning problems.
The answer to the second question lies in the realms of external ballistics. If pressures and velocities are limited by the extraction issue, 6.5mm bullets should perform better in terms of retained velocities and wind drift than equivalent 30s. Let’s examine a couple of examples using QuickLOAD and Lapua Scenar bullets. The 155gn Scenar is the most efficient of the company’s
30 cal. match bullets; the 0.264” 123gn model is very well suited to the smaller 6.5mm cartridges including the Creedmoor. Their G7 BCs are 0.236 and 0.265 respectively (Bryan Litz, Applied Ballistics for Long Range Shooting, 2nd edition).
Do QuickLOAD Charge-Run tables for the pair and it’s immediately obvious the Creedmoor/123gn combination generally produces around 100 fps higher MVs compared to the 155/308 at the same (50,000 psi) estimated pressure. Couple that to the 13% higher BC of the smaller calibre bullet and it’s going to perform better on the range or field – flatter trajectory, higher retained velocity and less wind drift. The figures for the classic 10 mph crosswind are just over 4-MOA for the Creedmoor at 600 yards, and a full-MOA more for
the 308/155, the gap rising to 2¼-MOA at 1000. This assumes 2800 fps and 2700 fps MVs for the pair, the 6.5mm bullet remaining just above transonic speeds at 1000, the 308 suffering the trauma of traversing the entire transonic speed range before just dipping below the sound barrier.
If we look at tactical and McQueen type competitions, I ran the external ballistics for the pair at 300 yards (the longer of the two McQueens’ distances) and assumed a 5mph wind-change from 90-degrees, actually rather a large gust or let-off on most ranges. The Creedmoor
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The Armalite AR10 by Vince Bottomley
and Laurie Holland.
bullet would move ~3”, the 308 another half-inch, maybe a just large enough difference to lose you more points.
Looking at the 300 yard wind figures also shows why you’d likely go for the bigger AR model in this application. The 223 Rem AR-15 is limited to low-BC (~0.190 G7) 77gn bullets seated deeply when magazine operation is needed and COALs are thereby restricted to 2.25-2.26 inches. The 77gn Sierra MK at 2700 fps moves 4½-inches in our 5 mph wind change. However, in its favour, the 223 produces considerably less recoil and rifle disturbance in the aim than either of the bigger numbers.
Anyway... moving onto the rifle in its born-again 6.5mm form, my experiences playing with the 308 Win. cartridge in the AR-10 as recounted above should have taught me something. That is, to use the invaluable QuickLOAD program to come up with a selection of load combinations that will likely perform at around 50-53,000 psi chamber pressures. How does one decide this? Good velocity allied to > 85% case fill-ratio and 99-100% of the charge consumed within the barrel. (Several powders give good forecast velocities and fill the case but, only see 90-96% charge burn at these relatively low pressures).
Initially at any rate, I’ll avoid double-base powders partly to preserve barrel life but also because past experience suggests such powders often need higher pressures to perform consistently. This particularly applies to ball powders that can produce erratic pressures and velocities, severe muzzle flash and blast at the sort of pressures I’m looking at.
Well, that’s what I should have done, not what I did. I’ll blame Hornady for this as the company produces two factory match loadings, 120gn and 140gn A Max at 3020 fps and 2820 fps in a 28 inch barrel. It goes further and publishes the components and charge weights used in these loads: F210M primers, 44.5 and 41.9gn Hodgdon H4350, COALs of 2.720 and 2.800 inches respectively. So, being in a hurry, I thought it made sense to simply copy Hornady’s loads starting a grain or so down and working up in small steps with 3-round batches. But, hang on a second …. factory ammo specs …. full SAAMI pressures?
In the immortal words of Homer J. Simpson: “UHH, DOH!” You guessed it – hard bolt opening, like REALLY hard opening. Run these loads through QuickLOAD, and the estimated PMax values are actually a bit down on SAAMI maxima but, no harm done anyway, as I’ll just put the unused rounds to one side to wait for the eventual arrival of the turn-bolt Stiller.
The other item of note about this first outing was that it took place on Diggle Ranges in mid December in a distinctly hostile environment. Vince and I almost had the place to ourselves, there being precious few other lunatics around willing to brave half dark, freezing conditions with a vicious wind blowing up the valley. Worse, we’d barely put a round downrange when it started to snow - light for a few minutes then filling the air with swirling flakes by the time we’d fired three 3-round batches. Discretion proved the better part of valour, especially in my case as I use the highest section of the trans-Pennine M62 motorway in my Diggle visits.
What’s that? Did we actually hit the target? Batch 1 (140gn) was used for sighting-in; batches 2 and 3 (120gn with Vince shooting the second of them) ran somewhere around three-quarters inch at 100 yards, so no reason to break out the bubbly or bewail a disaster in the making – typical first outing results. For next month, I’ll see if the Lothar Walther tube likes the 123gn Lapua Scenar and we’ll give N140 and N150, Lovex SO62 and SO65, IMR-4831 a try. Then after that, I’ll maybe give a few double-base numbers (N540/N550, Hodgdon Hybrid 100V, Reloder/Elcho 17) a whirl to see what sorts of velocities are available from these high-energy propellants and whether they perform consistently at 50,000 psi. There will eventually be a full report on loading and shooting this interesting new cartridge in both AR and Stiller rifles.
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The long ViewNews from the GB F-Class Association by Des Parr
The Long View by Des ParrThe F-class World Championships and the independent traveller...
The shooting highlight of 2013 for the long-range target shooter will be the F Class World Championships, to be held in Raton, New Mexico in August. If that wasn’t enough, the USA F Class Nationals will also be held, immediately before the Worlds.
The GB squads have already been selected, however that does not prevent any independent shooter going along to take part and this month’s article is aimed at the independent traveller who wishes make their own way to Raton in August for either or both competitions.
The BureaucracyThe first step is to obtain the necessary permit to enter the USA with a rifle. This is quite straightforward really; just download the 6NIA form from the BATF
website and return it with the official invitation to the matches. A formal invitation will be supplied on request from the Bald Eagles Rifle Club, who are the match organisers. See their website at: http://fcwc-usa.org/
For your first permit, allow up to 12 weeks for it to be issued, subsequent permits seem to be issued much quicker – around 5 weeks or so.
AccommodationHaving got the vital permit, next you’ll need to secure accommodation in Raton. This is where a bit of local knowledge comes in handy; on my visits to Raton I have paid from $39 up to $120 in a variety of chain and independent hotels. The cheapest option is long gone – but there is no shortage of rooms, expect to pay on average around $70 per room.
There is accommodation on the Whittington range, it falls into two categories; bunkhouses and founders’ cabins.
The bunkhouses offer basic accommodation with shared bathrooms and self-catering kitchens. They sleep 15 in small shared rooms and cost $26 per
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The independent traveller THE LONG VIEW
With Des Parr
person. The other type of accommodation is the Founders’ cabins. These are large, modern and stylish detached cabins. They have four ensuite bedrooms with twin beds and cost $35 per person. Realistically, I expect there would be little or no chance of the Founders cabins being available in 2013 as demand from the USA is likely to be high.
