I have a Bergara B14 HMR (covered in cheetoh dust) in 6.5CM that I have been working up a load for. I have read so many different ways to work up a load, that as an engineer I just did my own thing that seemed to make sense. I had 3 different powders and 2 different bullets. I looked at the starting and max loads for each combo and then added two equally spaced in between. For example, starting load 38 grains… max load 44grains, I loaded up three of each bullet (same weight projectile) at 38, 40, 42 and 44. Yes, I know a three round group can’t tell you it’s a good shooter… but it CAN tell you it’s a bad shooter. So, I had 24 different loads. Took the top five, and loaded 7 rounds each and then took the two best from that and loaded 10 rounds that I shot at 200. As you can see from the pics they are both slightly over 1 MOA (I don’t know how to make the app show a 200 yard group). My question is, would it be worth my time to 0.5 grains on either side of these and shoot another 10 shot group for each? Thanks in advance.
https://www.reddit.com/r/reloading/comments/1mt1gwq/trollygags_antiguide_to_ladder_woo/
In particular, look at the charge for group shot count vs mean vs SD.
A 1.2 MOA mean 10 shot average will have an SD group to group of .21.
Which means it is impossible to learn anything with high confidence from the data you presented.
Uh oh, here we go….
No.
Nodes don't exist. They are disproven fuddlore bullshit.
Powder charge is for muzzle velocity.
Consistency is for ES/SD.
I forgot to turn the Athlon on for the larger of the two groups at 200, but for the smaller group, ES=23.6 and SD=7.7, I was happy with those.
Nodes don’t exist but I do think that different charge weights influence overall dispersion, as in there is an optimal charge weights influence for best accuracy. Even the Hornady ballisticians have mentioned that “generally lower charge weights influence gives less dispersion”.
What your describing is literally a node. Which again, does not exist.
A node indicates a wave pattern that causes an increase and decrease as you go from low to high, as in a sine wave.
All of which is total bunk that was made up by some crank 30 years ago and has never left the shooting lore since despite also never having predicted anything or shown results.
Which I’m agreeing with. You don’t have nodes, because they don’t exist. You have a generally linear pattern of increasing dispersion from lower to higher charge weights, not nodes/sine waves. Y’all are way too excited to try to dunk on people about nodes, chill.
I refuse
Ha that’s fine. I spent years doing OCW shit and don’t touch it at all anymore, because I have had data presented to me that indicates to me that nodes don’t exist and therefore not worth the effort. That I am fully in agreement with. What I don’t agree with is that charge weight is completely inconsequential and can be ignored in every situation. While it may not be as influential on overall dispersion as other factors, there is evidence that it does have a causal relationship.
All that being said, for 6.5 Creedmoor, I load up around 41 grains of H4350 with a 140gr bullet and call it good if I get a good group, good SD, and good ES & don’t think about it twice, which is what I would recommend at this point to anyone who wants to spend their time shooting and not wasting time at the bench
https://preview.redd.it/lojxdu4ppt9g1.png?width=446&format=png&auto=webp&s=9b466dd08f50e6e7df6c31dc6f34aa3008bf0a03
lol. I forgot all about that shit head. Man was he funny to listen to.
The difference in charge weights will only have a significant impact on group size when you significantly change the charge weight. In my experience, the actual window of an "optimal" charge is huge. You only degrade the precision of load when you encroach into the extreme of the low end or high end of the pressures your cartridge is happy with. It is my opinion that the. Best place to load is between 95-100% case fill about a grain of powder less than where you begin to see pressure signs.
That is my understanding as well, both from the Hornady podcast and past experience, particularly very low and very high charge weights giving extremely poor groups
But so many YouTubers say they do exist!
You'll burn out a barrel trying to find a magic node for seating depth and charge weight. It would take a tremendous amount of shooting sample sizes at every possible increment to figure out if something was actually fractionally better. During that 1000+ rounds your barrels internals are physically changing anyways.
It's all chasing smoke.
Although I will say that for some reason I have had certain powders shoot repeatedly really really poorly in certain guns. I don't know why.
Reloading will make you go bald early if you don't find somewhere to draw a line.
That's the catch 22. Finding a 'Node' after every match or comp is chasing the evolving barrel imo. By the time you are happy with a node, you've eaten a lot of your barrel up.
I still fall into that trap sometimes., unfortunately. :(
Yes, 100% agree and understand. The first time I came into this sub to get info, some of the things I was being told… the first thing I thought was burning out a barrel before I had my load developed 😂. Which is why I did only 3 rounds per load. Then 7 of the top 5 loads then 10 of the final two. I was just frustrated at how close to sub MOA at 10 rounds I was with that group. I suspect if I shot it at 100 vice 200, it would be sub MOA. Anyway, I just started the same process on my RPR today. Let’s just say… the initial groups are ridiculously better than the Bergara I started this post about. Thank you for the feedback.
lol I’m driving about twice a month, 2.5 hours 1 way to shoot at my long range. There is one that’s an hour closer but it’s significantly more crowded and not nearly as nice. I think 2.5 hours is my limit. Not sure I would go if it was 3 or more lol
Anyway you cut it, that’s dedication! I will be retiring in the near future and will probably be willing to drive the distance needed. I would say 3 hours would be my limit too. Not only does it take up a great portion of the day, it just sucks mentally, at least for me.
lol it really does. Especially in the winter when daylight ends at 5-6 so you’re driving home in the dark. On the flip side, the shooting part is a good de-stressor so it cancels out lol
What kind of scale and powder thrower are you using? Gordon’s reloading tool is also very helpful.
