cayugad,
Does the cold weather have anything to do with sabot performance?
It is my opinion that
temperature has a lot to do with sabot performance. The warmer the outside ambient temperature the greater chance you will have of getting your group to open up. Even repeated rapid shooting in cold weather and the heating of your barrel will effect sabot and group performance.
I really prefer sighting in and shooting cool weather - something below 45 degrees.
The colder the sabot the tougher it is. i must say that I do get broken petals in cold weather also but I am shooting 100/110 grain of loose t7, with a very thin .458 Orange MMP sabot. At first the broken petals were a real concern to me, hince my conversation with Del several months back. I also once shot a sabot through a chrono - it was traveling 660 fps at 12 yards - the chrono didn't see the bullet but did see the sabot (I did not have the screens in place) - catching the air at that speed will certainly cause it to open and possible break petals if the petals are folded back far enough.