Development of PP loads for the .44-77.

[Steveu]

"I picked up some Remington primers here local and they turned out pretty junkey having misfires and patterns with what bullets paper."

What is the lot number of those Remington primers???

[Distant Thunder]

Steve,

2573 is the number imprinted on my boxes. Never had a problem before but these have been awful in two rifles. About 10% misfires.

[Distant Thunder]

More testing with the JIM441505EPP. I've only had this mold 4 days and I can say the quality is 1st rate. The other thing is I've only just started to do any development with it but it sure seems like I can't make it shot bad!

Today I shot this bullet over 1 1/2 Swiss with .060LDPE wad on top loaded in BACO cases (neck turned) with a Federal 210 LR primer.
The charge weights were 86, 87 & 88 grains. I started with 86 grains because I always like to shoot a group with my current best load for a fair comparison. That takes into account conditions, how I'm shooting on a given day and most importantly the lunar phase.

The info is on each target (i hope).

           

So it must have been a good moon phase because all 3 loads are nearly 1 moa. The 86 grain load had me worried a bit as the first 4 shots were a vertical line, but the 5th shot made things look a little better. The two high shot and one low shot that are circled are from fouling shots with just random leftover loads of 1 1/2 Swiss.

The 87 grain load probably looks best but there isn't much difference in any of them as far spread.

I finally remembered to move up a 1 1/2 moa for the 88 grain load. Not a bad group either.

There is one thing I'm going to try before I try some other primers, but with these groups today I'd say I'm pretty much ready to go. the rest of the development will come over time.

The thing that is making this work so well right out of the gate is that this bullet was designed for my barrel and chamber and it fits pretty well. My rifle has a 30" heavy full octagon Krieger 17-twist barrel with a Shiloh standard grease groove chamber. Shiloh did the work and it was worth the wait (11 months). I went with the 17-twist to handle bullets long enough (heavy enough) for Creedmoor matches. I wanted the Shiloh standard chamber because I knew it would work well with paper patch bullets, either bore diameter or especially 2-daimeter. So far so good.

I only turned the necks on 15 cases because I wasn't sure how that was going to affect the accuracy. Now I have another 85 to turn. The necks as they come from BACO are .002 to .003" too tight for the Shiloh chamber, which is tight. They would work great as is with straight bore diameter paper patch bullets but the goal here was to use the 2-D design. I used Arnie Seitz elliptical design because it has a history of shooting well at long range. Thank you Arnie for your help.

I know from working with my other rifles that once you are shooting 2 1/2" groups at 200 yards any gains in reducing the group size take time and are small by comparison. Obviously good brass that is fireformed to the chamber is a big help in accuracy. I got a little ahead of myself with a "new" rifle and it is my first bottleneck. There is little point in mixing fireforming cases and load development with the .44-77.

This is a great cartridge and I am very happy I decided to go with it. It does seem like every other day there is one more thing I need to make loading this .44-77 easier or better. I think I'm getting to the end of the list of accoutrements now. The neck turning tool was the last item I added.

I'm looking forward to shooting this rifle at the matches I have remaining this year. I don't think the .44-77 will replace my .45-70 Hepburn as my Creedmoor match rifle, but it will serve as a backup and an option for when I just feel a need to shoot something different.

[Kurt]

Well you got my two 5 shot groups beat by an inch and and the second by an inch and three eights.
I can only get 85 grains of 1.5 OE in the case so I started with that and compressed it with a .060" fiber gasket wad and seated the bullet .115" in the case. the second load was 82 gr. Both groups were round clusters.
I just finished loading a ladder load starting with 80 gr of 2E and ended with 85 gr. If the range is not to busy tomorrow I will give it another try. My .44-77 Hartford favors the 2F OE. I will see what the Farmer will do with it.
The conditions were not to good with a front moving it today and it seems like every body wants to ask questions and talk so I didn't shoot all my shells and went home.

It might be time to break in the new neighbors and shoot in my yard but it's short at 135 yardsI can get 180 but I might hit the corner of the house

[Distant Thunder]

Don't hit the house! That would be bad.

I'm going to try a wad stack tomorrow with 86 grain load. I shot one like that today as a fouler and I just have a feeling that with a bit more compression the 86 grain might improve, but it's just a feeling.

Turning the necks on the BACO cases was really easy once I got set up. Now I'll do the rest of the cases, it sure didn't hurt the accuracy any. That will make the BACO cases very usable with this 2-D bullet and the capacity is very close if not exactly the same as the JBA cases.

Kurt, if you have a .44-77 with a standard Shiloh chamber you should try that bullet in it. That is the chamber it was designed for.

[Kurt]

One at a time Jim I don't want you to leave me too far in the dust at Rapids.
I tried a bullet patched with .0018" thick paper in a fired case from the rifle you shot at Harris and it just fits.
My two tight .44-100 Rem straight I cant seat one in the fired case but the .44-90 bn's are a go. One has a 19 twist and the other a 17. The .44-77 you shot has a 19 twist and I will shoot that bullet when I get a load for the Farmer. I only need to shrink what I have now to be happy with. 3-1/2" I have now can be improved. Your there now, but you have a couple days head start on me LOL.

[Distant Thunder]

I'm not really in a race with you, other that for what fun I can have poking you a bit , but I am very interested in what this bullet is capable of in other rifles. I think it is great that you have the same bullet, you'll test it more than I would ever have time to . I believe the 2-D design has great potential and would really like to see it proven out.

