Well it wasn't snowing too hard out there this afternoon and it wasn't too cold. So I decided to take my TC Omega and my Lyman Great Plains Hunter .50 cal Caplock out for a dance.

Today's effort was to try out a new bullet and powder for both rifles. The bullet was the .40 cal, 220 gr PR Dead Center. The powder was Black Horn 209.

First up was the GPH. I take my box out to 50 yds and tromp back through butt deep snow. Having heard that BH209 was hard to light I put a bumper charge of 20 gr 2F GOEX followed by 75 gr BH209 and a PR DC.

Three shots down range off my table. First thoughts were this was a very nice load out of the heavy GPH. No felt recoil what so ever. Smoke wasn't too bad with only 20 gr of black down the pipe. It was pretty accurate too.



I wanted to test this bullet in the Omega as well so I didn't push my luck with the GPH. So I put the GPH away and grabbed the new technology.

Same range, same rest. Three shots. The three center high were fired at 50 yds using 100 gr BH209. Thinking I might be able to tighten it up a bit I bumped the load to 110 gr and dropped the scope 14 clicks then moved the target out to 100 yds in the same butt deep snow. I fired 3 more shots and these are the tree top left.



I do like not having to swab between shots. Accuracy in the GPH is good and deserves more testing. In the Omega I will play around a bit more to see if I can't tighten it up some.This rifle has shot MOA in the past so I know it's capable of doing it.

Day 2

Just took the GPH out this morning. Beauty morning, -11'C, calm, sunny.

All targets were shot using the PR Dead Center .40 cal / 220 gr bullet. I had a bit of fogging on my glasses problem this morning but I won't use that as an excuse......just sayin'.

I bumped up the charge from 75 gr BH209 to 80 gr and fired this target. Not sure what caused the flyer but I do suspect driver error.



Just for poops and giggles I bumped it again to 90 gr and fired. Point of Impact changed quite a bit with this bump. No indications of this load being too hot. The hammer remained right on top of the nipple with no blow back.



Then I thought I would kick it Old School and filled the pipe with some good old 2F GOEX @ 100 gr.



I must say shooting the BH209 sure makes a range day much more pleasant without all the mess of black powder. Clean up is pretty slick in the in-line.

Finally, just because it is a new year I thought I'd throw in a 3 Shot Challenge target.



More play time coming up!!!

HA