Wyoming State Midrange Championship

[Don McDowell]

10 shooters gathered this past weekend at the Worland Shooting Complex to shoot the 3rd Wyoming State Midrange BPTR match.
9 Wyoming shooters and 1 from British Columbia
There were some tricky winds to deal with as the temperature went up and the humidity went down on Sunday for the 600 yd match.
Kenny Wasserburger was shooting his Tollefsen gun, and set a very high bar for those coming behind to set new records.
Mark Pechares shot some stunning scores on his first adventure into the BPTR matches. Hope to see more of him on the firing line.
Bryan Youngberg walked away with the top honors after a job well done on thee firing line and getting the match organized.

   

[Cody Smith]

Thanks for posting the results, Don. It looks like it was fun, wish I could have been there.

[Don McDowell]

It was a tough one Cody. Surely tested one's fouling control methods and the spotters had to sit right on top of the condition changes.
You were missed.

[Gunlaker]

It sure was a pile of fun Don. I'm sorry I missed you on the way out.

I checked the humidity at the end of day 1 with my little Kestrel and it showed 18%. On day 2 it was 15%. I heard a couple of people fouled out. My worst target was from a brain foul out I think

I did what Eric H. Told me about for wiping. That is to leave the first wet patch pushed in the bore just ahead of the chamber while going to get the second one. I think this has helped me a lot.

One thing that probably helped me from fouling out was in the second half of the day Bryan mentioned that he might go to three patches. I thought if it works for him it'll probably work for me :-) Otherwise I'd have probably stayed with two and maybe had fouling problems. I'd never used more than two for greasers before.

Did you get a chance to talk loads with Cody and his new .44-77?

Chris.

[Don McDowell]

Chris it was good shooting with you again. Looking forward to seeing you at Byers.
I did get a little bit of time to talk bullets with Cody. I think he's on the right track already, but I will send him some bullets that work well in my rifle all the way out to 1000.

[Don McDowell]

PS. moving the sticks closer to the forearm stopped the vertical from the barrel heating, so I suppose I'ld just as well get used to shooting that rifle close to the sticks.

[Gunlaker]

Interesting Don. I know that a few pretty talented shooters put the sticks right against the forearm.

I'm already thinking about Byers. I'm going to play some more with the Borchardt, but my main priority is going to be really getting a handle on fouling control for that .45-90 paper patch rifle. The advice that Eric H. gave me has definitely paid off in the grease groove rifle, now I've got to see if it helps the other one.

Bryan and I were pulling Cody's target at 600 and there was one bullet hole that was noticeably oval, but I think just the one. Kenny told me that one of my bullet holes at 600 looked really weird, like a figure eight. I'm very sure the bullets are stable as it's a proven combo, but I wonder if the bullet got unbalanced hitting some hard fouling in the bore. Those bullets were as perfect as I can make them so I'm confident they were balanced when they went into the bore. I only mention it because I thought it was odd, and Cody had one like it too.

Chris.

[Don McDowell]

A couple of Johns bullets left holes that indicated a lot of yaw. I think there was some weird stuff going with the wind that was enough to disrupt some bullets. Weirdest thing was one of Eddies bullets during the 600 sounded like a june bug as it left, but the thing fell right into the basic group he had been shooting on the edge of the 10 ring.
I usually put the sticks against the forearm when shooting sitting, but prefer the longer stance out by the muzzle for prone. I think this barrel is light enough that the both heat sources was causing it to do some crawly things with the muzzle carrying that much weight. I'll start shooting this one close to the forearm and hopefully keep the shifting vertical that chewed me up on the 300 yd targets from happening again.
The fouling control I prefer is the delrin rod with a nylon brush pushing damp patches (7 parts water 1 part NAPA cutting oil) then follow with the dry Aresnal patch from BACO. Leave the arsenal patch on the brush , and on the following shot pushing it thru the bore first, then the 2,3,4 or however many patches until you can feel the rod push smoothly. Need to carry a lot of patches in your shooting gear.