Is it better to weigh charges or throw them?

[jonbearman]

The reason I am asking this question is due to an article in the august of 2013 american rifleman.The writer,John Haviland came to the hypothesis that thrown charge's gave better downrange results than perfectly weighed charge's.I dont think I read the article wrong but he says"From this test,its clearthat metered charges are capable of near-identical performance compared to weighed charge's.As such,this would be the preferred method for high volume loading.". If you look at his accuracy results it is a ridiculous conclusion as he shot a 22-250 and the weighed charge was 2.11 at 100 yds,the thrown charge was 1.43 at 100 yds.His results seem to contradict his findings overall. Has anyone else read this article and what is your conclusion?

 

[Terry]

http://www.americanrifleman.org/article.php?id=23284&cat=27&sub=29

 

[Stormbringer]

For me, I have always weighed each charge. Most of the time I set my RCBS Uniflow just below the weight I want and trickle up. If you have a high quality powder measure you might be able to trust it and only weigh every 5 charge or so.

But for me I have always weighed every single charge. Take's a little longer I guess but I don't mind and I have always had great accuracy results. I have also never double charged a pistol round or been off just a little. With some of the small calibers I shoot and pistols I reload just going over by .5 grains can lead to trouble.

JMHO.

 

[Forum Boss]

Talk to the top F-Class and long-range shooters. They are all weighing charges... and more precisely than ever before. The top guys tell me that precisely weighed charges do reduce ES (as confirmed by multiple chrono runs) and they are seeing tighter vertical at 800-1000 yards.

I have personally witnessed three successive charges thrown by Gene Beggs with a good powder measure vary by a total of 0.4 grains. Do you really want that?

As for the Haviland article -- look at the ES numbers, e.g. 80 fps for his .30-06. Those numbers, even for a 25-shot string, are really bad for both measured and weighed, showing his reloading methodology, dies, and/or components suck. Also for 2 of the 3 rifles his measured ES was twice as high as his weighed ES. As for accuracy ... I wouldn't give much credence to shooter/rifle combo that is only producing 1.4 to 2.11 inch groups at 100 yards (for his .22-250 and .30-06).

As for the Haviland data chart itself. -- It looks like there may be a typo. With his .223 Rem he says his smallest individual group was 0.65 inches. Yet he says the weighed charge average group size was 0.36. That doesn't make any sense (maybe it was 0.86?). You can't have an average that is half the size of the smallest recorded value.

That said, there may be good reasons to load varmint or plinking ammo on a Progressive press, and that uses a powder measure. You will be sacrificing some ultimate accuracy for production speed.

 

[lawrence97]

I shoot F-open at 1000 yards and weighing is critical to maintain a tight vertical and low ES. My accuracy window for tightest vertical is .5 grains and if I Just dropped charges and had a .4 grain variance I would be hurting.... To speed things up I drop with a chargemaster and weigh down to the kernel on my digital scale. For me each .1 grain equals 5-10 fps.

 

[Raythemanroe]

Depends on what discipline your shooting and your wanted end results. I weigh mine cause I can I guess, I tend to use powders that don't flow that well..I throw and weigh just shy and trickle up also..

 

[stool]

the american rifleman has become just another gun rag. they have no qualified staff, no qualified management.

last year they published an article on self defense ammo...all based on an employee that had some limited ballistic gell penetration tests.
but he starter with his own CRITERIA....what a joke....
cannot use 45acp because it was under his criteria of atleast 1000fps...no 44 special....
and then said 10mm did not work by using some off load.......

the entire article was a joke.......no modern criteria at all

 

[stool]

very good shooters are using electronic scales that do 0.02...
THE BEST SHOOTERS ARE USING SCALES THAT DO 0.01

as was pointed out above throwers using n133 can vary as much as .4 and do .3 on a regular basis. the problem is that the distance allows this to be "acceptable"...but not great

 

[brian427cobra]

If you want a chance at winning you must weigh your charges for long range matches, and do it to the kernel

 

[Old Navy]

That guy didn't learn much in 41 years of reloading. Later! Frank

 

[jonbearman]

I know the difference ,I was more interested to see if others read the article.I may not have been clear but that is what I am after.