ronlaughlin

This morning the plan was to shoot the two sabot with the rifle on a bench. When we arrived up there at 4900' it was snowing, and 36 degree. This brought about a change in the plan, and the shooting was done from the driver seat of the truck. We managed to park the truck so the range to the target was 97 yard. Rifle used was an Omega with a 1.5x--5x scope. The powder charge used for both sabot was 60 (weighed) grain of Blackhorn. The bullet used in both sabot was the 300 grain XTP. Primer used was the W209.

First from a cold clean barrel three shots were made using the black crush rib sabot, and the target photographed.











Then three shots were made using the two petal yellow sabot





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The two petal sabot were found out further than the crush rib sabot.















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sabotloader

I assume that you know that there is what I would call a significant difference in the loaded thickness of each of those two sabots, especially as they become compressed in the bore. The CR will be a tighter fit and have a better grip on the lands than the thinner 2 petal

Omega218er

My Omega hates Super Glide sabots with XTP's.

ronlaughlin

That makes at least two Omega.












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lemoyne

Neither will hold anywhere near as good a group in the Triumph or the Endeavor encore as the standard smooth short Black Harvester , and the second best is the MMP24

ronlaughlin

One of my Omega has a barrel just so barely looser than the others. In the beginning i tried using the short black Harvester when i shot it. After awhile i wised up, and quit, because i wearied of how hard it was to load. These days i only shoot the crush rib in all Omega rifles, unless shooting 0.458 bullets. Accuracy is good; makes me smile.













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TN Lone Wolf

Amazing that simply switching sabots makes that much difference.

bronko22000

IMO another difference in accuracy is that the 2 petal sabot is "hanging on" to the bullet for a bit longer and isn't releasing as evenly as the 4 petal CR sabot. Maybe its the design or it could be the sabot material.
Ron I wonder what the accuracy difference would be between the Harvester 4 petal smooth side vs the CR?

lemoyne

I believe that if you slug the barrels you will find that muzzleloader barrels of all brands are made to a much wider tolerance this can cause one gun to need a different sabot than an other. Lucky is the man that has half a dozen muzzleloaders that will all take the same sabot. An other thing I believe is that they can be to loose or to tight and it will open the group right up. Has anyone else had this experience?

bronko22000

I agree ML bores have a wider tolerance than CF bores. And I agree that too tight can affect accuracy. Too loose though that I'm not quite sure of. Now dropping down the bore loose yeah but not when some effort is required.
I usually get the best accuracy when using sabots when I can start the sabot with my thumb and then get a smooth pressure on the ramrod all the way down to the charge. IMO that give me enough pressure to engage the rifling and is tight enough for the skirt to open up providing an efficient gas seal.
Not saying Ron does it because he's been shooting a long time, but I think a good deal of shooters have accuracy issues by using too tight a sabot and improper loading technique which may damage the sabot, bullet tip or both.