I’m still using this tool, have you guys come up with anything better?

[Mikemci]

You don't need to know where the bullet is just touching the lands.
Find jam and work your bullet away from there, until you get good groups.

 

[mike711]

I assume everyone has seen this?

 

[Evan]

I still use my Stony Point.
When I setup my Bat last spring, I tried the Wheeler method. The challenge I had was feeling the difference between the bullet in the lands and the bullet being in the throat. With the bullet off the lands, I'd get just a bit of bolt lift resistance, and thought it was in the lands.
Alex has a great technique, I just haven't developed the proper feel to use it consistently.

@mike711 kinda beat me to it, but why do you need to get to that exact spot and not just the same spot that you can find readily? I use Alex's method when I first get a new barrel to find the exact point where the bolt stops dropping freely and that is as far out as I will seat a bullet - I work in from there because I want that buttery smooth bolt close that only a precisely bumped shoulder and bullet free of any jam will give me.

 

[Bill Norris]

Barrel-stub head-space gauge, and for new BBL, perfect seating depth gauge: this, or, for when ya have to, "chase the lands", the method displayed by Alex.

This is a great way to check it. Most accurate for me anyway.

 

[dcali]

I use a barrel stub - drop the bullet lightly into the lands (touch), measure the depth from the front of the stub. Then seat the same bullet and measure again. The difference is the number you use to figure out how to set your die to get to touch. This obviously only works with a new barrel, but once you know where touch is, you can work up a load. From that point on, you don't really care about where touch is - you just follow the tune as the barrel wears.

 

[Depart123]

That’s what I was thinking, it probably works great In a custom action where the tolerances are held to .0001 but my trued Remington 700 may not have those kind of tolerances....

...and who wants to completely disassemble thier bolt every time they work up a load?

 

[memilanuk]

It takes like five minutes... if you're going slow.

I would bet good money you waste multiples more time than that at any number of points in your load dev. process.

 

[PatMiles]

It takes like five minutes... if you're going slow.

If you're going REAL slow!

 

[Dave Way]

If you're going REAL slow!

With my BAT drop ports it takes 5 seconds to remove the firing pin assembly, no tools needed. The first four seconds is how long it takes me to look at the bolt to make sure I’m about to turn it the right way, and that takes about a second longer each year!

I’ve used Alex’ method for years now. I check the depth to “touch” every time I load ammo. My Hornady tool gathers dust.

Dave.

 

[Kracken McGraw]

I use a barrel stub - drop the bullet lightly into the lands (touch), measure the depth from the front of the stub. Then seat the same bullet and measure again. The difference is the number you use to figure out how to set your die to get to touch. This obviously only works with a new barrel, but once you know where touch is, you can work up a load. From that point on, you don't really care about where touch is - you just follow the tune as the barrel wears.

I am having a hard time grasping this so bear with me. I was thinking you would measure the sized case in the barrel stub like a comparator does. Then seat a bullet long, then keep seating the bullet deeper until you get that same case- barrel stub measurement and this would be your touch point. Does this make any sense compared to what you were describing?
Edit: I guess what I said wouldn’t work on a sized case because you would still have some more space back to the bolt face. Maybe a full formed case that was neck sized work? The Wheeler method has worked well for me, I was just trying to figure the barrel stub way out.

 

[Ranger007]

You don't need to know where the bullet is just touching the lands.
Find jam and work your bullet away from there, until you get good groups.

I had a dog and B I N G O was his name!

 

[Depart123]

You don't need to know where the bullet is just touching the lands.
Find jam and work your bullet away from there, until you get good groups.

I'm with you.

I take a sacrificial case and cut a slot with a dremel from case mouth to neck/shoulder junction. I clear any chips or burrs from the inside and finger seat a bullet. I run the case up into the chamber afew times, just as I would a normal round...and the resulting length is my start point.

Whether that start point is equal to "touch" or some amount of "jam", what does it matter? I just need a point to work from.

 

[dcali]

I am having a hard time grasping this so bear with me. I was thinking you would measure the sized case in the barrel stub like a comparator does. Then seat a bullet long, then keep seating the bullet deeper until you get that same case- barrel stub measurement and this would be your touch point. Does this make any sense compared to what you were describing?
Edit: I guess what I said wouldn’t work on a sized case because you would still have some more space back to the bolt face. Maybe a full formed case that was neck sized work? The Wheeler method has worked well for me, I was just trying to figure the barrel stub way out.

That's how I used to do it, but then it dawned on me that it's easier to measure it from the front. You wind up with the same number, but the measurement is more reliable the way I do it, in my opinion. You can get a pretty precise measure of a bullet that's just lightly dropped into the stub.

 

[Pablo]

There are a bunch of methods that work better than that POS gauge, the best way is have your smith cut you a headspace gauge with your reamer, if that isn't possible use Alex's method his method works on everything.

 

[Lefty Trigger]

I use the Hornady tool and get good results from it but I use an old aluminum cleaning rod down the bore on the front of the bullet and use the tool and the rod to kinda push the bullet back and forth finding the lands, this makes sure your not simply sticking in the throat.
However on the other end of the spectrum and the video above about chasing lands I have found two of my rifles shoot their very best with the bullets just seated to the "book" length. In my 6.5x47 that is a .077 jump and that groups pretty nicely at 300 yards. I think the key to longer jump lengths is to make sure the bullet is well into the lands before it leaves the brass. I had a 22-250 that loved light bullets but if they was loaded to book length there was about .120 of jump so that had the bullet out of the case before it was into the lands and it would shoot all kinds of weirdness. A longer for weight bullet got around that.

 

[Rick300]

For me anyways, I find the old Forster tool is way more consistent.

 

[Dave Way]

I assume everyone has seen this?

Yes I have. For me the argument breaks down right at the beginning. I am yet to have a benchrest rifle that shoots as tight jumping as it does jammed. Maybe it’s just me or maybe we have different accuracy expectations.

Dave.

 

[mike a]

Probably work just fine in your 700... it works like a champ in my Savage(s).

Gas guns... not so much.

And my Zermatt/Bighorn Origin had some quirk about the bolt head where it doesn't work so well. Can't remember for the life of me what it is, but I'm sure the next time I go to use it, it'll occur to me

The tighter the freebore diameter in the chamber, the more having minimal TIR in the loaded round will affect your 'readings'. Obviously not a problem for high-end guns like what Alex builds, or even really for any decent aftermarket barrel. Factory barrels... might not work as well in every instance.

Yep, the floating bolt head on the Bighorn does add a twist. I’d like to here from anyone that’s got it nailed. Without hyjacking somehow.

 

[Papa Charlie]

I use the Hornady tool. I have read where many say they are not repeatable. Have had no issues with it. Like any measuring device, it requires a learned feel to make it repeatable.

 

[memilanuk]

Yep, the floating bolt head on the Bighorn does add a twist. I’d like to here from anyone that’s got it nailed. Without hijacking somehow.

The toggle bolt head isn't the problem on the Zermatt/Bighorn... if it were, I'd be all over it as I figured that out on my Savage(s) long ago.

The problem is the mechanical arm for the ejector getting in the way. I've heard that it's possible to monkey around and feed the cartridge up from underneath thru the mag well, and slip it under the extractor claw and past the ejector arm... but for repeated measurements, it's a considerable PITA. At that point it's just easier to get the damn Stoney Point / Hornady tool out and be done with it.