A short video about my rifle

Looks like you had fun. I always like things with a personal touch, even if I don't necessarily like the end result: not so in this case, though.
The mag holder is a nice touch: always handy as a time-saver if nothing else, and the stock as a whole looks very nicely done. A neat, well-thought out package. Well done you!!

So, does the new stock improve your aim, comfort, both? Or purely cosmetic? Why the switch?

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twist rate, rpm's, and short barrels

Boolit Man Join DateAug 2007LocationMilwaukeePosts140

What would the ideal twist rate be for a 30 caliber barrel in a 10" length? The cartridge would be a 30 herrett and the preferred bullet weight would be 150 grains. The aimed for velocity with accuracy is 1800 - 1900 fps given all the other variables are taken into account.

This is about the max velocity with accuracy for a 1 in 10" in a rifle, at least for most and with relative ease. I'm wondering how this changes in a short barrel because the powder to achieve the same velocity will be much faster than in a rifle as will be the acceleration. Do we need a slower twist just to make the 1800-1900 goal in a 10" barrel?

Don't think it is going to happen in a 10" barrel. Not with cast anyway.

i don't see any reason to use a different twist then you would in an 18 inch barrel. just change up the powder for better performance.

what I hand-load; 45 acp; 223 rem(5.56mm); 22-250 rem; 243 win; 30-30 win; 308 win; 45-70 gov.
on the list to start Loading; 9 mm; 270 win; 30-06 springfield; 222 rem

"You might be a gun nut if you load 45-70 on a progressive press" -HICKOK45<- was he talking about me!?!

---
Si vis pacem, para bellum

There are twist rate calculators out there on the web. A shorter barrel may need a faster twist for that velocity for no other reason than the muzzle blast. It's the muzzle blast that destabilized a boolit but how much difference that would make is a guess. The stability twist to velocity is not linear. It becomes iffy at transonic and requires more twist below transonic than above and more twist as velocity approaches 3000fps.

Regards
303Guy

?It is hard enough to remember my opinions, without also remembering my reasons for them!? Nietzsche

The barrel twist is not going to effect the goal of "1800 - 1900" fps much. The standard twist for the 30 Herrett was/is 14" and it is a good one for what you want. However, you can sneak up into the 1700s with a 150 cast with a 30 Herret but you need a longer barrel or the case capacity of the parent 30-30 cartridge to safely get into the 1800 - 1900 fps range.

The older Lyman reloading manuals with the "Contender" data section has loads.

Larry Gibson

The Herrett, formed from 30-30 brass is 1.605" long. Rifling for a 10" barrel is 1 in 14" which works at around 1593 fps with a 150 gr bullet, about the same with a 165 gr bullet.
WW748 is best, and faster like 4227, 4198 also failed for accuracy.
You CAN get to 1850 fps with the 150 jacketed, I have nothing for cast. But accuracy is sad.
A good load is 25.5 gr of 748, 165 gr SPBT at 1525 fps. 27 gr with the 150 gr bullet for 1593 fps.
A faster twist will need LESS velocity, a slower twist needs more but you have pressure limits and burn rates from the short barrel.
I would play with SR4759 for accuracy and then a powder not even thought of, VARGET! You will be on your own with both, not much for loads with either powder. Not many loads for cast either.
Hodgdon will tell you Varget is too slow but I use it in the 7BR and 7R with good velocity and supreme accuracy.
I think your wish for high velocity and accuracy is a step too far, not needed, just accuracy.
I used 4759 in my 30-30 tender but I no longer have the loads, gave them when I sold the gun. I used the RCBS 308-165-sil boolit and could do this at 100 yards from the bench, scoped.

You might also want to check out your chamber's throat or freebore in this case. T/C liked to be very generous in freebore on their pet rounds. I wouldn't be surprised if it was 0.250 to 0.375 off of the case mouth. A friend's 357 Herrett is over 0.250. The long run in makes cast a challange.

You might also want to check out your chamber's throat or freebore in this case. T/C liked to be very generous in freebore on their pet rounds. I wouldn't be surprised if it was 0.250 to 0.375 off of the case mouth. A friend's 357 Herrett is over 0.250. The long run in makes cast a challange.True, they were all over the place and it changed from gun to gun. Rough bores were common too.

A few golden booliters have chimed in on your post. I will not try to compete with their knowledge in this area. It is a interesting concept though. Your OP suggest a custom barrel and experimentation. With the 1 in 10" twist and a WD or heat treated BruceB boolit the pressure should increase along with speed with a good chambering and boolit fit. As for accuracy are you talking scoring target or definitely behind the front shoulder at longer ranges. 44man made a good comment of "but you have pressure limits and burn rates from the short barrel."

When I played with my T/C 10" Herrett, I wound up with around 25gr of AA1680 powder (H4227 gave the highest velocities, but was NOT consistent or accurate), 6.8SPC brass for parent cases (change extractor to one from a 6.8SPC barrel), and managed 2150fps and 1.25" 5 shot groups @ 100 with 125gr Ballistic Tips. I only shot very little cast in it for fire forming, not for accuracy.

The throat in mine was super long. I found case neck tension (having plenty of bullet shank in the case) was more important that trying to approach the rifling, since I could drop a 180gr round nose in and put the case in behind it and it never touched.

In the end I sold it and figured I'd be better off with a .300 whisper or blackout.

I think 1:14 or 1:12 would do what you want.

Varget was just too slow. Ramshot TAC was getting there, but nothing like the AA1680.