Getting thereRaton does have its own little airstrip but, it is not served by any scheduled flights, the nearest cities with regular connections are Denver, Albuquerque and San Antonio. By some peculiar quirk of geography, Raton is exactly 204 miles from each of those three cities. Connecting roads are of equal quality, so really the only difference is which city can offer you the best selection of flights and prices. Denver is the more popular destination of the three, so flights there are just a bit cheaper, though August is high season so expect to pay about £900 depending on the airline and flight time.
Try to avoid Heathrow if at all possible, although I know that it is nigh impossible for many have to use it. One year, the security checks took so long that I missed the flight. Another year I built-in two and a half hours and still ended up sprinting to make the flight! I would now advise building in three hours at least, if using Heathrow. Flying via a regional airport is by comparison far more efficient – and cheaper.
As a rule it is best to avoid code-sharing airline arrangements. Fly with one airline for the whole journey, as two airlines can mean double the risk of non-cooperation, differing rules and meeting incompetent staff. Sadly, all airlines now seem to charge extra for carrying two checked bags. Firearms can attract extra charges, so allow for an extra £50 per leg.
Car HireCar hire will be your next priority to arrange, this should a pleasant surprise, as car hire in the USA is very cheap. For example on my last trip to Raton Ebookers offered a compact economical car from Dollar for just £300 for 18 days – a bargain.
Car-sharing needs to be thought out carefully. Small ‘compact economy’ models should be avoided, unless it is to be used by an individual. It is best to hire at least a mid-range size car for a maximum of two shooters. This is simply due to the sheer amount and bulk of kit required and the space it uses up. Not only is the equipment bulky, it can cause damage if all lumped in together in a tight space, the lack of space can cause irritation between the shooters too. So, as a rule it is best to hire larger vehicles – they are so cheap to hire that the added cost is not significant.
TravellingOn landing at either Denver or Albuquerque, you would be well advised not to make the 204 mile journey to Raton immediately. By the time you land, you could have been on the move for 18 hours. Instead, seek a hotel about an hours drive from the airport and stay there for the night to recover from the journey and proceed to Raton bright and refreshed next morning. There are plenty of places to stop along the Interstate 25 - I can recommend the town of Castle Rock if arriving via Denver.
AmmunitionGoing abroad with a rifle usually means having to make arrangements for ammunition as well. You are
range space will be very limited – act now or live to regret it.
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The independent traveller THE LONG VIEW
With Des Parr
allowed to carry up to 5kg of ammo. per person. That is not enough for all the shoots and to avoid any hassle carrying it, you may opt to make your ammo. in Raton.
For components, simply use your preferred US supplier and have items shipped to the range or hotel. Whittington centre staff are helpful in taking delivery of parcels, so it is feasible to have equipment sent there to be held in their locked ‘goods receivable’ room for you.
Eating OutDining in Raton is limited to just a handful of restaurants, this is not a problem - though in August with an additional 300 visitors in town, it may be wise to make reservations.
K-Bobs is a steakhouse and a range sponsor, it is reasonable and economical, though nothing special.The Sweetshop is a little bit more refined, though still very basic by British standards, it provides reasonable food at slightly higher cost. There is a 24 hour diner – Denny’s, a US chain which is basic & cheap. The Oasis diner is a traditional US diner; it is adequate for lunches or breakfast. Apart from those places, there are the ubiquitous McDonalds, Subway and a drive-in Sonic.
There appears to be just one pub in Raton, called the White House, it sells mostly bottled American beer.
The VenueThe NRA’s Whittington centre is located 11 miles south of Raton, it is an impressive range complex, covering over 30,000 acres, it caters for every target shooting discipline and hunting too. It has a souvenir shop and accommodation.
Raton and the ranges are at an altitude of around 6500 feet, that’s pretty high for most folk and some don’t acclimatise very well, suffering from headaches and nausea. Unfortunately, there’s very little comfort to offer; just drink plenty of water, take it easy and avoid alcohol.
The range points North, extends to 1000 yards with 100 targets. The most significant feature is that the firing points have been constructed from coal-mine tailings. As you might expect, this is filthy stuff and very jagged. As a result the firing points are rough, with many small, sharp stones. The points are consequently uncomfortable and extremely dirty. As a consequence, it is absolutely essential to have a well-padded shooting mat. A thin sheet of PVC or canvas will not save your ribs, hips and knees from getting cut and bruised. The mats sold by AIM Fieldsports would be ideal.
Normally, there isn’t any food available on the range, though for big matches a catering wagon is brought in, supplying burgers etc. at reasonable cost. It is expected that for the ‘Worlds’ there will be adequate catering provision. Water is available in the butts and in the range offices but it is of course absolutely imperative for shooters to bring plenty of their own bottled water. The hotels all provide ice free of charge for filling cool-boxes.
Due to the dry hot wind, lips can be a problem, so having lip salve is essential. Due to the hard, stony firing-points, cut elbows is a realistic problem, so having elbow-protection is essential, if not then come prepared with band-aids and antiseptic wipes. Obviously, due to the bright sunshine, sunglasses and sun-blocker are top priorities. A wide-brimmed hat or at least a baseball-cap with a neck-protector would be essential.
The CompetitionThe day starts early, I usually timed my arrival at 7.30 each morning and was regularly among the last arrivals – but nothing happens until 8am.
There is little or no tradition of using paid markers in the US, so competitor marking is the norm even 78
The independent traveller THE LONG VIEW
With Des Parr
in big matches. Marking is expected to be fast and accurate; hence two competitors mark each target, sharing the job. On the whole, it works; shooters give other shooters the sort of service they expect and you know who is marking your target and can hold them accountable. The downside is that is makes for a very busy day; you’re either shooting or marking with very little time in between. As soon as the detail is finished, the markers race out of the butts whilst the shooters are likewise racing to get off the point and into the butts. It all feels quite frenetic.
It means you get nowhere near the amount of time in between details that you would in the UK so by the end of a long hot day’s shooting you can be pretty tired - exhausted frankly.
Shooting in the World Championships is all string-firing. Basically, each shooter is allocated a block of time, usually 20 minutes and can use that time as they see fit. It is an interesting way of doing things and has some merits. For example, with a fast butt-marker, the shooter can get all his shots off in remarkably little time – cutting down the chance of getting caught out by wind changes. The location of the spotting-disc can be used to get immediate feedback on any gradual changes - ‘following the spotter’. String-shooting can give rise to some pretty impressive scores. The downside is that it is very hard on the barrels, as they get very hot – no wonder the Americans change their barrels so often.
As a minimum, expect to shoot at least 500 rounds – that’s including the Individual and Rutland Cup team shoots and the US Nationals. By the end of that your barrel may well be on the point of giving up!
