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Forum for discussion of guns and ammo
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Postby fusordoug » Mon Sep 10, 2012 11:09 am

If you guys like to talk about guns, ammo, shooting, etc - here's the place. I didn't start right off with this since I thought I was kind of the only one here with any interest in this. The fact is, I'm a reasonably competent gunsmith (not just a screw replacer) and ammo fabricator, which is key to winning the competitions I enter. I'm mostly a benchreset guy, though I enjoy handguns too - I'm just not good enough with handguns to do much more than impress the locals.

I do things like buy actions at gun shows, rebarrel them, make stocks, make them hummers, do trigger work, rechamber and thread barrel blanks, make my own super precise ammo (some runs show ZERO std deviation and sub tenth moa accuracy), cast bullets, make the alloys...and so forth.

Please don't discuss doing illegal things here...we don't want to encourage the teeny-bomber/whack job types one bit.

Here's an old link to a few of my toys.

I've added quite a few since.
Why guess when you can know? Measure!
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Re: Start thread

Postby Doug Coulter » Mon Sep 10, 2012 11:24 am

I'm lucky, I have a lot of land. So I have not just one, but two shooting ranges. The one "in the back" is the larger, and recently we upgraded the tent over the rifle bench to a real shed roof.
AllDone.jpg
New bench

Looking from the vicinity of the bench downrange:
RifleTargFmBench.jpg
Have a whole mountain for a backstop.


Of course, even though I don't rate for competition, I shoot handguns too:
PistolRange.jpg
Handgun backstop with brass catcher tarp stand

We help local cops train for requalification here, and teach the VA CCW safety course whenever there's enough demand to make up a class. Dave Knight (hope to get his neat solar system up in alt energy soon) is the main instructor for that - and he's REALLY good.

But my backyard is a half-mile drive from here, so sometimes I just shoot in my front yard - it's nice to be able to try some tweak, make just a couple rounds with a new recipe for example and test without a lot of waiting for each go around. This vid (a 65 yd shot on a 1/4 lb jar of tannerite) was taken with the help of another member, Jon Howard, who came out for a visit when his company flew him to this side of the pond for another reason.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znw0vcRgOPI

This one was shot with my hyper accurate cooper in .223. One of the few I really didn't have to do anything to to make it a great rifle (single shot all the way, baby, with stuff like this it's all you need).


I'm extensively into reloading...
Posting as just me, not as the forum owner. Everything I say is "in my opinion" and YMMV -- which should go for everyone without saying.
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Re: Start thread

Postby solar_dave » Sat Oct 27, 2012 1:41 pm

Here is a full out 6mm PPC benchrest gun. Boy this thing shoots! Unlike the other guns, it just about doesn't care what sort of ammo is put into it – they all go into the same hole no matter what. I have a target with a 3/8 inch hole in it from 20 shots of 4 different loads and two shooters. That's pretty good. Almost ruined it for me, as I like load development, and with this, there's basically no point. Well, it does show a slight preference for match grade 70 gr Sierra bullets and powder that burns at about the right speed, which could be any of H322, W748, N200 or N201. The trigger on this gun is the lightest I have ever experienced. It is too light for me to measure, or even feel. It takes a bit of special technique to shoot this gun.


I have a similar gun but it is a real sleeper as well. It is a 244 Remington (note i didn't not say 6mm) built on a Remington 788, not my choice of action. I picked this gun up from a guy in PA that thought he had shot it out as well, he was also afraid of the gun because he tried to work on the trigger and one time he took it off safe and it discharged. A good cleaning and a rebedding of the action was all it took. It has a 26 inch CJ Hart SS heavy barrel with a 1 in 12 twist and a Canjar set trigger. I disassembled the trigger and remade a couple of the parts he had screwed up and the safety now works as designed (BTW I hate guys with dremel tools). It has a 6X18 Redfield scope of 1980's vintage on it, optics are great.

It likes 75 gr Hornady bullets the best ( I bought a lifetime supply 20 years ago from a guy going out of business) with IMR 4350, I can't quite fill the case with that as it will over pressure as denoted by stiff retraction and flowed brass into the bolt face. You can also tell when you go to reload them they take more than a touch up on the length trimmer. Move up to IMR 4831 and it can't quite get to the optimal pressure. I have a quality set of neck sizing dies and a old A2 heavy RCBS press which will repeat like mad. The press is another story how I laid my hands on that. I have seen the Wilson trimmer barely kiss the case with the best of the loads. The CJ Hart barrel is reamed slightly deep on the neck area and you can hang the bullets out some, just so they kiss the lands of the rifling.

What I like about the gun is it looks ugly, and it gets laughed at the range. They mock the action, the stock is beat 6 ways to Sunday, it too has the mounts for a sling, but I do use it for antelope and bring a bipod out and attach it for those days. They get pretty quite when I shoot the C out of a Coke can at 300 yards (OK it has to be a really cool morning with very low wind). It is funny as the can never moves and they think it is a miss, spotting scope and the can itself always says different. The antelope hate it even at 600+ yards. I used to go prairie dogging with it but those little buggers are getting pretty scarce, and since I moved to AZ I have not seen one town.

BTW I have about 15 boxes of original Remington 244 ammo in the old green boxes I got on 1/2 price clearance as people would not buy them cause they didn't say 6mm. :D :D :D

Edit: OMG I just went surfing around the net and that old ammo is worth $75 a box, quite a nice investment from the $3 I paid. Glad I didn't shoot but a couple rounds.
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