Are We Doing Load Development Wrong?

[Jager]

It's in print....his own book. I should buy it to review the mistakes, but nah...I've seen enough of it posted. Bottom line is this, because tuners work very similarly to load development...If you believe that changing loads matters, then you pretty much have to agree that tuners work too because they are both accomplishing the same thing. That being for the bullet to exit while the bbl is at the spot that shoots best. Really nothing more to it than that. He missed the boat on this subject but his overall work has always been good...I think. At this point, I see no other reason to question his other works. This one was out of his area of expertise and poorly executed. It might add a little fuel to the debate short term but the fact is, I know very, very few people who go about using tuners properly that don't love them. There is a very key word...properly. Thing is, they are super easy once you let go of misconceptions and things like his article. The results are clear to anyone that halfway uses them right.

I'm not gonna go as far as to say he did it to sell books but can anyone tell me the subject of a different chapter? Hmmm. I'm sure there's some good stuff in the book but one chapter was marketed a bit differently is all.

I've got Bryan's three previous books and was confused because I could find none of these provocative conclusions supposedly made by him. I didn't realize his third book in the Modern Advancements in Long Range Shooting series has already been released... but is NOT yet available on Amazon (where I buy most my books). I'm guessing the content now being questioned is in that third volume.

Could someone who actually owns that book post a few snippets where Bryan suggests that powder charge and seating depth aren't critical?

I, of course, recollect the long thread we had back in October regarding Bryan's conclusions about tuners. I think @dgeesaman said best it in the very second post of that very long thread... Bryan was doing his "tuner testing" using the wrong rifle and the wrong rifle context. Kinda like if I were to put one on my old iron-sighted Model 94 .30-30 and then complained because I couldn't tell where it made a difference.

I've got too much respect for Bryan's body of work to throw him under the bus just yet. My guess, while awaiting my volume of his new book, is that he once again is reporting results from a gun or a discipline where some of these things just don't matter as much. Maybe if I was having that beer with him I'd suggest he raise his eyes a little further down the road.

What's beyond dispute - for me - is that at the very highest levels of rifle precision, everything matters. It's a world of nuance and subtlety.

And that's what makes truly accurate rifles such a beautiful thing.

 

[Alex Wheeler]

LOL This whole thread could have stopped after Alex's response.
Edit to add: And he did it without the apostrophe and the 're'. Saved three key strokes.

Sorry, they kicked me out after 10th grade.

 

[STS]

Sorry, they kicked me out after 10th grade.

Well, it's true. They wrong.

 

[Alex Wheeler]

Theys alls wrong.

 

[nksmfamjp]

There is some real burnt butt here. I’m guessing Hornady has some basic idea of what they are doing and I won’t tell them how to do it better.

We must remember that what drives their business is not how to load develop for my rifle, but for all rifles. Also, whether you are PRS’ing, hunting, or making factory ammo, that is different than benchrest. That said, I can learn from them.

I don’t think they said do regular load development with 20-30 round groups. I think they said, for the above purposes, shooting or starting a 20 round group is helpful.

Imagine you say your hunting rifle has to shoot 0.5 moa 5 shot groups. As you lay 20 into the same bullseye or multiple superimposed, did you exceed 0.5 moa in the last 5 shots? If you did, change something…they said swap a component. Then start over. Once you get to 20 meeting your goal, you have found a load that will stay in tune. That’s all.

The point is at 20-30 shots of the same recipe, your tune is tuned and you know that tune. Make sense. Basically, 20 shots of the same thing, just tell you it will hold. The key piece is to use small samples to determine what is not good.

If I shoot 3 into an inch, but my target is 0.5” for the population, 20 will never be under 1”. We can get into the statistics, but frankly those who shoot well with 1 or 3 or 5 shot groups are either wrong, lucky or have a good shortcut. My guess is they get 20 shots of the same thing down range before they are set on that load.

That said, their bell curve for the 200 shots was not a Gaussian normal distribution. It seemed to have several sources of variation. Single variable distributions are much tighter. There is a formula for how normal your normal distribution is. There’s was not normal. They need to hire another math guy. Still, their work is not crap.

