Head space and lands

[Harvey_NW]

Eric has always tuned loads with seating depth. He recommends seating the bullet .020” from jam (lands contact) and then working up your loads. Once loads are worked up then he goes for the “accuracy node”. He moves in at .003” increments and fires groups until he reaches the middle of a “plateau”. Someone said somewhere that he very seldom moves more than .009” to reach the node but don’t remember the who or when, so can’t verify that. Personally, for my hunting guns and how I shoot that is too much effort and money spent for little gain.

Not to mention when seating tests are taken to statistically valid sample sizes, the groups are all the same..

 

[Gila]

Depending on the mag setup it is a good idea to see where the lands are for safety concern depending upon your loading procedure, but on something like a Tikka with a known mag limitation for certain cartridges it's a safe bet you're jumping at mag length. My personal preference is to seat bottom edge of bearing surface to neck/shoulder junction, and test the combo. IME that is the consensus, it either shoots well, or it doesn't. Dropping the powder charge can improve dispersion, but it may not be enough. If it's not acceptable then I'll swap bullet or powder and retry.

Not always…my Tikka .284 Win is 3.1” maximum. The mag length is 3.37”. But with a factory barrel in a common cartridge more likely that the cartridge will fit.

 

[Gila]

Not to mention when seating tests are taken to statistically valid sample sizes, the groups are all the same..

I don’t think an elk is going to know the difference no matter what the range Is.