MLKeith

I have slugged my bore and it is .500 on the money. I think one of the problems is that t/c uses a rather shallow rifling which is slanted towards sabots. Many of the other rifle barrels use deeper grooves which allows the sabot material a place to flow when loading. It also allows for a little more fouling as the grooves will give the fouling a place to go. I find that the thinner Harvester sabots make loading at least possible although the Powerbelts still load the easiest. I shoot the Hornady 300SST bullet but in a Harvester sabot for my first shot hunting. If I need a second fast follow-up shot I load a 295gr. Powerbelt and the POI is very close at 100 yards and worked just fine for me this year as my elk did not go down on the first shot and I had a second one in and shot within about 30 seconds. I am looking at Harvester Sabretooth bullets as they are less expensive than the Powerbelts.

buckslayer88

powerbelts are expensive no doubt about a buck a piece,,,,and i have a starting toolas pictured thats not the problem,after that using the ramrod is very tough..im going to try some thinner sabots like harvester orgreen mmp but were do you get them at??midway doesnt have em..??

sabotloader

buckslayer88,


http://www.wholesalehunter.com/produ...slerSabots.htm

www.mmpsabots.com - call them talk on the phone you are going to want the HPH-24's - the thin ones.

www.claybusterwads.com/harvester.html

www.gamaliel.com

www.midwayusa.com

www.prbullet.com

These are some places you might look at...

Got your e-mail will try to get some stuff off to you middle of the week...

Mike

MLKeith

I got my Harvesters at Midsouth Shooters Supply. I find they usually are less expensive than Midway. I also bought some 300gr. copper coated cast bullets that shoot good in them (try to stay at .451 or smaller). Harvester P/N H5045SB for 300gr. bullets or lighter. $4.23 per 50.

Tahquamenon

Get yourself a solid range rod for load development.

Also, ensure that you have removed all of the packing lube from the barrel. I use a quality bore solvent for this task like Butch's Bore Shine. 20-30 strokes with a brush and 20-30 strokes with patches.

Also, spit/damp patch, alcohol patch and dry patch inbetween each shot.
Try to ensure that the barrel is clean and bone dry.

The sabot is likely too large and as soon as you start getting any fouling buildup, then the more difficult loading begins. The xtp should not be that tough to load. The SST or Shockwave albeit a fantastic projectile is tougher to load.

I also like to shoot at least 40 lubed conicals and wads at moderate charge to help break in the new barrel. After shooting 20 conicals, use the bore solvent to remove any leading and continue. This is just something that I've found to help get a barrel broken in versus reaching for the lapping compound first thing.

oneshot/one kill

I have had my Encore for 2 years now and love the accuracy I get. It was really tight but reading posts on here I took advice to shoot a lot of solid lead bullets with my encore to loosen the barrel. It has seemed to help and the use of bore butter doesnt help but just hurts accuracy with sabots

2eagles

Buckslayer, please read the long answer I posted in Bellm's m-loader forum. I'm telling you Dead Centers are great! Jim