I bought a new XR and I am wondering what loads you shoot,.. It will be mainly a elk gun and I want as much long range performance I can get. I was thinkin Powerbelts or Sabots. What do you shoot? Loose powder or Pellets? thanks

Good choice on guns. I bought a XR last fall and hunted whitetails with mine. I use the powerbelt hp 248 grain, I think, with 150 grain of pyrodex pellets. Some say it is overkill for deer, I like the knockdown power. The gun will shoot this combo very well. I didn't shoot a deer, so I don't know about performance on game, but it places the bullets where i want them. I also tried the t/c cheapshots, shot ok, but harder to load.

I have the BD-XR and have put a lot of different stuff through it. If I were going after elk, I might be loading 120 grains of loose Pyrodex RS and a 250 grain T/C Shockwave. I am shooting some fantastic groups with that load. I would start my rifle out at 100 grains and work up. My rifle does not seem to like anything over 120 grains of loose powder.

Another load I shoot but not for elk is the T/C 240 grain .44 caliber XTPs. I was shooting fantastic groups with 100 grains of powder at the 50 yard line. In fact the first two shots looked like one, dead center in the bull. The third clover leafed. Why, I have not figured out, but at 100 yards they opened to a 1.5-2" group and a few inches high.... I have not figured that out yet.

You might want to try some big conicals out of the Black Diamond. I shoot 320 grain REAL conicals and they do real good. I also have had great luck with the T/C maxi ball in 370 grain I think they are. They shoot really good with 100 grains and would get excellent penetration. If your distance shooting was not to far away, I have also been shooting a 533 grain conical with 80 grains of Pyrodex RS. What a monster. But very accurate. I have shot them only out to 50 yards. I was going to try it further but was having so much fun shooting the big conicals, I shot them all off. These would penetrate anything, and the damage they would do inside should be tremendous, although the conicals I have recovered were not as expanded as I thought they would be.

Some of the hand cast bullets I am shooting are giving excellent groups, but they are not something I would elk hunt with. I tried the powerbelts, and they did not shoot well at all. I shot a 4" groups with them. With my scoped rifle I expect more then that from a projectile.

Have you people that own BD's noticed that the max powder charge range is about 120 grains? Not that I am all upset over that. I never intended shooting 150 grains of powder, but anything over 120 grains and they groups really open out. 100 grains seems to be the average powder charge for most projectiles. Have your rifles been different?

I was shooting at 200 yards a couple weeks ago just to see if I could. With the Shockwaves, I was holding a 6" group from the bull. This was off shooting sticks, so considering a elk hot zone is 8" I was told, this would have all been lethel shooting. I was real happy. It is the first time I ever tried to do it. I want to go on record, I would not shoot that far at an elk with this rifle. I am not sure of the energy at that range and I am not tracking anymore then I have to.

Cayugad, do you mean that you shot a 6" group @ 200 yds. or that your group was 6" low of the bull at 200 yds. Just curious as I am thinking about trying some 250 gr. Shockwaves/SST's in my Black Diamond XR. Have you tried the SST's and are the sabots any different between the Hornady's and the T/C's? I've just been out once last week with my gun and only had one weight bullet and one weight powder charge pre-measured out. The best group @ 100 yds. for me that day was 2 3/4" for 3 shots. I hope to do much better with different charges of T7ff and different weights/brands of bullets.

All the hits were within 6" group. The hits were a little under the bull, but not all that bad. This is not the best group, but to be honest, with only a 4 power scope that seemed far enought for me. Plus I had shot all day and was really tired towards the end when shooting. I really think with practice I can do much better, but I would seldom if ever have a need to shoot that far.

I have shot the Shockwaves and the SST's. Funny about the Hornady SST's they load harder. I think it is due to the different sabots. So I orders sabots from MMP, Harvester, Knight, T/C mag express, Claybuster Harvester, and Nosler. I am going to try all of them in the rifle and see what sabot the rifles likes the best. My Staghorn likes MMP's and my Black Diamond likes the T/C mag Express. Who makes them I have no idea, but I intend to test a bunch of different ones.

I also just bought a Knight Wolverine II and I want to run a bunch of different loads through that and see what it will do. I also orders some cool projectiles, so maybe I can find a real shooter out of all of them.

One person I talk to claims the Noslers shoot fantastic out of most in lines. Time will tell. I ordered three different weights of them. The Knight Red Hots I am sure will shoot fine out of the new Wolverine. If that is the case I will develope loads for each rifle,and stick to that.

I shoot Pyrodex RS loose. Depending on the projectile I change my charge weight. I also got some Triple Se7en I will shoot through it to see what it does. One person claims to shoot some Pyrodex P in them. So I got 2 pounds of that to try. I will let you know what I find out in future posts...

Cayugad,
I called Hornady the other day and the gentleman on the phone told me that they manufactured the Shockwave bullet for T/C but didn't provide the sabot, just the bullet. So T/C puts their own sabot on the Shockwave/SST bullet which must make for the slightly looser fit in the bore. I have read posts where many others like yourself say that the Shockwave loads a little easier than the SST's. I just ordered a 30 pack of the Shockwaves in 250 gr. from Cabelas. Can't wait to try them out to see if they are shooters in my gun as most everybody else seems to have had good accuracy and performance on game with them. Good luck w/ the new Knight rifle also!

Thompason Center claims if your rifle is the XR model, you can shoot three pellets (notice I did not say 150 grains of loose) and the 250 grain Shockwave and get excellent accuracy. I found 120 grains of the loose and after that it starts to spread a little more.

I bought a box of the 300 & 250 grain Hornady XTP's also. I am going to shoot them in some of the different sabots and see what kind of accuracy I can get.

I took the Staghorn out this morning and was shooting LEE 320 grain R.E.A.L.s at the 50 yard line with open sights. I had shots touching each other using 80 grains of Triple Se7en, so I was more then happy.

My Wolverine II and my .58 caliber did not make it here friday, the guys in the little brown truck down come this far back into the woods everyday. So I will have to wait until Monday for it...

Good luck with your rifle. I am sure you will like the Shockwaves.