New .44 caliber Brooks mold.

[Distant Thunder]

I believe Brent's problems with that original Sharps Creedmoor bullet were related to his bullet OAL and his ROT and not the design. He was trying to push a 1.500" long bullet from an 18-twist and it was marginally stable at best. He had erratic results with it and many dirt diggers.

He actually had the same problem with the 1.520” prolate bullet that I made the mold for when he shot it in his then 18-twist 1877. To correct the problem he rebarreled that rifle to a 16-twist and for a number of years he was hard to beat at Lodi. Then the wheels came off and he has never completely got them back on. He says, and it may be true, that his problems now are related to the lots of Swiss 1 1/2 that are out there. We all know that Swiss 1 1/2 has gone through some changes, most notably the density, lots beginning sometime in 2013 suddenly were fluffier and did not do well when loaded like the old lots of Swiss 1 ½ using little to no compression.

Other shooters have found ways to make the newer lots of Swiss 1 ½ work. For the past several years I have been loading a 2013 lot of Swiss 1 ½ in my .45-70 Hepburn for long range matches. My results and scores would seem to say it shoots pretty well.

Then the question comes up every once in awhile, “How did the ODG make those 1.500” long 550 grain bullets shoot as well as they did back in the 1870s?”. I think some of the answer is in the 100 plus grains of powder they were burning and the increased velocity they were driving those bullets with. The cupped base may have also helped by moving the center of gravity forward some making them harder for the winds to destabilize. Other than that I don’t know how they could do it if they indeed did it consistently. A marginally stable bullet can remain stable in mild conditions, but when they are fired in the more active winds and especially headwinds they will usually come a part and start to hit in places that can make a shooter scratch his head.

I look forward to testing this new Brooks bullet in both flat base and cupped base. It should be interesting. Maybe I can answer a few of these questions that we talk about but never really know for sure, at least to my own satisfaction.

God this is fun stuff!