Hey guys, I have a buddy that has a Optima Pro, we can’t get this gun to pattern at all. He’s using 100 grain(2 pellets) of Tripple 7 with a Hornady 44 240 grain with the supplied green sabot. Scope rings are tight, everything seems to be good other then his pattern. I’m thinking he should go to blackhorn 209 but not sure. Any recommendations on a load he should try even if it’s a new sabot bullet combo, any recommendations would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

Can you be more specific as to the group he is getting? How any shots at what distance? Shooting from a bench with rests? How big is the group? Is it a circular group, strung horizontally, vertically? Does another person shooting the gun get the same results?

We had the same issue with one of the guys on our hunting lease a few weeks ago. Turns out it was the shooter, not the gun.

At 50 yards, shooting with a lead sled, 1 shot might be high but dead center, next shot low and left, next shot high and right, it’s just all over about the size of a paper plate. He shot a whole box and a half of the Hornadys ( about 30 shots)

OK I'm going to assume that your friend is a fair shot and knows how to shoot. That being said and noting that he's using a lead sled which should eliminate human error and the scope is tight it still could be several things. The least of which would be the scope but not uncommon. First thing I would do is get rid of those pellets and get loose powder and a powder measure. I'm suspecting that those pellets are contaminated/old. During loading make sure you apply consistent firm pressure on your ramrod to tightly compress your bullet/sabot over your powder.
Lately I've been playing with Alliant's Black MZ powder with good results in my Accura.

Also I’m reading where he may need a new breech plug to be able to shoot blackhorn 209? It’s a 2004 model

To my knowledge CVA does not provide a new breech plug that is Blackhorn compatible. What was done back then was to modify the standard plug so it would reliably ignite Blackhorn. Here is just one way to do the modification.


















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Ok thanks Ron

CVA does make a BH209 breech plug. Not sure if it will fit the Optima Pro though

Could he be crushing the pellets when he loads? I've never shot pellets before and I don't know what that would do to accuracy but I have heard it can mess with it.