When do you pull the plug?

[SippyCup]

At what point in the process do you guys finally come to the conclusion that a certain combo isn’t going to work?

Here’s what I got going on. Newer 22 arc barreled action dropped in a chassis. All the factory loads I’ve fed it have been less than 1”. I have one solid hand load that give me consistent 3/4” at 100 yards. The guns accurate.
I just gave up on a combo with 62gr. ELD-VT over a bed of Varget. I tried different brass, different primers, after doing ladder loads that’s showed little to no potential. I eventually found a combo that gave me 1.5” group but it was all vertical spacing. Leading up to this point the groups were 2-3 inches with no consistency. I took the 1.5” vertical group combo and tried a seating depth test doing .010” increments from mag length all the way to .100” jump. My starting point was .040” jump.
After the seating depth test I decided to give up on this combo. I’ve never not struck gold with Varget but there’s a first time for everything.

 

[Luked]

Did you try a different powder with the same bullet?
Nothing wrong with Varget as I use quite a bit of it too. But could just be something that your combo doesn't like much.

 

[SippyCup]

Did you try a different powder with the same bullet?
Nothing wrong with Varget as I use quite a bit of it too. But could just be something that your combo doesn't like much.

I’m going to try staball match next. I was really hoping to find something with Varget cuz it temp stable and I have a few pounds on hand

 

[Billogna]

Thread 'Painless load development (mine)'

Oct 25, 2021

I have had multiple people ask me to lay out how I do load development being that what I do is different. Since Shaen @Shooter71 just rebarreled a Tikka 595 in 6XC I thought it would be easy to show how I do it. It’s a Master Sporter with a T3 lite profiled 20” barrel- keep in mind it is a T3 LITE barrel. So by conventional “wisdom” it should be more picky and less accurate than a heavy barrel. His work is shoddy (), but I bet I can overcome it.

The rifle-


First was @Unknown Munitions factory load with 105gr Berger Hybrids. 5 rounds to zero, 5 for a...

• Formidilosus
• Replies: 1,261
• Forum: Reloading

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This thread has saved me SO much time and money chasing my tail, and wasting components. It's definitely worth a read!

 

[khart_6882]

If you have one solid hand load that gives you 3/4” groups then why are you still experimenting?

 

[Schmo]

I’m going to try staball match next. I was really hoping to find something with Varget cuz it temp stable and I have a few pounds on hand

Try a VV powder in the same burn rate as Varget.