Barrel wear, case wear, component lots, tooling sub lots are all screwing up this distribution. I wonder how the same statistical work would look with Lapua brass, Barts bullets, a rail gun and a massive stockpile of same lot components would look through 5-10 identically built actions and barrels in a rail gun type setup with a custom 6PPC reamer. I would guess it would look more normal.

 

[gunsandgunsmithing]

I've got Bryan's three previous books and was confused because I could find none of these provocative conclusions supposedly made by him. I didn't realize his third book in the Modern Advancements in Long Range Shooting series has already been released... but is NOT yet available on Amazon (where I buy most my books). I'm guessing the content now being questioned is in that third volume.

Could someone who actually owns that book post a few snippets where Bryan suggests that powder charge and seating depth aren't critical?

I, of course, recollect the long thread we had back in October regarding Bryan's conclusions about tuners. I think @dgeesaman said best it in the very second post of that very long thread... Bryan was doing his "tuner testing" using the wrong rifle and the wrong rifle context. Kinda like if I were to put one on my old iron-sighted Model 94 .30-30 and then complained because I couldn't tell where it made a difference.

I've got too much respect for Bryan's body of work to throw him under the bus just yet. My guess, while awaiting my volume of his new book, is that he once again is reporting results from a gun or a discipline where some of these things just don't matter as much. Maybe if I was having that beer with him I'd suggest he raise his eyes a little further down the road.

What's beyond dispute - for me - is that at the very highest levels of rifle precision, everything matters. It's a world of nuance and subtlety.

And that's what makes truly accurate rifles such a beautiful thing.

I think we agree. I didn't mean to imply that changing loads isn't critical..just the opposite. Read my post again and hopefully it becomes more clear that what I'm saying is that tuners change tune much the same as changing the load also changes tune. Because they both affect the timing of bullet exit with muzzle position, it's difficult to believe one works but the other doesnt. Again, I think we agree.

There was a snippet or so posted on here in one of the previous threads regarding his book and the chapter on tuners. Someone posted pics of the page(s) on this forum but I don't recall who it was.

 

[gunsandgunsmithing]

If you plot multiple shots at every charge weight, you will not see spots where velocity flattens out with increasing charge weight. More powder = more energy = more velocity.

It’s only the variance that makes it look that way. I’ve done this several times, and Bryan does it in his book. People confuse a flat spot in vertical with a flat spot in velocity. The first exists, the second doesn’t.

Damon, I'm not sure where there's any confusion here but I used the term speed or velocity because my post is based on actual chrono numbers, multiple times, multiple chronos and over many years of seeing similar numbers. I agree with you in principle but not in reality. Yes, logically, more powder would equal more speed but obviously, I'm not the only one that has seen results that don't align with that principle. Again, I've read articles over the years addressing this..for many years. Reaffirming, others have seen it too.

I'm not going to claim that I know the physics behind it but just that most or at least many have seen what I described as velocity plateaus. That's all my friend. Not wanting to argue it at all. And sure, there are considerations such as overlapping es and statistical significance but that's factored into my statement. Temps alter powder characteristics too. I've seen velocity increases of say, 10fps per .1gr at some temps but that number be different at different temps too. Just another factor.
Merry Christmas my friend.

 

[Dave M.]

In the benchrest shooting,
If the shooter is chasing extreme accuracy.

He will drop powder to one kernel
He will measure BTOG of the round to within 0.002"
He will measure BTOG of the bullet to within 0.002"
He might weigh the case volume too and bin to 0.5gr or less
He would measure TRO to within 0.002"

What is he tuning for? What variables left to tune for?
1) Weather changes
2) Powder burning consistency?
3) Primer burning consistency?
4) "name your variable"

You better be measuring your CBTO better than to 0.002” if you want to win. As far as TRO (I prefer TIR) I’ve proved to myself that doesn’t mean a hill of beans. I done the studies and it makes no difference in target.

 

[Dave M.]

There is a universal answer and “it’s tune your rifle to be as competitive as possible for whatever disciple you shoot“

But when questions like “Are we doing load development wrong?” Then told “Our sample sizes are too small” and “seating depth and powder loads aren’t as critical as we think.” That just doesn’t fly with the Benchrest community who are trying to squeeze the last possible .001 they can get out of a gun. The “Experts” putting out this crap are the ones that need to be specific about what type and discipline of shooting they are referring to. Because they have no clue what it takes to be competitive at the highest levels of Long or Short range Benchrest.
Bart

I couldn’t agree more Bart. When we graduated from higher end stock rifles to custom built purpose specific F class rifles, we immediately vaulted to “middle of the pack” shooters. When we figured out tuning and improved our loading process, we started winning.
My girlfriend shot a rifle for the first time in August 2021 and won her first competition less than one year later by shooting a perfect 450 points through relays at 300, 500 and 600 yards.