So, if the idea of travelling independently to Raton to take part in the F-class Worlds and US Nationals appeals to you, best get the wheels in motion now, the BATF permit is the only thing that is out of your control, so best get your application in now.
The World Championships only comes around every four years and it may be a very long time before it returns to the USA, it will be a massive attraction, so range space will be very limited – act now or live to regret it.
The Whittington ctr1000 yard match range...
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The independent traveller THE LONG VIEW
With Des Parr
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ThisSMALLBORE Business
by Don BrookeThis Smallbore Business
First let me state, that before graduating to an electronic machine of any sort, the basic training process must be well in place before any attempt is made to move to electronics to gain the finer motor skills of standing shooting.
Many shooters regard ‘standing’ as the most comfortable position and, they are right in my opinion, yet it is the more difficult to maintain a hold pattern and release sequence before moving to an electronics, such as a Scatt system. There has to be a great deal of training under the belt before the real benefit of the Scatt can be of any use.
The new shooter to ‘standing’ will have enormous problems even getting a shot away with the aiming mark still in the fore sight ring... If they move onto the electronics prematurely, the hold trace may even be well off the aiming mark when in the first stages of training standing. This produces serious trigger-release problems as the shooter
tries to get a shot away when the aiming mark moves through the sight picture. The trigger is
‘hammered’ and the follow-through just does not exist!
The position needs to be able to sustain a hold that stays reasonably steady and the new chum may find that the hold just does not produce any form of steadiness at all. There are lots of dry-fire techniques to maintain until the position of the rifle stays even somewhere near the target and many shooters find the position far too problematical at first.
There are those around however, that that do not give up and simply learn to hold the rifle still enough to produce scores above the eight ring, then with more work, gain the nine ring so that their skills become far more interesting.
So this then, is the area I am to focus on for this article, when the shooter learns to hold it still enough to register scores into the 90s, or with a hold inside the
nine-ring generally and so able to make use of the
Scatt machine. (My readers out there, I
wish I had access to these things when I was training, let me tell you!)
The stability of standing
to register consistent
Shooting standing on a Scatt machine, or similar electronics
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ThisSMALLBORE Business
by Don Brooke
shots in the eight-ring or above can only come from diligent training both on the range, and with dry fire techniques at home.
I had to work hard without a coach, to sustain any form of skills for well over two years, just to sort out a position that ‘pointed’ at the target and thus be able to work on the shot release/follow through sequence.
In fact, it was not until I met a lot of my shooting friends on the circuit, that I gained any real information to be able to gain some form of momentum. I learned a lot from blokes like Mal Cooper, Barry Dagger from the UK, then the USA coaches such as Bill Krilling, whom I met in Munich, 1972 after I shot my way into the Australian Olympic Team with my prone skills.
I also had an extremely informative session with a great Canadian coach, Jack Clinton and his shooter that year in Marty Klepf. These guys steadied my progress into the big standing shoots I was able to reach.
I was also really fortunate one year in Strassbourg, to shoot alongside of Mal Cooper when he fired that incredible 397 points, to be the only smallbore shooter I have ever seen clapped off the firing point…. Even a number of the great Russian shooters applauded his effort that day!
BUT, it brought to my attention that you could shoot scores like that standing, and that 397 points actually eclipsed his prone shoot! (396..) I was stunned by
that, let me tell you. My shooting years have been filled with incredible scores by shooters that had very obviously done a great deal of work.
OK, on to the abilities to move to a Scatt machine, and the really important stuff of reading the trace pictures correctly. This is not easy in standing and once more
if you look at fig.1, you will see the illustration of a reasonable standing shooter as they hold into the eight-ring. In this case, the hold trace approaches from the left side, and settles around the aiming mark, and you can see the ragged sharp angles of the hold trace exhibited on the Scatt screen.
This shooter is battling the hold, (indicated by the left side direction of movement to the aiming mark, of which more on this below) trying to muscle the rifle to stillness long enough to gain a release window where the hold is relatively still.
Usually the shot is released with a ‘belt’ on the trigger and, notice the follow through sequence (blue line) that
This shows the jagged trace lines of a hold pattern than needs a lot more work to stabilise. The trace can actually exceed the total aiming mark. As indicated in the text, the trace starts from the left (#1) and wants to return to it’s origin, which creates the jaggedness of the pattern. Even so, the shot may stay inside the ten ring with luck, given the trigger release sequence and follow through indicated by the blue trace line. (See text.)
This (fig 2) shows a trace line of a hold approaching the nine and ten ring generally. The shooter has a much improved point of entry (#1) dictated by a better Natural Aiming Point. The trace line shows four points where the red line moves outside of the ten ring, while the blue line, after a successful shot indicates a trigger release sequence that needs a lot more work. The follow through is non existent in this case, given that the blue trace lines moves even off the aiming mark in total. (See text) This shooter would perhaps register ten shot scores in the high eighties (87 plus) up to 92.
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ThisSMALLBORE Business
results as the rifle is moved with the trigger operation. A major fault of the shooter’s position assembly, is that his position aiming start point is well to the left, resulting in a hold that wants to move back to where the start point was. This is why the lateral movement of the hold trace is evident. The shot is muscled onto aim, which affects the hold dimensions, release window and follow through. (If there is any!)
The electronic systems will tell you this very quickly and the shooter should put the Scatt system away until there is some modicum of ability to hold the rifle still enough to get a well directed shot away. They are simply not yet ready to move to the electronics…. This is dangerous to learning processes and this guy should go back to the drawing board pretty quickly!
The follow through process of all position shooting is crucial to results. The ability to register a hold window long enough to release a well executed shot is a product of many long hours of training, not only in shooting skills but also in physical fitness and very high mental processes.
If you look at fig.2 for example, you will see the development of a hold pattern/ release window that is very obviously a lot closer to the ten ring than the example shown in fig.1. This shooter has worked hard on his position and the hold and has established a release window of around four seconds of steadiness, allowing him to release a steady shot. The red trace shows the direction of assembly of the position under breathing, the hold window, where the trace stays within the ten ring long enough to fire the shot. However, the blue trace line would indicate a less than perfect release sequence and follow through pattern even though the shot stays in the ten ring.(More luck than good management!)
OK, as with the last issue of Target Shooter, I have illustrated a very good standing hold and shot release /follow through sequence (fig.3). This illustration
is what you should be looking for on an electronic monitor. This shows a shooter such as Matt Emmons (USA) whom I consider to be the best standing shooter in the world today. His approach from the 11 o’clock sector, then the settle on the nine and ten ring, together with a hold window he establishes to register the shot release and follow through trace. Get hold of it like Matt has, and you too would be up there with him!
Finally, bear in mind however, that NO electronic system can show you a live-fire recoil-trace and this can affect shot nomination factor, particularly for standing, or the heavier recoil of the 300m rifle. (Not unless you blow a big hole in the electronics! Just kidding!)
