The usual hazy, hot and humid...........

[Richard]

July weather at the Catawba Valley Wildlife Club in Hickory NC.
This weeks agenda was to shoot the load I used last week with a little tweak. I switched from the 4759 powder for the starter to N-110. I kept it at 16 gr...........The main charge I dropped from 60 to 59 gr. I am trying to minimize the muzzle flash. My thought was a little hotter starter and lower the main charge. Still getting some flash though!
Preferring to "condition" the barrel prior to shooting the above load, I started with another load from a few weeks back which I also tweaked. All shooting today was at 100 yard with the .45 cal Savage/PN.
Target one was a 10/56 duplex with N-110 and Re-7. As usual, the first shot from a "cold" clean barrel tends to be on the high side so I did not include it in the Average. It did groups somewhat outside the main cluster but still "deer" good. Note the .886" three shot group.
#2 was the same load with the "NEW" Midway 200 gr. blem (SW) and it did not like this bullet?
#3 utilized Re-7 along with 4759 for its starter. The first three landed in .853" whereupon a little BS session took place prior to the last two shots which.............moved up and out of the cluster?
#4 utilized the tweaked load which appears at the top of this post: Man, this one wanted to give me a five shot sub 1/2" group but threw shot #4 out Five came right back in the middle making it .496" for the best four!
#5 was the same load with the 200 gr. Blem. While the five shot group suffered a bit, it also gave .889" three shot.
When looking over all five groups, four of them contained three shot groups that averaged .781" and that is with three different loads. So, not too shabby for shooting in weather that climbed from 72* to 84* in the shade. The one large group? was shot under the exact same conditions as the others with the same cleaning and cooling so who knows? The bullet and load just did not like each other ;D
Note: The first group was shot at a target which had been below it. It appears like the group shot low but it did not.
Richard

[edge]

Did you observe any visible or weight differences between the firsts and the Blems?

edge.

[Richard]

Just did an inspection of the blem against the 200 gr. Hornady SST. Weight wise, the blem weights 1/2 a grain more than the SST. The diameter of both mic at .3997". The base of the blem actually a flatter base than the SST. You can see the edge is less rounded. Outside of that, they are pretty much the same. I probably should have shot a group with the SST's for comparison but at the time felt they were the same bullet ..........and chalked it up to the load not liking the bullet---which it may just be?
Richard

[edge]

It will be interesting to see how they fare in the future if you shoot them side by side.

I have often used the Nosler Accubond seconds and have not had any problems. I have used then interchangeably hunting along with the firsts and have not found a difference except in price

edge.

[Richard]

I am shooting the Nosler 200 gr. HP blems now and they shoot exactly the same as the "new from the factory" ones? Except for a little hot lead splash spots.......its just cosmetic!
Richard