 

[BartsBullets]

Barrel wear, case wear, component lots, tooling sub lots are all screwing up this distribution. I wonder how the same statistical work would look with Lapua brass, Barts bullets, a rail gun and a massive stockpile of same lot components would look through 5-10 identically built actions and barrels in a rail gun type setup with a custom 6PPC reamer. I would guess it would look more normal.

I looked at my stats yesterday for the Short Range Group matches (100/200 yards) I attended this year. I shot 5 matches; Shamrock, Hog Roast, Super Shoot, IBS NATIONALS AND NBRSA NATIONALS. The conditions at several of these were quite windy. With the exception of the IBS Nationals. Conditions there were light all week.

I used a 6PPC for all Aggs except for two aggregates where I used the 6BRA (HV at the Hog Roast). During the HV 100 the gun broke on my 3rd group and I finished with my 6PPC for the remainder of the match. I was able to finish the HV 200 yard aggregate with the 6BRA.

For my bag guns I fired 600 record shots consisting of 120, 5 shot groups. My aggregate .2803.

I Also shot my railgun for 26 groups of 10 shots each. That raised my total to 146 groups and 860 record shots. My aggregate .2858.

I used 1 railgun barrel, and 2 LV barrels for the year. I tune mainly with 3 shot groups.

Bart

 

[dgeesaman]

I've got Bryan's three previous books and was confused because I could find none of these provocative conclusions supposedly made by him. I didn't realize his third book in the Modern Advancements in Long Range Shooting series has already been released... but is NOT yet available on Amazon (where I buy most my books). I'm guessing the content now being questioned is in that third volume.

Could someone who actually owns that book post a few snippets where Bryan suggests that powder charge and seating depth aren't critical?

I, of course, recollect the long thread we had back in October regarding Bryan's conclusions about tuners. I think @dgeesaman said best it in the very second post of that very long thread... Bryan was doing his "tuner testing" using the wrong rifle and the wrong rifle context. Kinda like if I were to put one on my old iron-sighted Model 94 .30-30 and then complained because I couldn't tell where it made a difference.

I've got too much respect for Bryan's body of work to throw him under the bus just yet. My guess, while awaiting my volume of his new book, is that he once again is reporting results from a gun or a discipline where some of these things just don't matter as much. Maybe if I was having that beer with him I'd suggest he raise his eyes a little further down the road.

What's beyond dispute - for me - is that at the very highest levels of rifle precision, everything matters. It's a world of nuance and subtlety.

And that's what makes truly accurate rifles such a beautiful thing.

I have Vol III and I've read most of it, including the whole tuning section where he tested tuners (in a way I'm not used to seeing) and performed extensive testing of powder ladders to find the flat spots in velocity. In my four books don't see anything condemning the idea of testing for powder or seating depth generally. I have not seen/heard any of the podcasts.

I was not surprised by his conclusions on either test. Tuners, because I don't think statistically significant data is compatible with the realm where tuners work (which is, in a nutshell, benchrest tuning where adjustments are normal and frequent). Velocity nodes, because I personally don't think they exist at all or don't exist consistently enough to be a universal tuning method.

If you think snippets of his velocity 'flat spot' tests would be helpful, I can do that. I suspect that's not it though.

I did find his chapter on BC variance to be very interesting. It has interesting implications for anything from airgunning to ELR.

I do think Brian needs to take more consideration when borrowing benchrest concepts and mashing them onto different disciplines. (I believe that some of the PRS crowd has gotten too deep into advanced handloading and load development than is useful, and I suspect Brian is trying to shed some light there). If you breeze through it sure looks like he's trying to debunk a whole thing (tuners) when in fact he's only disproven tuners in a very specific, unconventional application. In reading 3-3/4 of his books don't remember him touching benchrest shooting disciplines or benchrest tuning methods. He tests with some FTR rigs but in terms of tuning it's not benchrest at all.