Go for it shooters, big things CAN happen when you devote the time, work load, and thinking processes, after analysis of methods worked on with the aid of modern electronics...
Would I buy one? Bet your boots on it readers! Brooksie...
As indicated in the text, this illustration shows a good quality standing shooters trace lines. Not that the “point of entry (#1) is well within the eight or even the nine ring due to good pre shot routines, while the hold once more settles into a pattern holding the ten ring. Good shot release techniques will register a shot inside the ten ring, (as indicated) while the follow through trace remains over or around the ten ring. Top quality international standing shooters often reach a hold pattern such as this, and can often retain the release window for extended periods. This is where a Scatt machine can be very helpful!
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86
The SEB Joy-PodBy Laurie Holland
Joy-PodThe SEBThe SEB
Joy-PodThe F/TR shooters’ jungle drums are beating out
a message, quietly but insistently – there’s a new
generation of competition bi-pods on the way and
they’re joystick controlled.
87
The SEB Joy-PodBy Laurie Holland
The SEBThe SEB
Mere rumours? Actually no, and Target Shooter
Magazine has the distinction to have prototype model
No. 1 on test. Read on...
88
The SEB Joy-PodBy Laurie Holland
With the word getting round, opinions
have been mixed on US shooting forums,
no comment that I’ve seen here yet, as
nobody outside of Diggle Ranges seems
to have noticed anything going on.
Mixed opinions? The anti-F/TR evolution - let’s make everybody shoot Remy 700PSS rifles off cheap Chinese copies of the Harris bi-pod brigade - are unsurprisingly appalled! Yet more complexity and expense taking F/TR further away from ‘shooting real rifles’ (whatever they are). At the other extreme, I’ve seen forum posts by shooters who reckon this will be the next step in F/TR evolution and a game-changer. Others are already asking if it’s match legal, moreover, should it be so? These comments and opinions are from those who’ve yet to see a photo of the prototype, never mind got any real information about it, or when production examples will appear on the market, if ever and, what they’ll look like, do, cost, or anything else!
This is all good rip-roaring rollicking fun and adds to enjoyment and interest in the discipline, so I’m not knocking it or anybody else – we’re all entitled to our opinions. It’s also a pointer to the influence Sebastian Lambang has had on precision shooting in recent years largely through his superb joystick front-rests, widely used in Bench Rest, F-Class and goodness what other shooting activities. The ‘J-Pod’, or ‘Joy-Pod’, springs from this likeable Indonesian engineer’s fertile brain and superb design and manufacturing skills. A thread currently running on the AccurateShooter Forum about his ‘Neo’ joystick controlled front-rest under the heading of ‘SEB Update’ now runs to 18 pages and has received an astonishing 258 posts with 36,899 views as I type this. Now that’s real interest and respect!
Enter ScuttleAnyway, there IS a prototype and it WAS forwarded to Brian Fox at Diggle, Fox Firearms UK and our SEB products importer, late last year. It’s a sign of the great respect that Seb holds Brian in and I’d like to think his views on British F and Bench Rest shooters too, (especially one V. Bottomley, Editor of this fine journal), that it has come to Britain for testing / evaluation, rather than the hugely larger US shooting scene and its many fine participants – as did the initial prototype batch of ‘Neo’ front-rests.
Since Vince doesn’t shoot much - if any - F/TR these days since he fell under the evil influence of the Dark Side (F-Open), it has fallen to the GB F/TR scene’s very own Fred Scuttle* (see photo) to have a go. Now in many ways I’m not the right person to test a joystick pod – no, not because I’m b***dy useless (What do you mean, of course you are!), but because I’m a turret clicker. While Steve Donaldson might aim-off three
The Joy-Pod on the author’s 308 Win. Savage. Will it cope with the inevitable movement on the firing point under this cartridge’s recoil?
89
The SEB Joy-PodBy Laurie Holland
target frames down the line to get his windage right, plodder here is carefully twiddling the windage turret and noting each move on the plotting sheet and taking three times as long as Steve does to get the shot off. The raison d’être of a joystick design is to assist you to aim-off, and do it fast and accurately. Ah well, I’ll just have to try it and suppress my natural inhibitions, I suppose.
Fred Scuttle? Does this really look like Laurie?Well maybe...
PrinciplesIn its basics, the Joy-Pod idea is simple. Take one conventional F/TR type bi-pod with adjustable leg heights and ski-feet and put a miniaturised joystick controlled head onto the legs that lets you move the aiming-point laterally and vertically, both together in combination if need be. It’s mounted to the rifle by a robust Anschutz style rail fitment, nothing unusual there, so the interesting bits are between the leg pivot points and the rifle forend.
Push the ‘stick right or left and the muzzle/scope crosshairs go that way, push it down and you depress the aim... all very straightforward. It’s spring-loaded to rise to the top of its vertical (elevation) travel if left to its own devices, while there is no bias in windage position.
There is a degree of inbuilt friction in the mechanism to stop it being too fussy in use and this can be adjusted up or down to suit individual tastes and shooting style. In any event, it operates very smoothly. While not having as much travel in any plane as the much larger SEB front-rests, there is more than enough allied to a good amount of coarse elevation adjustment through the twin sliding-section legs.
With its at-rest position being up, the leg heights are adjusted to put the crosshairs also slightly high, and centred laterally with the joystick/moving head-assembly centred. Get an ‘average windage setting’ and then merrily aim-off laterally if one’s reading of the wind says so, while holding the ‘stick down a little to depress the aiming mark as required.
No different from shooting ‘Open’ using a joystick front-rest, is it? No bag squeezing, no leaning on the buttstock or rear-bag to push the crosshairs either way, hopefully no need to move anything in one’s
original set-up throughout the match... just concentrate on the aim and take the shot smoothly without affecting the rifle hold. The Joy-Pod on the author’s 308 Win. Savage. Will it cope with the inevitable movement on the firing point under this cartridge’s recoil?
Well, it’s not the same as F-Open and shooting off a heavy adjustable front-rest. The BIG difference is a good front-rest is as stable as a rock and the rifle forend
Our intrepid contributor uses his 223 Rem Savage in competition with the prototype SEB Joy-Pod from a nice dry covered firing point (not!).
90
The SEB Joy-PodBy Laurie Holland
isn’t attached to it. The rest stays put; the rifle recoils smoothly on it; the shooter returns the rifle to battery immediately after the shot using the forend stop to return to exactly the same position.
The Joy-Pod IS attached to the rifle; it WILL move on the firing point under recoil just like any other bi-pod. The shooter keeps his or her hand on the joystick throughout the process and the $64,000 question is, does the rifle plus bi-pod move under recoil before the bullet exits the muzzle?
If they do, the aim will undoubtedly change from that appertaining at the time the trigger was squeezed and the shot will go somewhere different. It has to, as the shooter obviously cannot keep a steady aim if the joystick and the aiming hand are on the move. This was the question I wanted my testing, under real competition conditions, to answer on different firing points, using varying degrees of elevation and with two rifles employing different cartridges - 308 Win with 168 Hybrids at ~2925 fps and 223 Rem spitting out 90gn JLK VLDs at ~2875 fps.