I have the Franford arsenal Intellidropper that verify against an old school RCBS digital.
https://preview.redd.it/aul0t4x5nu9g1.jpeg?width=1320&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b7f6e430262458761d5ab7ca1ccfc7d5438b4b82
Here is my load data. These shot insanely good out of my rifle. I got .29moa with 10 shots. I did zero load development. Just loaded to an approximate velocity I was looking for and measured some other ammo from eagle eye ammo to get my COAL.
Also recommend shooting groups at 100yrds and get a small aiming point. I usually draw a bunch of red dots on a torso target about 1/2in big. Aim small miss small
My load is incredibly similar with similarly excellent results.
I will say, taking the same 1” grid target out to 200yd is aiming small, at least compared to 100yd 🙂
lol that is definitely fair. But mirage and a tiny bit of environmentals are going to make it a little harder. Aldo not sure what scope they are using but some scopes suck past 100 lol
The grid is actually 1/2” and the center bull is 1”. Scope in questions is a 25x Viper PST Gen 2 EBR-7C. Essentially the 1” bull is 2x width of the scopes center dot at 200. I utilize the aim smal miss small train of thought.
Yeah that sounds like a solid set up. I do think environmentals will start opening your groups a bit at 200. Not a lot but like you said, the groups would have probably been sub MOA at 100
Yes, environmental as well as MY personal ability. I in no way claim to be a super duper shooter…😂. I can definitely hit an 8.5X11 piece of paper… I will claim that😁
😂😂😂 with that group size you would hit a lot smaller than 8x11 at a lot further distance!
Thank you. That’s the problem, the nearest “long range” is hours from me. So 200 is all I get to play with. I would really love to see my rifles stretch their legs and see what I can actually do.
Look at my post in my profile doing a load development for my 30-06. You can see night a day difference how much .3 of a grain can do!
I have tested the “final” load 3 times on 3 separate occasions. They all shot similarly. Powder charges 100% affect barrel harmonics, if you take the time to do a load development you will het good groups.
Sometimes it takes different powders, bullets, and better brass. Before you can find the right load!
Tried finding it in your profile but it's all hidden. What was the sample size you were using to determine that .3 grain increment was actually doing anything?
Check it out now! Im sorry I don’t know why my post were hidden. I flipped it to “show all”
I shoot 5 shot groups.
So during load development I experiment with different powder charges of Varget. I had a speed goal of 2900fps with a 168gr Nosler LRAB out of a 22” barrel.
after finding the “node” that shoots well, I then load up another 20 rounds of that “node” for testing. If it is similar or better… load development is done.
If it is worse, back to the drawing board with a different seating dept, bullet or powder. Usually I play around with seating dept before changing powder or bullet combination.
I'm just always skeptical that a single 5 round group of any powder charge is going to tell you anything significant. Like I'd bet money that 30 round groups of 3 powder charges over .6 gr is going to show any meaningful difference. Especially so with a high recoiling hunting rifle. If you were talking about a 30ib 6 GT it's a bit different. But between most people's ability to shoot and the round count I just don't understand how methods like that can be reliable in the typical sense. I'm sure it produces great ammo but I'm not sure it produces ammo in a way that picking a speed and shooting it wouldn't.
I have shot 20 rounds of that “node” in 2 different occasions. So that would make it total of 45 rounds (plus 5 from the original node testing) for testing, it all shot SUB-moa. Not to mention I’ve taken down 3 big bucks from 200-300 yards.
I regularly target shoot out to 1000 yards, I took this 30-06 out to 800 and was getting impacts.
I think its safe to say “i found the load”.
I only picked the speed in order to match the ballistic to my leupold BDC reticle.
I'm sure your load shoots great. I'm just not confident that your load shoots any better than the ones you didn't pick. If I took a rifle that shoots 2 inch 20 round groups with Hornady match, shot 6 3 round groups with it, and then said "no look these 3 or 5 or whatever shoot better than the rest" that doesn't make any of them better shooting. I may have a 2 inch 3 round group in there and in that's 1/4 minute. If your making load decisions based on that, that doesn't make it any more likely to be right than wrong.
“How much human error can I blame on outdated reloading practices”
So you can shoot a .2 moa difference on the regular out of a 2 moa gun? Must be a civil for that math to math.
On behalf of M.E.s we don't claim this one.
Edit: I glossed over the part where the pictures don't match the distance, so it's a 1 MOA gun with a .1 moa difference in group size. My point was that the powder charge difference wasn't a huge factor and OCW, node, or whatever testing is fuddy.
Seems more like 1 moa gun. The distance is 200 yards
Maybe you should learn how to read.
Agreed, but his point was probably valid nonetheless
That makes it a .1 moa difference in the group. Either way, the point I was inferring was that the powder charge really didn't make a statistical difference in group size.
In short, a LOT.
I do my ladders in .3 increments usually.
fuck that.
🤣
Tbf you really only have to do it one time.