I was able to get to the 'pit' for a little bit this morning. I just loaded up my trap shooting stuff and the ML gear, went the the Troy-Deary Gun Club shot a couple rounds of trap then head to the the Rock Pit. I really wanted to shoot these new offerings from Lehigh. Remember these are his first run and I believe the first shooting of these bullets. It is like they are 'hot off the lathe'
Confession time, I have never shot any FPB's or Thors from a ML so I am not really sure what a copper sabotless should load like. I have both bullets right here in the bullet stash but just have not been interesd in shooting them. I have shot a bunch of Bull Shop Dan's lead conicals and a few other lead conical offerings. Of course Dan's Bull Shop's sized to the bore are very easy to load, while some of the Hornady Great Plains have been fairly difficult.
So with that information in mind, I will try to rate the loading pressure required for this run of sabotless. They were not easy to load a push down the barrel. They definitely required a short stater, but the way they are built it really makes it easy to set the short starter on and 'rap' the bullet down. With the design of the gas rings the bullet alignment is virtually assured to be straight to the bore, a real plus.
After getting the bullet down the length of the short starter applying the range rod to push it down further is not like pushing a normal sabot load down. Two things I would offer make sure you have a good loading jag like a 'Spin Jag' and a solid ram rod. The bullets go down tight but for required some taps on the head of the rod with the palm of my hand.
The next problem... I could not 'FEEL' the bullet contact the powder... in fact my first load when I thought it was in contact it was not. Bouncing the range rod off the bullet showed me it was not seated. Once I got it seated the all important 'witness mark' was applied to the rod and from then on seating was much less a concern. I also should also say I have loaded some PRB's that were more difficult than any of the Lehigh Sabotless.
I chose a 100 grains of T7-2f just to be on the conservative side in the beginning and since I had created a witness mark - I stayed with the 100 grains through out the testing.
Ole #71 is a very good shooting gun and has been sighted in for a 40/200 grain Lehigh. I was not sure where these sabotless bullets might impact so I chose to set that target at 75 yards just tomake sure I was on the paper some where. After shooting the paper and then shooting breakable targets at the back of the pit on the Pit Wall... The scope was pretty much dead-on... It was really fun - HOT but fun...
Here is a picture of todays outing....
I think they shot very well.... #4 was Semi's fault - I got so confident in shooting them I was just pulling the trigger and #4 occured cuse I was going for Semi's 5 shot group...
Finally - I do have some suggestions that I will bounce off Dave that i would think might make loading easier and hopefully not effect accuracy.... cause I am telling @ a 100 yards they were deadly accurate on breakable targets...
I do not know where or when he might get the time to make another limited run of these and I do not know if my suggestions might improve anything - he is the scientist - I am just a shooter - but 'man' he is close to being ready - I am thinking he could maybe get these out this year - but that is probably to much to ask...
Test 3 Shooting the Lehigh Sabotless