I had a gut feeling it might work well, brilliantly even, with the minimally recoiling 223 but had grave doubts about the harder kicking 308. The idea was to get a couple or three matches in before Christmas, which we did, albeit one in such bad conditions that we had to retreat to a covered firing point and shoot off concrete, then a few more quickly in the new year but, global warming has got in the way here, Diggle Ranges melting in unseasonal human-induced winter warmth and shooting virtually suspended. (What really? No... of course not! Such is the degree of global warming that Diggle is currently basking under several inches of snow and enjoying continuous minus-whatever degree C temperatures topped off by strong north easterlies that originate in Stavanger, more likely the Siberian city of Novosibírsk!)
We’ll give you a full description of the prototype
and report on whether it worked next month.
The working bits – the moving pod-head in its default spring-loaded raised position
ANY NEW PRODUCTS TO PROMOTE ! GIVE TARGET SHOOTER A CALL...TARGET SHOOTER IS READ BY OVER 10,000 DEDICATED SHOOTERS IN MORE THAN 100 COUNTRIES EVERY MONTH...
The British Shooting Show just a few days away and
a host of interesting stuff for the target shooter will
be on display. I’ve just had a preview of one of the
most interesting - the new action that Dolphin Gun
Company will be displaying. Dolphin already build
rifles on the New Zealand Barnard and American
Nesika actions and, this new action is also from the
USA.
The action is a Remington clone – no, let me correct that – it is a Remington ‘footprint’ but there, any similarity ends. This action has some revolutionary new features – which may have appeared on other actions but if so, I’ve certainly not seen them.
Yes, there is little wrong with a straight copy of the Remington 700 – with a few tweaks of course, which most of the current clones will boast but, this action, from Custom Shooting Technologies (CST), is bristling with innovation.
Custom Shooting Technologies? A visit to their website www.cstmtech.com tells us more. The company was
Dolphin Gun Company’s
NEW CST ActionBy Vince Bottomley
92
NEW Dolphin CST ActionBy Vince Bottomley
established in 2002 and, in addition to their actions, they also offer some nifty bits and pieces for that other ‘industry standard’ the Ruger 10/22.
So what makes the CST action so special? What makes it worthy of our attention, when there are a dozen other Remington clones currently on offer – including several from UK manufacturers.
Firstly, lets look at what makes a custom action superior to a mass-produced factory action.Why is it worth spending an awful lot of your ‘hard earned’ on a custom action? Well, obviously, tolerances on any mass-produced product can never be held as ‘tight’ as a custom manufacturing outfit and you will hear of gunsmiths offering ‘blueprinting’ of actions like the Remington. In other words, re-working the action so that it is more like what the designer intended!
It’s not difficult to see how things can be improved. If you own a factory action, close the bolt (on an empty chamber!) and pull the trigger. Now wiggle the back of the bolt and you will see some ‘slop’ in evidence. Have a look at one of your fired cases – is the firing-pin
strike exactly in the centre of the primer? Probably not. Why not? Because little in that action is quite as it should be.
Think about what happens when you close the bolt on your Remington. The rear of the bolt is lifted ever so slightly in cocking - thanks to the ‘slop’ and angled
Dolphin Gun Company’s
accurate equipment is the first – and essential – step on the road to the
winner’s circle!
93
NEW Dolphin CST ActionBy Vince Bottomley
cocking-piece – only a few thou. yes but enough to prevent the bolt-lug (now in the 12 o’clock position) from making full contact with the action lug. (We all know the importance of full bolt-lug contact – don’t we?) What’s going to happen when you pull the trigger? That’s right – the immense pressure generated will slam the bolt-lug back into contact - inducing vibrations. Can that be good for accuracy?
The custom action builder attempts to solve this problem by making the ‘bolt to action-body’ fit as tight as practical, thus reducing the ability for the bolt to lift under cocking. However, some clearance is necessary to allow the bolt to operate freely.
If you’ve ever looked at a Savage factory action, you will see that the bolt-head is a separate component, held to the main bolt-body by a pin. This is an accident of manufacturing rather than design but, it works. That tiny bit of ‘articulation’ in the bolt-head allows the lugs to remain in full contact throughout the firing cycle. That’s probably why some Savages shoot amazingly well right out of the box – have a look at Sean Broxham’s groups at 1000 yards with his Savage 6.5-284. (Sean currently holds the UK record with his absolutely standard factory Savage).
CST approach the ‘lug’ problem from a different angle. The bolt is a three-lug affair – like the Barnard – but the CST bolt-lugs are conical – on the front and on the rear. The separate bolt-handle is also machined to a cone, which matches a cone-shaped bearing surface in the rear of the receiver and, to quote CST:
“The heart of the action design’s accuracy potential lies with the cone-shaped locking-lugs and the cone-shaped floating bolt-handle. Both the locking-lugs and bolt-handle are matched to precision conical seats machined in the receiver concentric to each other and centre of bore.
Upon bolt lock-up, the floating bolt-handle becomes pressurized, to force both the rear and front of the bolt
to seat dead-center and square every time, regardless of bolt diameter fit or wear. With this system, pressure to all locking-lugs is maintained even after the sear is released when pressing the trigger”.
Yes folks, that’s what every custom action manufacturer on the planet is striving for!
There is another problem that custom action manufacturers also like to address – the guided firing-pin. It’s difficult to look inside a bolt with out a borescope but if you did, you would see another
Note ‘coned’ lugs on front and rear of bolt-body Note ‘coned’ lugs on front and rear of bolt-body
This shot shows the matching coned locking surface in the rear of the action
The ‘coned’ bolt-handle
94
NEW Dolphin CST ActionBy Vince Bottomley
difference in custom and factory actions. The firing-pin on a custom action is a proper fit over the distance it travels on release. Of course, making anything ‘close tolerance’ means that it could bind, achieving the opposite effect as to what is required. This has also been addressed by CST by employing an ingenious ‘floating’ firing-pin.
A claw extractor and a floating ejector-pin (which doesn’t place a side-load on the cartridge like a spring-loaded one) completes the job. Incidentally, if the bolt is beginning to sound a bit complicated – it isn’t and is easily and quickly field-stripped without any tools.
Note coned lugs and floating ejector-pin
A stud on the underside of the action like a Barnard) takes care of recoil, so no need for a separate re-coil lug – which means a switch-barrel rifle is an attractive option and, if you switch cartridge head size, just a bolt-body – as opposed to a complete bolt - can be purchased.
The single-shot actions are available left or right-hand bolt and reloading-port and bolts can be fluted, actions can be polished or matt finish. The action is machined from solid 17-4 stainless steel with the bolt from 4340 alloy and the bolt- face diameter is offered from 223 up to WSM capability. The trigger-hanger takes any Remington-style trigger – like the Jewel or Kelbly. You will also see from the website that other variations of the CST action are available depending on your intended application.
