Smokecloud

After failing for about 1 1/2 years at producing an acceptable performing load, I have finally have a recipe I'm happy with. In a smoothbore 18" 870 it hung about a 7" group at 90 yards. I swapped out to my JM 930 22" and accuracy was about the same, both guns seem to print this slug right about 5" though, no matter what powder, wad or velocity I throw it out at. I tried my rifled choke tube in the 930 and the group came back to center and tightened up about an inch, so 6" group yesterday. Keep in mind this is with the stock bead front sight. I still need to get a set of adjustable sights on it as all slugs, even my handrolled ones, shoot about a foot or so high. Win AA hulls Longshot powder Fed 12s4 wad, trimmed down to match the height of the slug paper square overpowder piece around the base of the wad to minimize powder migration hot glue fill the base of the Lyman slug win 209 primers Load data for 1 1/4 oz shot out of Lymans manual, but my slugs are underweight, so a bit of a safety margin approx. 1350fps I shot an old water heater at 159 yards, the slugs were still tracking nose first through the side of it, I recovered both and was amazed it was still stabile at that distance. im just going to make up about 300 or so and be done for a while and move on to the next reloading project.

No I-phone, have a Motorola Droid with Android stuff, any app for that? I got the link for the I-phone stuff. I'm very excited about this match, its here, its here!

I did manage to get my shotgun back from Mossberg about 2 weeks before the Ironman. After several complaints and emails to multiple people, I finally got in touch with the head guy in charge of the service department. It was assigned to their top service man and fixed that day and mailed out that night. They pretty much replaced the entire shotgun, I got back a few of my old parts, but not many. New barrel assembly, new mag tube with Boron Nitride finish on it, new bolt, new elevator and complete trigger housing and all new trigger parts. I managed to get back my old stocks, receiver and choke. They adjusted POI, apparently from a vise, as it still shoots about 10" high, but they included the test target. they did manage to twist my vent rib slightly though adjusting the barrel and I worry that it may come loose some day, but other than that it runs pretty well now. I still have one problem that remains, that involves loading the gun. when I load the tube and put a flag in the chamber, it wont cycle right when I try to chamber the round afterwards. Then after cycling it a time or two, it will spit 2 onto the elevator, I have to reach in and push one back into the magtube, then the other will chamber. the avoidance manuever for this is to get on line, ensure nothing is in the chamber after removing the flag, dry fire on empty chamber, then it will handcycle the next round out of the tube, I can top off and it will run perfect. They replaced the part that regulates the shells out of the magtube also during the rebuild as it was a problem that existed before warranty repair. I may try the polish fix that brownells has a video of and put some adjustable sights on and just shoot the crap out of it for a while now that it runs good.

I also remember last year, that #6 was the largest shot size allowed. I brought about 75 rds of buckshot and never got to light one off. I will bring buckshot again, just in case, but have also acquired a box of Federal Prairie Storm #6 for the spinners just in case. Im ready to pull out in 2 days, can't believe its here already.

I remember it being not quite required, but highly recommended last year, but then after shooting all the stages, there was not one that you needed it for. I put GGG swivels on my shotgun, they caused some feeding problems, the one that went on the mag tube, created a small void between the magtube and the mag extension, which caught the rims of the shotgun shells and jammed up the feed tube once in a while, then while shooting left handed, the side loop off the front of the buttstock (like a single point attachment) tore my knuckle up pretty good shooting it from the wrong side. I took them off and am not planning on running a sling on my shotgun this year. I sure hope no stages require them.

installation of the roll pin in the trigger guard is probably the most nerve racking part of a build. You have a way oversize pin trying to pound it into a small hole and hoping you don't break off one of the ears, because if you do, and its made of 7075, good luck finding some way to repair it. Its scrap. I have a lot of friends that bring me theirs because their simply not up for the anxiety. It would be nice to have a screw sleeve with the bead head cap screws, simply slide in and secure it. Changing out trigger guards later would be a much easier task, and it adds a nice aesthetic view, especially since it matches the screw supplied with the Magpul trigger guard. On installation of the standard roll pin, I squeeze them down with a good set of pliars, maintaining their round shape of course, until they pass into the holes with only a slight resistance. If you go too far, you can always flare one end slightly with a small punch or nail to acquire the friction you are comfortable with. its not like the whole gun is held together with that one pin, so why should it take so much force to install it as is? I have somewhere in the neighborhood of 80 builds under my belt and this would certainly take some of the process out of it.

any good quality spring will do, but black inserts are for carbine, but will also work in rifle. Blue inserts are for rifle and not strong enough to work reliably in carbine. If you have a good spring and black insert, your fine. No doghnuts, too much tension and it starts wrecking the rims on the cases.

