fixed for life. Actually, it did last for years. Maybe because of that early experience, 4895 is still my
favorite powder. I’ve used it for everything from the .222 up to the .458 Magnum. It wasn’t always the optimim choice but it always gave reasonable results. If I had to get along with only one powder, that would be it. So naturally that’s what I tried first now. Since I was working with a new gun, a different batch of
powder, etc., I set up the measure – a Redding this time, my earlier one having disappeared many years ago – to give a bit lower load of 34 grains. I had a good supply of 55-gr. Sierra open point boattails, so loaded them into Winchester cases with WLR primers, bullet ogives barely touching the lands. It took a few moments to get comfortable with the
My swivel top tripod rest isn’t quite as good as a benchrest, but it’s a lot more portable.
stock – it was radically different from what I was used to but I managed. Then I dryfired the rifle a few times. Gary had eliminated all trigger movement and adjusted it to less than 2 lbs. – admittedly a long ways from the mere ounces bench- resters demand but plenty good for sit-still varmints. Then I squeezed off five shots at 100. They formed a perfect hunting zero, 2 inches high. That would give about a dead-on impact at 250 yards, 3 inches low at 300, and 14 at 400. And that takes in most normal hunting. More interesting was the group size. All bullets piled into
a small hole mebbe a quarter-inch on centers. This is nothing to a competitive benchrester, but for an old live-critter shooter like me, it was plenty good. An adult ’chuck gives at least a 4-inch-diameter shoulder/chest/vital area, so quarter-minute accuracy is better than needed. Still it’s nice to know it’s there – and I’m sure it would be even better if I could still shoot like I once did. The head gives added target area of course but I rarely try for it anymore. A slight unexpected wind drift at long range can destroy a ’chuck’s muzzle, leaving it to suf- fer and starve to death, and I don’t want that to happen. I’m a hunter and I don’t mind killing game, but I don’t want to torture it to death. Anyway, I reloaded the few empties so I had a full box.
No extreme procedures, just sizing two-thirds of the necks and seating the bullets to kiss the lands. I used the 34-gr. load, thinking that the Hart’s two extra inches of barrel, compared to the 34-inch I’d usually used, would give essentially the same velocity at lower pressure. Then I was ready to take the new rifle into the field. First shot at live game came at a farmer friend’s, a half
hour’s drive from home. Bob Wise had picked up Tom Stumpf and me in his Ford Expedition, which had plenty of room for a portable benchrest. Bob didn’t bother bringing a rifle, but he did have his .357 Mag so he wouldn’t feel naked. Tom, who had three tours in Vietnam, the last one as commander of a Marine battalion, had his heavy M77 .223 Ruger with 10x Redfield, and I of course had my new .22-250. A grassy farm road led up a shallow valley, and after
Of the several thousand woodchucks I’ve shot with high velocity cartridges since the summer of 1946, this one which weighed 16½ lbs. was the heaviest.
Page 32 Spring 2013
a few hundred yards we found a spot with a good view and parked. Bob and I set up the bench and put my rifle on it, opened a couple of folding chairs and began glassing. Tom wandered a few hundred yards away to cover a section beyond some trees. His rifle had a Harris bipod fitted, so he didn’t need to share the bench. It was late afternoon, when ’chucks are often seen, but nothing was moving. Bob was using his 8x56 Swarovski and
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