Of course, no one is naïve enough to believe that purchasing any action will make a mediocre shooter into a winner but accurate equipment is the first – and essential – step on the road to the winner’s circle! Benchrest shooters are accuracy obsessed and one of the World’s top benchrest shooters has been carrying out some testing with the CST - with very encouraging results. www.dolphinguncompany.co.uk
So, what are you waiting for? Go pay Dolphin a visit!
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NEW Dolphin CST ActionBy Vince Bottomley
The Sportsman’s Association of Great Britain & Northern Ireland
New Products at The British Shooting Show
Dear Fellow Shooter,
The Sportsman’s Association of Great Britain & Northern Ireland is lobbying the Government to repeal the 2nd amendment and restore 22 rimfire target pistols to section 1 status.
We need your help. We shall be at the British Shooting Show on 9/10th February at Stoneleigh Park fundraising.
I am asking you for a donation to help this Association to reverse the decision the Labour Government made in late 1997.
The ban on the private possession of handguns in Great Britain came into effect in two stages. A Conservative Government banned all large-calibre handguns from July 1st 1997, with a period up to the end of September, in which all such guns had to be handed to the police. Following a general election in May 1997, the Labour Government extended the ban to all small-calibre (22 rimfire) handguns, which had to be handed in before the end of February 1998. More than 162,000 handguns and 700 tonnes of ammunition was handed in. More than £80 million was paid in compensation and the cost of the confiscation scheme to police and government cost tens of millions more.
Please send a donation in the following ways;
www.sportsmansassociation.co.uk (click donate)
Send a cheque payable to SAGBNI
SPORTSMAN’S ASSOCIATION2 Clockhouse PlaceLondon SW15 2EL020 8789 1211Mobile 07973 262133
Lets make a difference together...
Stoneleigh Park 9/10th FebruaryJust a few days to go to the fabulous British Shooting Show at the Stoneleigh Park exhibition centre. This is the fifth year of the Show and would you believe – this year it will be five-times as large as the original one at Newark.
As always, Target Shooter will have a stand and we hope to meet as many of you as possible and, a few of your favorite writers will be in attendance to answer all you reloading and shooting questions.
Once again target shooters and accuracy nuts will be well catered for with more interesting rifles and equipment under one roof than anywhere else in the UK. I can tell you that Dolphin Gun Company will have their new action on show (review elsewhere in the issue) and Osprey Rifles will also have a new modular chassis on show which even I haven’t seen!
March UK will have the full range of their scopes on show, set up so that you can see for yourself just how good these scopes really are.
No matter what some internet forum wannabe tells you about the Show, please come and see for yourself. With the support of British shooters, the Show has grown every year and, with your continued support, we now have one of the best shooting shows in Europe. What’s more, unlike the American Shot Show and the German IWA Show, this Show is open to everyone, not just the trade.
As well as the smaller dealers and club displays, our big importers – like Edgar Brothers, Viking, RUAG etc. will be exhibiting so, if it’s shooting, it’s going to be on display at the British Shooting Show.Show organizer, John Bertrand has just sent me the pictures of the following rifles, which will be making their debut at the Show and there’s some interesting looking stuff here – I just can’t wait.
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Latest News...LATESTNEWS...
New Products at The British Shooting Show LADISLAV NINGER – OBITUARY by CARL BOSWELLIt has been difficult to write an obituary about the Chairman
of the European Rimfire and Air Rifle Benchrest Shooting
Federation, who was also the Vice President of its sister World
Federation, the WRABF. Hopefully what I write couples
respect with dignity but mingled with a bit of humour - which
he would have liked!
Ladislav Ninger of the Czech Republic died on 25th December
2012. He suffered a stroke earlier in the year, battling against
odds to regain consciousness after several months in a coma
and fight his way to partial recovery. Sadly, full recovery was
not meant to be, as he passed away on Christmas Day leaving
behind his partner Eva, two daughters, mother, brother, family
and a great many friends.
At this point we get the tissues out and I can feel his breath
at my back as he gets ready to punch me on the arm as we
both did in life. Wuss, I hear him exclaim in my minds eye!!
The twinkle in his eye and the infectious laugh that he had,
resonating around my thoughts.
This is a time for grief, as it is a natural process for the times
we all will no longer be able to share with him but, it is also
a time of celebration for the times we did have. For the
gratitude I personally have for him being in my life and mine in
his. I write this as a colleague, a fellow sportsman, but mainly
because he was my friend. So really I do not want to talk
about his death or the suffering over the last nine months. I
want to talk about his life, or the part of it I have seen.
Certainly Ladislav was not an angel - I see him smiling that
quirky smile as I write that statement - if you ever tasted any
of the ‘boom boom’ Czech liquor he carried at times you would
know because it is evil stuff. Do I paint a picture of a typical
member of the ‘hierarchy’?. I hope not, as Ladislav was a man
like any other, loving food, loving the ‘occasional’ beer and
loving life.
He would stand resolute in his beliefs, taking on logical
discussion only and was sometimes misunderstood for being
straightforward. He saw rules as rules! No grey areas, just the
black and the white, just the logical and precise! Personally,
this was easy to deal with as we were the same. Do
something, don’t do something but, if you do, then do it one
hundred percent. If its time to move on, then move on!
Ladislav was one of those people you could rely on in life, for
a great many things. He was a mover and a shaker! Certainly
without people like him the state of both rimfire and air rifle
benchrest at international level would have taken longer - or
just fizzled into obscurity. For these reasons, the sport, the
sportspeople, in fact all of us involved have a great deal to
honour him for and no doubt we will!
He started the CBRA, the Czech
Benchrest Association, to mainly
compete in Centerfire Benchrest
shooting. Ladislav soon fell in love with rimfire benchrest,
developing this extensively and bringing his national team to
high profile with various achievements at international level.
Since 2009, Ladislav led the European Federation, developing
the second European Championship and first World Cup in
2010. This highly successful championship demonstrated
his understanding of how such a competition could be
professionally run, from taking care of competitors, hotels and
transport, through to how each match was run with precision.
So impressed were competitors that they wanted next year’s
European and World Cup Championship to be in Plzen once
again. Ladislav was already in the process of finalising the
details of this when he suffered his stroke. With nineteen
countries attending and a full capacity of one hundred and
twenty competitors, it will be the biggest and most competitive
international event for this sport so far. Sadly the tributes we
will pay to him next year will not be in person but there will be
tributes nevertheless. His vision of professional tournaments
will live on. His vision of a growing sport will live on. His vision
will live!
This is what we must celebrate in death, the legacy of a
person, be it small or big. Ladislav was a big man in every way,
whether people understood him or not, his life contributed to
others positively in small ways and in big ways. Time is short
in this life, there are no practice runs! Ladislav used life to the
full, even though for those of us left behind his time with us
was cut short. Certainly regarding this sport, like many other
people, he contributed a great deal. For this we can all be
thankful.
