I fired that M1903A3 I bragged to you all about.
Handloaded 100 rounds of 3 different types of bullets and powders, and bought a box of Win Power Point hunting ammo to get "on track" with what velocities would look like coming out of commercially produced ammo. I fired the Winny stuff (didja know you can stuff 6 rounds into a Springfield Rifle?) got a 3" 5-round group with the that stuff (not counting the first round; this would have opened the group to 4.5 MOA). Chrono measured 2948 fps, second round 2977, then 2964... First round (fouler) was slowest, fastest round was 3005 fps. Avg was 2975 and Ex Spread was 57.08, with an SD of 18.84. All seemed ok with typical fouling shot shennanigans.
Then tried my 168 gr. SMK with 47 grains of Varget, which resulted in a 2.83 MOA group. Groups (or my shoulder getting beat to shit) started to open up with increased velocities...
Then things went haywire.
The Chrony started telling me I was seeing 3300, 3400, 3500... I was not getting any overpressure signs (no sticky lifts, no bashed in heads, no case splitting or the like) so I tried my handgun through the Chrony. 1061 fps. Hmmmmm...
I decided that discretion was the better part of valor, and put War Horse down - my shoulder started thanking me profusely.
So I shot my AR, resulting in one .6 MOA group (I swear to God, I have pics of all of this) and the Chrony read 4k! This made me pick up War Horse again and put some rounds out of it; the Winnys were ringing in at 3400 fps - so something was goofy with the Chrony. I later on found out the battery had gone into the 8.47 V range; this is the kiss of death for those things.
Shot my steel 8" target at 100 yards and it knocked it off the stand twice! That .30-'06 hits like a freight train (and your shoulder gets hit by that kind of force too); I'd hate to be on the receiving end of the that kind of firepower.
Poor Japanese and Germans!
Handloaded 100 rounds of 3 different types of bullets and powders, and bought a box of Win Power Point hunting ammo to get "on track" with what velocities would look like coming out of commercially produced ammo. I fired the Winny stuff (didja know you can stuff 6 rounds into a Springfield Rifle?) got a 3" 5-round group with the that stuff (not counting the first round; this would have opened the group to 4.5 MOA). Chrono measured 2948 fps, second round 2977, then 2964... First round (fouler) was slowest, fastest round was 3005 fps. Avg was 2975 and Ex Spread was 57.08, with an SD of 18.84. All seemed ok with typical fouling shot shennanigans.
Then tried my 168 gr. SMK with 47 grains of Varget, which resulted in a 2.83 MOA group. Groups (or my shoulder getting beat to shit) started to open up with increased velocities...
Then things went haywire.
The Chrony started telling me I was seeing 3300, 3400, 3500... I was not getting any overpressure signs (no sticky lifts, no bashed in heads, no case splitting or the like) so I tried my handgun through the Chrony. 1061 fps. Hmmmmm...
I decided that discretion was the better part of valor, and put War Horse down - my shoulder started thanking me profusely.
So I shot my AR, resulting in one .6 MOA group (I swear to God, I have pics of all of this) and the Chrony read 4k! This made me pick up War Horse again and put some rounds out of it; the Winnys were ringing in at 3400 fps - so something was goofy with the Chrony. I later on found out the battery had gone into the 8.47 V range; this is the kiss of death for those things.
Shot my steel 8" target at 100 yards and it knocked it off the stand twice! That .30-'06 hits like a freight train (and your shoulder gets hit by that kind of force too); I'd hate to be on the receiving end of the that kind of firepower.
Poor Japanese and Germans!