I'll have to be on my game for Rapids on the 22nd. I faltered at 600 at the gong match. The heat and fatigue got to me and I was really unsteady on those last two gongs. I shot really well at 300 yards, I was very steady and broke good shots. At 600 it was pretty obvious that I hadn't shot a match in 10 months. I'll probably do so shooting with my .22 to "toughen up" for the paper match.

All this is to get me in shape for Lodi in September, I hope to do reasonably well then.

[Kurt]

I shot all my range setting shots at the small right hand gong, I think it was 8" but i'm not sure on that. I missed just one from the 600 using the 2.6. even the first shots just guessing turning the elevation knob one full turn per 100 yards from a 200 yard known setting on the DZ scope the shoots were on that small plate. The 200 was what I failed on.

I had some lead in my barrel when I cleaned today. I put the patch right at the transition of the shank to the ogive. There is a very thin faint line when the cavity was cut where the shank ends and this is where I held the patch but I will move it ahead a 1/16" with the next batch I cast.

The testing will come this winter. I want to see just what the base is going to do with different wad combinations and alloys. This is an interesting bullet design for sure. I'm happy with the first 10 shots staying under 2 MOA with out a load work up. Looking what your doing I know it will make a MOA bullet even if I need to buy another case of Swiss if they ever get a good batch again.

[Distant Thunder]

I know Swiss has had it's problems and it is not now the same powder it was years ago but I have to say I have worked with two on thw newer lots in this .44-77 and they shot pretty well. The 2016 lot seems to be shooting really well with this 2-D bullet.

I even got exceptional accuracy in my .40-65 from the lot that Brent had all the trouble with and that was with no load development. I just increase the compressive to around .200" and it shot very well. The old Swiss shot well with only minimal compression. This 2016 lot has done well with about .060" compression up to about .150". To get the 86 grains to fill the case enough to have some compression I'm just dumping the weighed charge into the funnel on my 14" drop tube. If I pour too slow I don't have any compression at all or the wad never touches the powder.

My old shooting partner Glenn put his offhand loads together by just dumping 1 1/2 Swiss through a short funnel and seating a wad on top followed by the bullet. I called it "fluffing up" the powder and it worked well for him. It gave him a reduce load with less recoil and plenty of accuracy to knock down chickens at 200m.

I've spent most of my time trying to get more powder in my cases, with this .44-77 I'm actually trying to put less powder it the case. It's working, maybe because it's a bottleneck case.

I do believe I will get to a point where this rifle shoots 1 moa at 200 yards and beyond. That will take some time and a better understanding of the .44-77 case but I'll get there. I've only had this rifle for a month and I've only spent two days developing a load with this 2-D bullet! I'd say it has gone pretty well so far. I'm smiling all the time I'm working with it I can tell you that.

Dave Gullo told me that the most accurate rifle he owns, and he owns a few, has this same barrel on it. I believe him.

I still need to put that shim under the trigger spring like you told me, just haven't had time yet.

[Distant Thunder]

A very interesting day at the range with the .44-77. First thing this morning I tried a wad stack that I thought might work and allow for compressing the 86 grains of 1 1/2 Swiss a little more. That didn't work out at all the way I hoped. I need to study this wad stack thing more I guess.

Then I turned to testing primers and since those things are scarce as hens teeth around here now with everyone worried about the future I just tested what I had lying around.

Five different primers were tested and the targets have all the info written on them. None shot horrible but there were a couple of gems found, most surprisingly the Federal 215s.
These are only 3-shot groups but the consistency is very promising. Along with the other groups this bullet has turned in it gives me hope and the rifle is working very well.

So here are the targets from today.

           

I'm at the point where I start doing little adjustments in my loading setup and procedure. They aren't any that one would think would make a different but the target says otherwise. I adjusted my seating depth for this bullet to .095" in the case and that gives me a COAL of 3.600". That is just about all I can "cam" in with the Sharps breech block. The cartridges slide in with some resistance until about .015-.020" from all the way. The block easily pushes them in the rest of the way. That way I know that the step between bore diameter and groove diameter is tight against the rifling leade. This has worked well for me in the past with 2-D PPB.

I refined my drop tubing to be more consistent and uniform. This was a result of watching what work best as I've been going through this development.

Because the powder fills the case to within .060" of the top and I can just thumb push the wads in level with the case mouth I decided to use a bushing as a guide for my compression plug. I damaged one case the other day and I paid way too much for those JBA cases to do that again! Guiding the plug straight into the case seemed to help true everything up very nice. My compression was more uniform than what I had before.

I also believe that turning the necks on the BACO cases, which would have been unusable with this bullet otherwise, improved the accuracy. The bullet bases are a nice snug fit in the case mouth and the case just fit the chamber. The alignment could not be better. The bullet is well centered and supported over a maximum of it's length. This rifle may prove to be even more accurate than I had hoped, it's getting very close to that.

I also did some minor tuning to my rifle which may or may not help with accuracy it's just something I've been doing.

I tried the orange sticker this morning with the wad stack load but I just can't use that for an aiming point so I just aimed at the center of each sheet of paper. That works pretty well for me. The little 3/4" black paster in the middle is just a reference for the center so I can move the groups around on each target. I can see it through the scope until it's behind a crosshair.

I think I'm closing in on some fine accuracy with this .44-77 and something I can use at a match. I'm going to set this project aside for now and get to some other things that I am behind on around the house. At least the weather is supposed to cool down some. I plan to write up a summary of how I'm loading these 2-DEPP bullets but I'll start a new threat for that and I'll also review how I came up with my dimension for the 2-D bullet incase someone is interested and isn't shooting with Shiloh's standard chamber. A review of that might be helpful.