His passing is a sad loss to us all for his humour, his
determination and energy. We will miss the laughter we
shared, we will miss our friendship, we will miss the times you
stood resolute with conviction in your purpose, we will miss
you each in our own way!
Ladislav was laid to rest on Friday 4th January 2013. Goodbye
Ladislav and rest peacefully our dearest friend. You have been
all you could have been and more. You were one of the few!
“Today belongs to few and tomorrow to no one.” W.S. Merwin
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LATESTNEWS...
More 2012 Olympic quota places won with ELEY Ammunition than any other brand
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To introduce ourselves we are the United Kingdom Association of Rimfire and Air Rifle Benchrest Shooting. By that we mean "True Benchrest Shooting". The Association
is recognised by rimfire shooters across in the UK, with partners across Europe and the rest of the world, as the
presentative body that promotes rimfire and air rifle benchrest across this country and with other partners in
European and World events.Visit our website for news about national and international
competitions that all can ‘have a go at’. From novice to champion shooter, everyone is welcome
www.benchrest22.org
Double Launch!By Liz Woodall, DSP Co-ordinator
Break out the champagne! In the final phase of
the Disabled Shooting Year, the DSP is delighted
and proud to announce the launch of two major
initiatives. In February and March we will be
holding six Regional Conferences for those with
an interest in any aspect of disabled shooting.
Then the year will be brought to a triumphant
close with the presentation of the Disabled
Shooting Awards. Now that the future of the
DSP has been secured until 2017 by continued
Sport England funding, we hope that the
conferences and awards will become annual
events.
REGIONAL CONFERENCES
The Aim: To Inform, Encourage and Inspire
These are open to anyone who is involved in disabled target shooting, whether as shooter, coach, official, helper or assistant, range or ground administrator, or any other capacity. We hope to be welcoming representatives of the media and disabled sport bodies, as well as disability support organisations.
Each of the conferences will cover all shooting disciplines and any type of disability. We will run the same programme at each venue, so anyone who wishes to attend can pick the date and place most convenient for them.
The conference programme is intended to:1 - Show the many and varied opportunities and options that the sport offers to people with disabilities2 - Provide information, and sources of information, particularly for clubs, shooting grounds, coaches and officials catering for different disabilities3 - Set out plans for future development in this area of the sportOffer delegates a valuable chance to meet other people in this field, swap ideas and experiences, and make useful contacts All of the conferences have been scheduled for weekends, and will run for an afternoon, starting with a buffet lunch to ‘meet and greet’. Some of the venues are able to provide opportunities for delegates to have a shoot before or after the conference, by prior arrangement.
With a view to keeping money within the sport, the facilities and organisations that are hosting the conferences are representative of a wide range of target shooting disciplines. All of them have a tangible connection with disabled shooting. Naturally, they are all disabled accessible and can cater for wheelchair users. We would like to record publicly our thanks to them for hosting these events, and we hope they benefit from more business as a result.
South East Region Saturday 16th February at SportsAble, Maidenhead, BerkshireSportsAble is an integrated sports club that caters for a wide range of disabilities in about a dozen different sports. It has excellent, purpose-built facilities, including a 10-metre airgun range.
South West Region Sunday 3rd March at Purbeck Shooting School,
Disabled Shooting Project
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Latest News...LATESTNEWS...
Wareham, DorsetThe School has excellent disabled-friendly credentials and hosts events for Sportability, as well as having several disabled shooters amongst its regular clientele. In addition to award-winning clay target facilities, the shooting ground is developing Hunter Field Target and Archery ranges. North East RegionSaturday 9th March at Easingwold Rifle Club, North YorkshireThis small-bore rifle club has achieved the remarkable feat of embedding itself at the heart of the Easingwold community. It has an excellent 25-yard indoor range at this venue, and an outdoor range a few miles away. The club has disabled members, and is keen to become one of the first to join the DSP’s Focus Clubs Scheme (to be launched shortly).
North West RegionSunday 10th March at Blackburn Rifle & Pistol Club, LancashireThis is a large, multi-discipline club (rifle, pistol, crossbow and archery) with an astonishingly extensive complex of ranges and a gunshop at this venue. It caters for members with various disabilities, and has an enthusiastic blind/VI section.
East RegionSunday 17th March at Norman Cross Ranges, near Peterborough, CambridgeshireThe 50-metre and 100-yard ranges at Norman Cross are used by several organisations for smallbore and Field Target shooting. The Cambridgeshire Target Shooting Association has just been awarded a Sport England Inspired Facility grant towards the cost of transforming the site into a regional centre of excellence with an emphasis on disabled participation. West RegionSunday 24th March at Royal National College for the Blind, HerefordThe RNCB offers to its students outstanding opportunities in a wide range of sports, and has had a 10-metre airgun facility for blind/VI shooting for a
number of years. Students compete in the national leagues and championship meetings.
Register to AttendAll those interested in attending are asked to complete a registration form and return it to the DSP Co-ordinator Liz Woodall. The form, together with additional information on each venue, is available on the DSP website www.disabledshooting.org.uk, or by e-mail from [email protected] . Register soon, as numbers are limited!
Please spread the word about these conferences to anyone who might wish to attend.
DISABLED SHOOTING AWARDS[DS Awards logo]
“Thank you” and “well done” are the two most important phrases in any sport. Until last year there were hardly any official opportunities for public recognition of the effort put into shooting by many of those involved in it. There are still very few. For the last 12 months we have been urging everyone to nominate target shooting people for the numerous sports awards schemes all over the country. Now we are launching our own!
Nominations are open for the inaugural Disabled Shooting Awards. The nomination form can be downloaded from the DSP website www.disabledshooting.org.uk, or requested by e-mail from [email protected] . The closing date is Monday, 11th March 2013. Presentation of the awards will take place at the closing ceremony for the Disabled Shooting Year, details of which will be announced in the next issue of Target Shooter.
Disabled Shooting continued...
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LATESTNEWS...
Disabled Shooting continued...
More information:Disabled Shooting Project: www.disabledshooting.org.uk
International Paralympic Committee, Shooting: www.ipc-shooting.org
International Blind Sport Federation, Shooting: www.ibsa.es/eng/deportes/shooting/presentacionInternational Shooting Competition, Hannover: www.i-s-c-h.de
Clay Target Grand Prix, Lonato: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wFKzJ7ZfQzM
British Blind Sport: www.britishblindsport.org.ukInternational Blind Sport Association (Shooting): NSRA: www.nsra.co.ukDisabled shooting content in NRA Journal, Pull!, The Rifleman, and Target Shooteris available on the Downloads section of the DSP website.
