I picked up this slick old bolt action 2, maybe 3 months ago. I thought I had started a thread on it but evidently not. Anyway, the bore is slick and shiny but shows some wear and the rifling is shallow.
First thing was dies and cases. Even with the wear in the bore this crazy thing still only miced .352. I got hold of Dave at Ch-4D and he made up a set of dies for me. A friend had a pile of 30-06 brass and he gave me 100 cases. Forming was easy, just slowly run the -06 case over the tapered .352 expander plug and set the neck. Then cut off most of the excess and trim to final 2.21 length. Even the chamber is tight on this rifle so I had to take just a bit off the head. It amounted to .002, not enough to worry about. Here's the 9 X 57 cases flanked by the parent 30-06 cases.
I had a little data from COTW and with some help from GGCA friends who have 9 X 57's I decided to start with a Hornady Interlock, 250 gr. round nose. First I had to make a swaging die to take them to .353-.354. A bit of sizing lube and the bullets ran through the die easily. Now I have bullets and dies so I decided to start with 40 grs. of IMR-3031. It was pretty good right out of the gate except that it was about 8 inches high. I upped the powder charge, 1 grain at a time, to the 44 grs. COTW gave and POI never came down enough to help. We are blessed locally with an excellent gunsmith/machinist os I took the rifle over to Mark and he made me two front sights, one .050 taller and another .070 taller. The shorter one printed a few inches low so out came the file and I proceeded to "shoot and file" until I had it cutting the X-ring at 50 yards, benched. Velocity averaged 2143 fps with energy at 2550. There's a good hunting load!
I'm not really cheap but doggone jacketed .358 round nose bullets are a bit expensive for an old cast bullet shooter....and they are not the most plentiful. A friend sent me 50 sized, lubed and gas checked cast bullets that run right at 250 grs. My first load with them was H-4895 and I was surprised at the results. I didn't expect gilt edged accuracy with this old bore but I didn't expect them to tumble either. At 50 yards they were going through the target sideways. I suspected I was overdriving them for the shallow and worn rifling. So just a bit ago I loaded 13 grs. of Unique, topped that with an open cell foam filler of enough length and diameter to hold the powder against the primer and loaded 3 cartridges with the cast bullet. Ahhhhh....the sweet sight of success!!!!! All three went under an inch at 50 yards, benched! I didn't set up my chronograph so I don't really know what it's running but I expect around 1350, give or take. Problem is that it is again about 8 inches high. That's ok....there is still the .070 taller front sight!! I can repeat the process and have a playing/plinking load with the cast and a good hunting load with the jacketed. I need to tweak the cast load and if I can get to 1500 fps with it I may use it for everything. A 250 gr. cast bullet at 1500 fps will work on any whitetail in the states.
Now to contact Tom at Accurate molds and pick out one of his bullets and have him cut me a mold at .354...and I am set!
Problem is now I need another project.....maybe that Sempert - Krieghoff kiplauf I saw on ********* in 8 X 57I.
First thing was dies and cases. Even with the wear in the bore this crazy thing still only miced .352. I got hold of Dave at Ch-4D and he made up a set of dies for me. A friend had a pile of 30-06 brass and he gave me 100 cases. Forming was easy, just slowly run the -06 case over the tapered .352 expander plug and set the neck. Then cut off most of the excess and trim to final 2.21 length. Even the chamber is tight on this rifle so I had to take just a bit off the head. It amounted to .002, not enough to worry about. Here's the 9 X 57 cases flanked by the parent 30-06 cases.
I had a little data from COTW and with some help from GGCA friends who have 9 X 57's I decided to start with a Hornady Interlock, 250 gr. round nose. First I had to make a swaging die to take them to .353-.354. A bit of sizing lube and the bullets ran through the die easily. Now I have bullets and dies so I decided to start with 40 grs. of IMR-3031. It was pretty good right out of the gate except that it was about 8 inches high. I upped the powder charge, 1 grain at a time, to the 44 grs. COTW gave and POI never came down enough to help. We are blessed locally with an excellent gunsmith/machinist os I took the rifle over to Mark and he made me two front sights, one .050 taller and another .070 taller. The shorter one printed a few inches low so out came the file and I proceeded to "shoot and file" until I had it cutting the X-ring at 50 yards, benched. Velocity averaged 2143 fps with energy at 2550. There's a good hunting load!
I'm not really cheap but doggone jacketed .358 round nose bullets are a bit expensive for an old cast bullet shooter....and they are not the most plentiful. A friend sent me 50 sized, lubed and gas checked cast bullets that run right at 250 grs. My first load with them was H-4895 and I was surprised at the results. I didn't expect gilt edged accuracy with this old bore but I didn't expect them to tumble either. At 50 yards they were going through the target sideways. I suspected I was overdriving them for the shallow and worn rifling. So just a bit ago I loaded 13 grs. of Unique, topped that with an open cell foam filler of enough length and diameter to hold the powder against the primer and loaded 3 cartridges with the cast bullet. Ahhhhh....the sweet sight of success!!!!! All three went under an inch at 50 yards, benched! I didn't set up my chronograph so I don't really know what it's running but I expect around 1350, give or take. Problem is that it is again about 8 inches high. That's ok....there is still the .070 taller front sight!! I can repeat the process and have a playing/plinking load with the cast and a good hunting load with the jacketed. I need to tweak the cast load and if I can get to 1500 fps with it I may use it for everything. A 250 gr. cast bullet at 1500 fps will work on any whitetail in the states.
Now to contact Tom at Accurate molds and pick out one of his bullets and have him cut me a mold at .354...and I am set!
Problem is now I need another project.....maybe that Sempert - Krieghoff kiplauf I saw on ********* in 8 X 57I.