And yet there are benchrest specialists who are very aggravated by his work. I don't expect them to buy his books to read it for themselves, but I am also disappointed to see them lashing out based only on second- or third-hand information.

I would also like to see him address the elephant in the loading room of what happens when the most-statistically-significant scientific method simply can't keep up with the shooting discipline. I would like to know, in a word, if he agrees there are some phenomena in shooting that are real but out of reach of his scientific method, and if so, does he have interest in modifying his methods to study those topics. Why so many sigmas? It seems his testing methods do draw very useful conclusions about many topics (BC variation for example) so maybe he'll stick to his guns.

The engineer in me is 100% comfortable if his answer is 'in benchrest, there are well established practices and phenomena that this method won't pin down'. That would reinforce my confidence in his scientific work. I'm borderline an academic and with any test or study I'm accustomed to asking myself "what is being tested here, and what is *not* being tested here?". I'm also comfortable spending $45 for a book where the tests I care most about might turn out to be inconclusive. I realize I might be the exception. He might not want to lose support (from sponsors, customers, industry?) by admitting this form of scientific testing has any limitations. Or maybe there's no interest because benchrest disciplines have such limited military application and much of what he does seems to combine military and civilian disciplines. I don't know the guy at all so maybe his answer isn't even on my list.

If I could address this crowd, my suggestion is to read the content yourself and consider if his test fits your shooting discipline. Borrow the book if you don't want to contribute to him financially. I think some here are misapplying his work. It's *not* about benchrest shooting.

 

[dgeesaman]

I would want to see this within my own testing before I accept it.

Repeat the ladder several times. If the flat spot repeats, its repeatable.

Brian's testing found that if that flat spot was real, it didn't hang around for long enough to be consistent. Each ladder had a different shape.

 

[dgeesaman]

Shots at the exact same velocity should hit at the same vertical.

Except that ballistic coefficient (more accurately, the drag force on a particular shot) varies.

Vertical can come from either velocity or variance in ballistic coefficient. It certainly does promote the value of the most consistent bullets we can get.

 

[nksmfamjp]

Theys alls wrong.

Not really arguing with you here just wondering why you offer no explanation for what you have posted several times.

 

[gunsandgunsmithing]

I have Vol III and I've read most of it, including the whole tuning section where he tested tuners (in a way I'm not used to seeing) and performed extensive testing of powder ladders to find the flat spots in velocity. In my four books don't see anything condemning the idea of testing for powder or seating depth generally. I have not seen/heard any of the podcasts.

I was not surprised by his conclusions on either test. Tuners, because I don't think statistically significant data is compatible with the realm where tuners work (which is, in a nutshell, benchrest tuning where adjustments are normal and frequent). Velocity nodes, because I personally don't think they exist at all or don't exist consistently enough to be a universal tuning method.

If you think snippets of his velocity 'flat spot' tests would be helpful, I can do that. I suspect that's not it though.

I did find his chapter on BC variance to be very interesting. It has interesting implications for anything from airgunning to ELR.

I do think Brian needs to take more consideration when borrowing benchrest concepts and mashing them onto different disciplines. (I believe that some of the PRS crowd has gotten too deep into advanced handloading and load development than is useful, and I suspect Brian is trying to shed some light there). If you breeze through it sure looks like he's trying to debunk a whole thing (tuners) when in fact he's only disproven tuners in a very specific, unconventional application. In reading 3-3/4 of his books don't remember him touching benchrest shooting disciplines or benchrest tuning methods. He tests with some FTR rigs but in terms of tuning it's not benchrest at all.

And yet there are benchrest specialists who are very aggravated by his work. I don't expect them to buy his books to read it for themselves, but I am also disappointed to see them lashing out based only on second- or third-hand information.

I would also like to see him address the elephant in the loading room of what happens when the most-statistically-significant scientific method simply can't keep up with the shooting discipline. I would like to know, in a word, if he agrees there are some phenomena in shooting that are real but out of reach of his scientific method, and if so, does he have interest in modifying his methods to study those topics. Why so many sigmas? It seems his testing methods do draw very useful conclusions about many topics (BC variation for example) so maybe he'll stick to his guns.