Award CategoriesAn independent panel will consider nominations for the following awards:*Outstanding Disabled-friendly Club or Shooting Ground *Outstanding Contribution by an Organisation that is not a shooting body *Disabled Shooter at International Level (Senior and Junior awards)*Disabled Shooter at Domestic Level (Senior and Junior awards)*Coach working with Disabled Shooters*Coach with a Disability (for those with a moderate to severe disability)*Volunteer working with Disabled Shooters*Volunteer with a Disability (for those with a moderate to severe disability)*Outstanding Individual Contribution to Disabled Target Shooting
Please help to make the Disabled Shooting Awards a success, and show how much people are appreciated, by nominating those who deserve recognition.
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Latest News...LATESTNEWS...
UKPSA NEWS from Vanessa DuffyThe Midlands Long Barrelled Firearms Championships.The Championships were held at Leicester Shooting Centre on Sunday 25th November and was the last match of the UKPSA LBF Championship Rounds.
The match had an excellent turn out and the usual mix of fun and challenging stages were provided by Match Director Ian Chamberlain. Starting with a long stage that gave many options on the way to shoot it, the large turn out meant that not all the planned stages could be shot in the time allocated but, this did not detract from the enjoyment of the match.
The scores from the match would determine the overall champions for the year as well as crowning the Midlands Champions. The match winners were Rob Adam in LBR Standard, Pete Starley in LBR Open, Dan Boswell in Open Mini Rifle, Andy Duffy in Standard Lever Action Rifle, Alan Wragg in Open Lever Action Rifle and Nick Towndrow in LBP Standard.
UKPSA Long Barrel Championships 2012With the Midlands Championships, came the year end results for the overall LBF Championships. The Standard LBR Championships was won by Graham Guest, Rob Adam was second despite winning at Leicester. The Mini Rifle championship was also a close affair between Andy Welch and Ronnie Graham with Andy coming out on top. Nick Towndrow has been the consistent winner of Long Barrel Pistol all year long and it was no surprise to see his name at the top of the rankings, over 50 points ahead of Ian Chamberlain. Other winners are Andy Duffy in Lever Action Rifle standard and Alan Wragg in the Open class. Pete Starley in Open LBR and Gary Dyer in Open LBP.
UKPSA Shotgun Postal Leagues 2012.Last month we brought you the Handgun and LBF postal league results. The two PSG Leagues for slug and birdshot run a month behind. Over 80 shooters participated in the birdshot League, made up of four rounds and consisting of 14 stages requiring a minimum of 130 rounds to complete. The slug competition was as equally competitive and was made up of 12 stages and requiring 96 rounds to complete.
The winners of the Birdshot League are Mike Siva-Jothy in Standard , Ed Buttler in Standard Manual, Nigel Claxton in Modified with Graham Watts winning Open division.
Three divisions were contested in the Slug League. Winners were Mark Sandford in Standard, Walter Robinson in Standard manual and Phil Swainson in Modified.
UKPSA AGMThis year’s AGM had to do battle with the weather but, despite the snowy conditions it was a good turn-out despite a number of members not able to attend. The first agenda item was the awarding of the Postal league trophies. Honouring our British Champions for Long Barrelled firearms and Shotgun followed this.
After some lengthy reports members moved onto electing the office bearers to the Association. After the Chairman’s and the Regional Director’s positions were contested, Vanessa Duffy has returned to her old stomping ground of the Chairmanship. Neil Beverley is now Regional Director and Rupert Stanley is the new Treasurer. With Alan Phillips remaining as Secretary and Ken Trail as PRO.
2013 UKPSA Competition Calendar.All members have been informed of the many UKPSA matches taking place in 2013. A number of new venues have been added which can only mean more fun and even more choice for UKPSA members.
Postal Leagues 2013The UKPSA Postal leagues were a great success in 2012, with over 240 shooters participating across many different gun divisions. This year’s Leagues are being put together already. The Leagues are open and free to enter and as well as being simple to set up and run, they are great for the club environment.
More details about IPSC practical shooting can be found at www.ukpsa.co.uk
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LATESTNEWS...
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Introducing Kelbly’s Tactical Rifles.bringing benchrest precision to the tacticalmarket. With loads of options to choose from,and pricing that shatters the competitors.
Introducing the first hunting and tactical scopeswith 10 times power ratio on a variable scope.March 1x-10x-24mm and 2.5x-25x-42mm. 1/4” clicksand 25 MOA per revolution. All lenses in scopes arecemented in place, and do not rely on O rings to holdpoint of aim. Argon gas purged.
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NEW - THE DOLPHIN MODULAR RIFLE SYSTEM
Dolphin Repeating Rifles
Dolphin Single Shot F/TR RiflesDolphin Single Shot Rifles. (Two above).Dolphin Stock in Hard Anodise Choice of Long F/TR, Short or Open front forendWith Morgan recoil padChoice of colours available Barnard S or RPA Quadlite Timney Trigger (Jewel £40 extra) 17 or 25 moa scope rail Bartlein, Lilja or Krieger barrel Choice of twist & profile Choice of .223 Rem or .308 Win or any othercalibre suitable for a 308 bolt. WEIGHT 6.5Kg (with med Palma Barrel)
£2360 including VAT
Options AvailableOptions - (Only when ordered with Rifle) Spiral Flute Barrel £160Straight Flute Barrel £120Interrupted Flute Barrel £160Duracoat Barrel £60Water Transfer Print stock £180Dolphin Trakker Rest(long) £150Dolphin Trakker Rest(short) £140Dolphin Muzzle brake £100Long F/TR additional forend £100Short additional forend £80Open/Bench rest Style forend £140VAIS style Muzzle Brake £120Thread for Moderator; £60Including fitting , proof and invisible end cap.Holland Style Muzzle brake; £120Including fitting & proof .All prices inc VAT
Stocks now available individuallyinlet for Remington 700, Barnard S & SM & RPA Quadlite. Coming soon ~ Savage.Only £630 inc VAT.Folding modular stock version coming soon.Keep visiting our website for latest products...
LATEST NEWS
Dolphin Repeating RiflesDolphin Stock in Hard Anodise
Choice of Long F/TR, Short or Open front forendWith Morgan recoil pad
Choice of colours availableBarnard SM or RPA Quadlite
Timney Trigger (Jewel £40 extra)17 or 25 moa scope rail
Bartlein, Lilja or Krieger barrel(Choice of twist & profile)
Choice of calibre available5 Round AICS magazine
£2460 including VAT
Dolphin Gun Company - Southwold - Donington on Bain - Lincolnshire - LN11 9TR - EnglandTelephone +44 (0) 1507 343898 or +44 (0) 774 7771962. www.dolphinguncompany.co.uk - [email protected]
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NEXT ISSUEOut 1st March 2013
Target Shooter will be at THE BRITISH SHOOTING SHOW so please, stop by our stand and say hello – we will have a few of your favourite writers manning the stand, ready to answer all your reloading and shooting questions. We look forward to seeing you there...
Don’t Forget... 9th & 10th February. The biggest retail shooting show in Europe.
ITS SHOW TIME...