Pac Nor sabotless

[dougedwards]

I think this has been discussed before but I can't find it. Hasn't it been discovered that some Pac Nor barrels are very tight near the muzzle and very loose near the breech end? If so, is this a design flaw? I am having to knurl bullets perfectly so that they have some level of tightness near the bottom after being forced through the muzzle end with considerable force when shooting sabotless. Anyone experience this condition with their Pac Nor barrels?

Doug

[dave d.]

:)doug a knurled sabotless bullet is going to feel looser as it goes further down the barrel because it is engraved after the first couple of inches. There were a few that thought there barrel was looser at the bottom but weren't. I'm pretty sure this is what your feeling.

[smokeeter]

not only engraving, unless you have a spin jag or rotating ramrod the bullet may skid and remove some of the knurl as it reaches the breech plug. I get that feeling with a lot of my sabotless loads but it doesn't seem to effect the ability of the smokeless powder going off, a veggie or wonder wad will help maintain a seal.

[edge]

I think that you will find that Dave is right as this feels worse than it really is.

Try loading one from the breech and see if it doesn't feel loose toward the muzzle. If it does feel tighter near the muzzle that is not necessarily that bad AND it is the correct direction to get good accuracy.

MY HandiRifle is the opposite, being looser toward the muzzle!

edge.

PS I prefer a bullet that requires a short starter to ensure that the rifling is engraved and that the bullet is NOT skidding down the bore as mentioned by smokeeter!

[chuck41]

I shoot a .40 so all my shots are sabotless. (Still looking for 40/357 sabots).

The other guys are right on. When you first put a knurled bullet in the barrel it feels tight. The further you slide it down the bore the looser it feels. By time it gets to the bottom even a bullet that had to be pounded in initially usually feels quite loose. Like Edge said, mine feels pretty much the same if you push the bullet through from the breech end.

[jeff]

You get the same sensation[ ;D] with the sabot starting and finishing in the pacnor.
Jeff~

[moto357]

I had a similar sensation when loading sabotless in the SMI I just sold. I found my own technique that would for the most part prevent the feeling looser at the bottom. using sabots it felt same allll the way down

[Dave W]

I posted the measurements I got from seating on a scale, possibly on the old board. IIRC seating was close to half the resistance of the initial push to get the bullet started. The TMZ seemed to have even lighter resistance since it sizes smaller in my die than a SST and needs a heavy knurl versus the SST which requires no knurl.

[Richard]

I haqve not tried pushing a sabot less bullet down the new barrel yet! I will probably try it this evening and give my opinion.
Richard

[dougedwards]

It surely does feel like a huge difference. At first I only sized the bullets without knurling and they were barely tight going in and almost fell down the barrel as they got about half way down. I also had one misfire using 63gr R-7 and 250gr SST down a 45 caliber Pac Nor.

For my second outing I decided to heavily knurl only the tops of the bearing surface of 200 gr Hornady pistol bullets and they fit nicely into the muzzle requiring a bullet starter to get them started but pushed steadily down to the powder. This time the result was a five shot group in less than 1 1/2" which suprised me using such short and stubby bullets. I wasn't able to check the speed as I was shooting at a public range but I know they were being shot very fast using 18/42 of N110 over 10x.

This sabotless shooting is going to be challenging for me as I will have to resize each bullet to fit a .451 bore. It surely feels strange pushing these bullets down so I guess I will have to learn to knurl them to fit tightly into the crown.

Doug

[shivesy]

Sept 3, 2010 11:17:03 GMT -5 smokeeter said:

not only engraving, unless you have a spin jag or rotating ramrod the bullet may skid and remove some of the knurl as it reaches the breech plug. I get that feeling with a lot of my sabotless loads but it doesn't seem to effect the ability of the smokeless powder going off, a veggie or wonder wad will help maintain a seal.

I hope I'm not getting off the subject but how do you load a veggie or wonder wad? Do you just drop it down the barrel after you add the powder or do you somehow attach it to the bottom of the bullet? I'm lost on this one.

[Dave W]

Once the powder is in, you can push the veggie down by itself and then the bullet, or start the veggie in the barrel and then the bullet and shove them both home at the same time. Bad Bull's video shows them separately being seated I believe but I seat both at the same time. Not sure if their is an advantage to either method.

[chuck41]

I too just put the wad in and press it in place with my finger then place the bullet and insert it with the short starter. The wad is pushed down the barrel as I push the bullet in. No problem at all.

[Richard]

I do the same also. Just seat the veggie wad with the tip of your finger...........then insert the bullet on top of it. The flat base of the bullet will guide it squarely down the bore.

Last night I tried seating two sabot less bullets. One mic'd at .450" and the other at .4505 - .451" The looser bullet slid down the bore with the same loose resistance all the way out the bottom. The tighter one slid all the way down tight. Both these bullets were sized down to .448" and then knurled up to .452+ and then sized back down with a .451 or .4495" die. The bore likes the fit of the .451 bullet.
My shorter barrel definitely has some looseness down close to the powder charge.
Richard

[edge]

Sept 4, 2010 14:20:00 GMT -5 Richard said:

SNIP.

My shorter barrel definitely has some looseness down close to the powder charge.
Richard

YIKES! I wonder how that happened? ;D ;D ;D

[dougedwards]

A slightly tighter bore at muzzle is usually an advantage for a center fire rifle barrel but I don't think that it serves the same purpose as we do things backwards with a muzzleloader. I think I would rather the breech end of the barrel to be slightly tighter for our purposes.

I was going out to the nearby public range this morning and all 10 stalls were full with people waiting one half hour after it opened. I have got further testing to do with these sized and knurled bullets to try to find the perfect fit for obturation and accuracy. It should be fun.

Doug

[bigmoose]

I only use Barnes 290gr. Flat based bullets in my .45, as Richard and others have said I put the wonder in the bore the use the bullet to square it, I like a tight fit, I resize and knurl, so it take lots of push to seat it, I have a number of times got the bullet in the bore and couldn't seat it, at that point I use a rubber mallet to beat it down the bore, and while it ruins the ballistic tip at a 100 yards the accuracy is unaffected. I think futher down range it would be.
so my motto is "Tight is Right"

[Richard]

Edge.............You are probably 100% on the Yikes! Although, I have found some tighter bullets will, in fact, go down tight all the way. Remember, I could only remove so much of the breech end otherwise there would not be enough diameter to cut the external threads.........or I would have taken another inch off. Fortunately Pac-Nor gives you about 4 to 5" of full diameter barrel before tapering. Where Savage's taper starts right under the barrel nut . With the sabots, I do not feel it at all. I guess its due to the expansion factor on the plastic. Still, I have gotten some pretty good results sabot less so I don't know if it hurts at all? One thing I do know is..........had I listened to most everyone on the board, this barrel would have been used for staking up my tomatoes ;D Again, following the incident I fired (again accidentally) three 2900+ fps loads with no ill results. That is what convinced me that the barrel was sound. After some 1700 shots, mostly in the 2900 - 3,000+ fps range, I believe it is, in fact, "sound!"