Bullet weight consistency

[letronshootit]

As we all know you get what you pay for, nothing could be truer than bullets, just what everyone said on this forum. After a year of inconsistent performance at 1,000yds but stellar performance at 100yds I decided to do the dreaded job of weighing my bullets. Components are expensive and competing in club VBR matches with three 6mm rifles gets salty. So it was only natural to want the great deal to perform, and it did as mentioned, most of the time. My 105's ran from 104.8 to 105.8 of brand x for 100rds. I weighed my Berger Hybrids which at the time I purchased them lost out in the 100yd test for the ideal load and honestly I was elated. Well the Berger quality control was way better so I bought 1,000rds and my weight break down was like this; 1 - 104.5gr., 13- 104.9gr., 695 - 105gr., 291 - 105.1gr. I will shoot them segregated as God intended.....
-Ron

 

[Lapua40X]

Depending in manufacturer, competition and match grade bullets tend to have less variations in weight over a given lot (I suspect they take a single lot and simply sort them out to closer batch tolerances - with QC standards open to conjecture) but when they do all the sorting work before you buy them the cost goes up big time.

 

[letronshootit]

I really doubt that but it would be a question to ask Berger Bullets sometime. It would seem to me way too costly....

 

[dkhunt14]

I would weigh them on a scale that weighs to .01. It would be a way to check to see if your scale is accurate. A lot of the scales that weigh to .1 have accuracy of plus or minus .1 or .2. Matt

 

[Michael Courtney]

See:

http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a555976.pdf

 

[watercam]

Thanks for sharing that test result! Really need to pay attention to the weight scales to appreciate just how narrow a window they shoot for. My current lot of Fullbores falls within the time frame of the report, having weighed many samples without becoming alarmed, it seems I will just forget about it for now!
One of my fellow competitors shoots nearly perfect scores often (every time he picks up a rifle) and always places very near or at the top of every competition he enters said best about Berger bullets. When I asked him about tipping, weight, base-to-ojive length and overall length sorting to help my scores he had this to say..."Take them out of the box, load 'em up and shoot them. It's you...". He's right of course.

 

[letronshootit]

Excellent read, thank you!

 

[stool]

now that you have STARTED the sort process, finish.
sort by BEARING LENGHT within a weight sort

 

[Bluto65]

Best way to improve your shooting is; accurate weight of powder charge, but not to 0.01 gr, .1 is good enough, but it has to be consistent load to load. Also
start out with the best load developed MOA you can get. The rest is up to you; wind reading and trigger pulling/rifle hold [hard hold or sort of no hand pressure on the stock]. DO NOT JERK THE TRIGGER! Slow and steady. Use the best rest & bag you can get. Make sure the rifle is balanced on the rest. Tighten stock on rest. Level the rest. Get a comfortable shooting prone position. Oh one other thing "dont fart when you pull the trigger".

Geez I wish I could master all of these things 100%. Sometimes I miss on one thing and the 9 shows up, aaarrrgghh!

 

[M14AMU]

FWIW

For many years I made custom 30 caliber bullets for Service Rifle comp in NRA and also I shot Match Rifle using my bullets. On occasion the question of bullet weight would come up in discussion amongst Palma shooters and NMC shooters so I endeavored to prove to myself just how much difference slight bullet weight would cause poor shooting results. I would pick quiet days when no wind was blowing and I'd go to the range here on my place and I would shoot 20 rounds from both 300 and 600 yards using bullets I had made which varied in weight up to FIVE GRAINS! Using a proven rifle with a 20X Unertl scope mounted atop.....the groups from 300 yards would be a 'ragged knot' and I NEVER had any groups that went over 1MOA from 600 yards!! This was in .308 Winchester caliber.

 

[letronshootit]

For many years I made custom 30 caliber bullets for Service Rifle comp in NRA and also I shot Match Rifle using my bullets. On occasion the question of bullet weight would come up in discussion amongst Palma shooters and NMC shooters so I endeavored to prove to myself just how much difference slight bullet weight would cause poor shooting results. I would pick quiet days when no wind was blowing and I'd go to the range here on my place and I would shoot 20 rounds from both 300 and 600 yards using bullets I had made which varied in weight up to FIVE GRAINS! Using a proven rifle with a 20X Unertl scope mounted atop.....the groups from 300 yards would be a 'ragged knot' and I NEVER had any groups that went over 1MOA from 600 yards!! This was in .308 Winchester caliber.

RMulhern, that is awesome! I am shooting 6br and 6brx at 850 to 1,000yds not sure if that 5gr margin would not give me vertical stringing issues imop it would. It certainly does raise the question as to me once again screwing up having sold 1200 perfectly good 105gr A-maxes. The Bergers were more consistent in the weight and I was told they would be the better way to go from fellow competitors. The A-max grouped great at 100yd and I wanted the bargain to be the one that would do that at 1k also. I hope my wife never sees this post or I am gonna get another "see I told you so" -Ron