The engineer in me is 100% comfortable if his answer is 'in benchrest, there are well established practices and phenomena that this method won't pin down'. That would reinforce my confidence in his scientific work. I'm borderline an academic and with any test or study I'm accustomed to asking myself "what is being tested here, and what is *not* being tested here?". I'm also comfortable spending $45 for a book where the tests I care most about might turn out to be inconclusive. I realize I might be the exception. He might not want to lose support (from sponsors, customers, industry?) by admitting this form of scientific testing has any limitations. Or maybe there's no interest because benchrest disciplines have such limited military application and much of what he does seems to combine military and civilian disciplines. I don't know the guy at all so maybe his answer isn't even on my list.

If I could address this crowd, my suggestion is to read the content yourself and consider if his test fits your shooting discipline. Borrow the book if you don't want to contribute to him financially. I think some here are misapplying his work. It's *not* about benchrest shooting.

Litz seems to have coined a term that I'm not familiar with and may or may not shed a lot of light on the value of an important aspect of his test. Can you describe his so called
"sweep method" of adjusting the tuners he tested?
A crucial part of using a tuner is quantifying the value of each adjustment. If you don't know if you should move in 1 mark intervals or 1 revolution...its nearly impossible to establish anything repeatable, with any tuner. Thanks in advance.

 

[John Weigel]

One way to penetrate any established group of study or expertise is to don the renegade coat and challenge the pillars of experience based understanding. Whilst fresh ideas deserve to be examined, when repeated easily disproved theories of revolutionary insights that require abandonment of the established directions of study, it begins to look like a case of self-agrandisment. We've all had our journeys to accuracy on target in the reloading and shooting hardware, and for anyone to convince me (at least) that the levers we use (eg ammunition development incorporating bullet-seating depth) and/or barrel tuners, and accumulated an understanding of how these parameters can affect patterns on targets, its easy to dismiss serial renegades rejecting our real-world experiment-based knowledge. Best to change the subject and keep a look out for fresh ideas that can actually help, rather than make a splash.

 

[memilanuk]

Can you describe his so called "sweep method" of adjusting the tuners he tested?

As I read it... basically full revolutions. That's how he/they started off doing their tests - shoot a series of groups, do a full rev, shoot some more groups, do another rev, etc. Wasn't until later when that obviously didn't work that they contacted one or more tuner manufacturer, asked for guidance, and followed those directions i.e. test every 'n' increments on the tuner. Didn't seem to make much difference in their end results, but that's a different matter.

 

[Alex Wheeler]

Not really arguing with you here just wondering why you offer no explanation for what you have posted several times.

Well, at this point id just be repeating whats been said. And i am not taking this thread too seriously. I think theres way too much info on this very site about tuning from the guys that are currently winning matches that most are not going to take it too seriously.
But, if your going to do a test of anything with a rifle, it should be with the most accurate rifle you can find. So if theres a small difference you can see it.
I tune up a lot more non BR rifles than i do BR rifles. Most of the time i shoot even less shots with them. About the only way i could agree with the statistics guys about shooting multiple groups is when theres a weak link. Either the rifle doesnt shoot, the loader is inconsistant, the tuner cant tune, or the shooter cant shoot. In that case id want to teach them to fix the proplem rather than shoot more.

 

[gunsandgunsmithing]

As I read it... basically full revolutions. That's how he/they started off doing their tests - shoot a series of groups, do a full rev, shoot some more groups, do another rev, etc. Wasn't until later when that obviously didn't work that they contacted one or more tuner manufacturer, asked for guidance, and followed those directions i.e. test every 'n' increments on the tuner. Didn't seem to make much difference in their end results, but that's a different matter.

Full revolutions at a time was certainly getting started on the wrong foot and is very telling.
Bottom line is someone has to quantify the value of each increment before you can establish functional adjustments of each tuner and not assume the same for all of them or even the same on each gun.
This gets to my point, that random adjustments will yield random results. This satisfies me that the test was flawed from the start. But is not limited to this single but crucial reason.

edited out a comment that was in my reply because I mis-read the or more part of the quoted text above.

 

[Bill Norris]

Turning the the tuner a full revolution per test group not only is the wrong foot it also shows how little he actually knows about the tuner. With no knowledge of such how could one expect to test any product and convince an audience of seasoned shooters that the test would hold credibility. Again his smarts are ???