Range report- Lehigh's and SW's

[oldsmellhound]

Well, I finally made it out to do some shooting after a loooooonnnng break. I had just got a sample pack of 185 Lehigh's that I was itching to try, and I needed to pick a hunting load for this season. (This is with a .45 CVA Hunterbolt inline)

So I started out at 50 yards with 200 grain Shockwaves and 80 grains T7 3f. As usual, the SW did not disappoint in the accuracy dept:



About a 3/4" group. Not too shabby. By the way, I don't like the green sabots that come with the SW's, so I replaced them with the tan MMP's. So I decide to try the 185 Lehigh's with the light blue Harvestor sabot, also with 80 grains T7 3f.



Hmmmm...... Not so hot. I decided that the most likely culprit was the sabot. With the Harvestor light blue, the Lehigh almost dropped down the barrel - it was at least as easy as loading a Powerbelt. Personally, I like a bullet/sabot combo to fit pretty tight. Not so tight that I am wrestling it down the barrel, but so that it takes a little effort on the ramrod.

So I backed off the target to 90 yards. I usually shoot at 100, but I ran out of room today because of some trees, so I decided to leave it at 90. Here's where the surprise of the day came. I shot a 5 shot group of the 200 SW's:




A 2" 5-shot group. Not bad. Not the best I've done with the Shockwave/SST, but considering it was really hot out and I wasn't letting the barrel cool down, not too bad.

So now came the moment of truth for the Lehigh. Seeing as how the Harvestors loaded too easily, I tried the tan MMP's, and sure enough, they fit tighter- about the way I like them.




What happened was, I shot 2 shots- the first was close to the bullseye, and the second was that ??????? up in the left corner. The third shot was very close to the first. It got me thinking that maybe the flyer was a gift from one of the more malicious of the muzzleloading gods. I may have flinched slightly, but it didn't seem enough to throw it that far off.

So I decided to shoot a 5 shot group to see if the "flyer" actually was one. I was more than happy with the 4 shots - actually very suprised because if you throw out the flyer it matches my best group ever with my most accurate bullet (200 SW).

By the way, this was my first time shooting Lehigh's and I have to say, they make a mean-looking bullet. It also shows a lot of promise in the accuracy dept. Unfortunately, I only had 10 to shoot, so I couldn't experiment further.

I did a test with water jugs as well that I will post tomorrow.

After the shooting, it was time to sit on the tractor and bush-hog. Fun times!

[Gm54-120]

Both my 45s prefer the MMP tan sabot with those bullets too. Ive found a few loads that work well with the blue CR but i havent had the best of luck with the blue smooths.

On paper the 180gr XTP or GoldDot with the MMP tan have been my best tack drivers out to 100 yards.

There is one thing i really hate about the Lehighs....they look too nice to shoot at paper.

Vaporizing jugs with them makes up for it a little bit though.

[Semisane]

Good report Smelly. With groups like that with the 185 Lehighs, you ought to try some 180 Gold Dots.

I spent a few hours bush-hogging last week end in 98 degrees of Southern sunshine. It whipped my butt big time.

[lemoyne]

It is my experience that a bit more powder stabilizes the bullet better because it is spinning faster, I have never gotten any bullets to shoot really consistent with less than 90 gr. Still you are doing pretty good.

[oldsmellhound]

Lee,

I have found that with most bullets, 90 - 95 grains usually is the most accurate combo. However, this season it looks like 1 or 2 people might borrow my rifle when I'm not using it, and they are a bit more recoil-sensitive. So I decided to back it down a little bit. T7 3f builds pressure really fast in a .45, and even with 80 grains there is a bit of a kick to it. Also, from reading all the chrono reports I've seen, in a .45 there is not a huge difference in velocity between 80 - 90 grains when using T7. Truth be told, I've never been able to shoot much better consistently with this rifle - while it has a very accurate barrel, the trigger pull is very, very heavy- hard to shoot tiny groups with it.