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Pointed Soft Point "Core Lokt"

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[b]gettin old, i like short drags[/b]

I was transferring to a new phone today and was putting pics from the phone to the computer. Here is a couple of pics. This was my second cast boolit deer a few years ago. Thanx to a couple of years periodically lurking here for a couple of years before I joined the forum. The doe was at a 117 good paces and angled on a 30-40ish degree towards me exposing her left shoulder. She ran about 100 yards in the correct direction. As you can see the car is in the pic. It was my shortish drag ever without having to move the vehicle. Rifle is a Win 94 30-30 that I bought back in the mid-early 70's with paper route monies and cast boolit monies that I received from a local gun shop. The load was a Lee .30 180 gr in front of 32 gr of AC 4064.

good work.good shooting. I like that 4064 powder that's all I use in my 308. GD

"The good sense of the people will always be found to be the best army.They may be led astray for a moment,but will soon correct themselves" - Thomas Jefferson

I wasn't Born in the south but I got there as soon as I could.
I like this site. MOSTLY good people. good ideas.

I hate dragging too now. I have been using little machines for a while, recently changed to a Polaris 400. Dump bed. I can get very close to them and might have to drag a short distance. I can use it on all of my neighbors land.
Still a problem, some deer I can not lift into the thing so I go get help.
Long ago I had an old Toyota pickup. I mounted an electric winch in the front of the bed, pulled the cable out and attached it to the strap on the deer's neck. I put a plank on the tailgate and just pushed the button.
Been thinking of keeping one of my rope winches and a rope in the machine. Pull up the deer on a tree branch and back under it.
That's a nice deer, just the kind I like to eat.

My friend at Ft Campbell is a disabled Viet Nam Vet, a great hunter and an avid sportsman. He even works at the fish and game station on post. Being a very independent person and very self reliant, he carried a roll of 550 cord and if he killed anything, he would tie one end to the deer and the other to his truck. He just pulled slow and the deer always came right out. A very self reliant man.

I came into this world kicking, screaming, and covered in someone elses blood. I plan to go out the same way.

Shake your friends hand for me.
I could pull them out like that but then I have 1/2 mile of gravel road to home. I don't like to skin deer that way!

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Short case lenght 9mm & 40 SW

Yes. You only want to measure after sizing, as that narrows the brass, squeezing it out longer. It is common for load books to give the SAAMI drawing spec which is maximum case length. In the SAAMI drawings (links below) there is also a minus a tolerance. The trim-to length is then usually set inbetween the two.

Here's the thing, though: Many self-loading pistol chambers have a slight taper, even when the cartridge has fairly straight sides. When the rounds are loaded to pressures too low to stick the brass to the chamber wall, the brass moves to the rear of the chamber like a small piston and blows out sideways to fill the taper, making them fatter and shorter than they started out. Resizing doesn't restore the length 100% because it also massages some of the brass to the rear. I once tracked some .45 Auto brass through 50 reloadings (light target loads), and found it lost an average of half a thousandth in length per load cycle, ending up 0.025" shorter at the end when I finally retired what was left of it (started with 1000 pieces and lost about half of it to the range gods and, toward the end, to neck splits). None of that prevented it from working. It just couldn't reach a crimp groove anymore in the length I needed to load it to for best accuracy, so I had to taper crimp it into the lead a little.

SAAMI case lengths:

9 mm 0.744"-0.754". Trim-to length 0.749".
10 mm 0.840"-0.850". Trim-to length 0.845"

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"First contemplation of the problems of Interior Ballistics gives the impression that they should yield rather easily to relatively simple methods of analysis. Further study shows the subject to be of almost unbelievable complexity." Homer Powley

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Short shells (like aquila) diy?

I have done a lot of swapping Lee key slugs into Wally World birdshot and now am looking to branch out.

My Brother and I are setting up a loading bench and boolit casting area so we can start loading 12 gauge in bulk.

What i am wondering is how to load short shells like the 1 3/4 aquilas.

Mostly I want to load single round ball loads (.690?), though if I could work out a load for the Lee slug that would be alright too.

Our intended use is mostly for plinking, so maximum power and pinpoint accuracy are not crucial.

There is a load given here, http://www.thehighroad.org/archive/index.php/t-178253.html
How safe or what ever is a question for the poster and you.

http://www.ballisticproducts.com/ might be the go to folks for data.

Rather than deal with a mini shell casing, why not go with standard components and load data?

Update
The Hodgdon 2003 Annual Manual has some information about making and loading 2 1/2" and 2" shells.

I was figuring on cutting down existing shells.

To prep a Winchester Universal for a Lee Key Slug I trim off the crimp (I roll crimp in a drill press) so I have hundreds of shells that are already pretty short.

I can see value in the shorter shells over and above the possibility of stuffing more in the magazine.

For example, you could load slugs in a short shell and tell by sight/feel which shells are slugs. But this is entirely dependent on the ability of shorter shells to cycle reliably.

Load Type Gauge Shot Wt. Powder Primer Wad Powder Wt Pressure Vel. (ft/s)

Lead Shot 12 7/8 oz. Internat'l Win. 209 BP Compact Euro. 16 8,400 PSI 1180
Lead Shot 12 1 oz. Universal Win. 209 BP Ultra Short Euro. 18.5 9,200 PSI 1180

The above load data is from Hodgdon and is for 2" STS hulls

I do not see why it would not be possible to use the same data for loading slugs depending on wads needed.

Sure it can be done - just don't use loading data for standard length shells and then use shorter wads to compensate for lack of space. This is the equivalent of seating a boolit deeper, i.e. increasing pressure!

For light plinking loads I would use a fast burning powder, like Red Dot or even Bullseye, and then gradually work up a suitable load. Fifteen grains Red Dot should be a good starting point in a one ounce load.

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Abbreviations used in Reloading
Pointed Soft Point "Core Lokt"

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