I just returned from testing Eley ammo at Whidden Gunworks in Nashville, GA. Not a bad drive from central Alabama. My test was at 8:00am so I did over night in Nashville the night before. I highly recommend “Our Place Hotel” in downtown. A local family restored this historic building into a hotel.
The people at Whidden are top notch, friendly and extremely helpful answering all my questions. Jeremy met me at the door and showed me around explaining how things work and the procedures we would follow. He took my Hole Shot 2500X out of the stock and placed it in a steel template, he used some kind of heavy paper between the action and the template so it wouldn’t get marred. The template was placed in the vices and he sighted it to to targets. He said they have templates for most commonly made actions, but sometimes has to leave the rifle in the stock and use a padded installation with a front rest.
My test was supposed to be for Eley ammo at 50 meters. The 50 meter lane was down that day so I tested on the 50 and 100 meter lane typically used for Lapua and SK. This turned out to be very fortunate for me since our club shoots 50, 75, and 100yrds on a monthly rotational basis.
Jeremy warmed up the barrel with a few shots of SK, then we shot a control group using a lot of Tenex that I brought with me, that I use in matches. This lot of Tenex was bought at random online and had shot ok, but not lights out. I did the shooting and Jeremy ran the laptop and handed me each lot.
I shot 10 rounds out of 15 different lots of Tenex. I found the variations in the lots interesting. Some would string vertically, some would throw slight fliers, and some would string horizontally. But we found 6 that did well enough to shoot more extensively. After shooting 30 more shots with each one of those 6 lots. We found the one that was most consistent at 50m and 100m.
You can see in the pics the difference in my Tenex ammo from home(control) and the lot we selected. Smaller grouping and much more consistent at 50 and 100. The bar graph on the right in the pics shows how far each shot was from dead center X. 10.9 is a dead center x. The further out from the x a shot is, it gets a lower value such as 10.8, 10.7, etc. Total shots at each value is in the top of the bar.
FYI they also have a small fan blowing on your barrel to keep the temp down.
You can order and pay for the ammo from them while you are there, however they do not have these test lots in stock they are drop shipped to you from St. Louis, MO. A case of Tenex is $1,965 no tax or shipping costs. I did the test 2 days ago and the ammo is out for delivery today.
Sorry for the long post but I wanted to be complete. Also there were rifles there to be tested from people who shipped their rifles. The Whidden employees are competitive shooters and hunters and you can trust them to take care of your rifle. Even though I brought cleaning equipment, Jeremy cleaned my rifle after the first 150 shots and then again when we finished. He also put my rifle back in the stock and torqued it to my specifications.
The people at Whidden are top notch, friendly and extremely helpful answering all my questions. Jeremy met me at the door and showed me around explaining how things work and the procedures we would follow. He took my Hole Shot 2500X out of the stock and placed it in a steel template, he used some kind of heavy paper between the action and the template so it wouldn’t get marred. The template was placed in the vices and he sighted it to to targets. He said they have templates for most commonly made actions, but sometimes has to leave the rifle in the stock and use a padded installation with a front rest.
My test was supposed to be for Eley ammo at 50 meters. The 50 meter lane was down that day so I tested on the 50 and 100 meter lane typically used for Lapua and SK. This turned out to be very fortunate for me since our club shoots 50, 75, and 100yrds on a monthly rotational basis.
Jeremy warmed up the barrel with a few shots of SK, then we shot a control group using a lot of Tenex that I brought with me, that I use in matches. This lot of Tenex was bought at random online and had shot ok, but not lights out. I did the shooting and Jeremy ran the laptop and handed me each lot.
I shot 10 rounds out of 15 different lots of Tenex. I found the variations in the lots interesting. Some would string vertically, some would throw slight fliers, and some would string horizontally. But we found 6 that did well enough to shoot more extensively. After shooting 30 more shots with each one of those 6 lots. We found the one that was most consistent at 50m and 100m.
You can see in the pics the difference in my Tenex ammo from home(control) and the lot we selected. Smaller grouping and much more consistent at 50 and 100. The bar graph on the right in the pics shows how far each shot was from dead center X. 10.9 is a dead center x. The further out from the x a shot is, it gets a lower value such as 10.8, 10.7, etc. Total shots at each value is in the top of the bar.
FYI they also have a small fan blowing on your barrel to keep the temp down.
You can order and pay for the ammo from them while you are there, however they do not have these test lots in stock they are drop shipped to you from St. Louis, MO. A case of Tenex is $1,965 no tax or shipping costs. I did the test 2 days ago and the ammo is out for delivery today.
Sorry for the long post but I wanted to be complete. Also there were rifles there to be tested from people who shipped their rifles. The Whidden employees are competitive shooters and hunters and you can trust them to take care of your rifle. Even though I brought cleaning equipment, Jeremy cleaned my rifle after the first 150 shots and then again when we finished. He also put my rifle back in the stock and torqued it to my specifications.