Ok, I have been doing fine with installing roll pins in Lower receivers as I build them, but I hate them. I have even submitted tips to Brownells on how I install them with less fuss and its been added to their Gunsmith Kinks literature, but the other day I was tearing down my STI and giving some consideration to the small screw system at the front of the trigger guard, they are button-head cap screws, with a sleeve of some sort. Im not sure what the threaded sleeve is called, but is there any reason, a sleeve that was dimensionally correct for the trigger guard roll pin, would not be a good idea? A sleeve that's threaded on both sides, that accept the cap screws on both sides. If someone has already done this modification on their AR, please share the specs on the cap screws and sleeve. I did a quick search on google, I came up with some guys that were modifying their trigger guards and inserting heli-coils to install the cap screws, but that is not what im looking at. STI Owners will know exactly the setup im describing. I was thinking of Mcmaster Carr, or similar company and order a bunch if I get the sizing right, I think all my friends would want some.

I just checked the Ironman website, I didnt see that they posted the stages yet, where did you see the stages?

Federal 1610 fps slugs, will put it over fairly easy if its hit right. For the double spinners on use with shot, the magic is Federal Prarie Storm shot shells, one shot, "over" friend gave me a couple to try last year.

Sounds about right :0) Gives you a nice buffer in case you need to reshoot a stage or 3. Or share with friends, should they need to reshoot or something.

someone told me once, to take 3x what the round count is just in case. Seems like the slug count is down this year from last, which is nice since they have been hard to acquire. I plan on taking 900 pistol, 900 rifle, about 450 shot and maybe 150 slugs, some factory and some home rolled. Camping at the range. Still looking for stage descriptions.

So few weekdays left to prepare, off I go to find more shotshells, reloading pistol rounds tonight.

I typically use about an 80% load in most of my stuff when selecting powder charge, When I change from FMJ to Soft points, I keep at 25.0gr of TAC for both and velocity is pretty close for both. COL can vary depending on crimp groove location and the actual shape of the soft point on different brands of bullets. Most are pretty close and depending on the shape of the ogive, you may or may not have to adjust your seating stem.

I run SB dies to make the brass just a wee bit smaller for reliability in my AR's. When the gun gets dirty and hot, think 100+ rds on a stage, it adds a little margin for reliability when the chamber starts heating up. On tight chambered guns, at around 120 rds, I have had the guns start choking with standard size brass, less so with SB sized brass. I really dont care about work hardening the brass, I try to load my once fired brass with nice stuff the first time around, match prepping the case, then after I fire it again, it gets loaded with FMJ for grunt work at matches. Most large matches, you dont get to pick up your brass anyhow, so it becomes someone elses problem after that.

which hull?

I have a friend that has shared his recipe with me and has been very sucessful with those slugs in two different shotguns. He said he could not get them to shoot out of a smoothbore either, so he put in a rifled choke tube and was getting stellar groups. I have ordered the Rifled choke for my 930 and am waiting to try them out.

For AR loads, I use a variety of powder, but have my best luck with Winchester 748, TAC and H335, I also shoot 4895 and Varget once in a while. I just did a basic work up for my new barrel and 69gr Sierra BTHP and the 748 surprisingly gave me the best 100 yard group. i didnt tune it for days to get it perfect, I just didnt have the time, put together 6 loads, 2 each of varget, 748 and tac and went and shot. Extreme spreads were closer with the 748 and groups were noticeably better at 24.5gr of 748, which averaged 2640fps. So I just cranked out 500 of them for 3gun. I also loaded up another 400 of the 55fmj at 25 gr of TAC

I have ran 10K + of the Xtreme 180's through both a Gen3 glock 35 and a custom STI. I make Major with 4.3gr of titegroup in the G35, so for speed steel or 3gun, I usually run around 4.0gr. With my STI, loaded long, my 3G load is 4.2gr of TG, 4.3 sometimes makes major, but 4.4 always gets it. I really like the Xtreme bullets and the last time I ordered them, I had purchased 10k in a group buy, they went way up in price since then, I only have a couple of thousand left, not sure If I will buy them again at their current price, it will depend on if I can get any discount for bulk and what prices are on other stuff at the time. If money was not an object, for a plated bullet, I prefer the Xtreme over Berry's and Rainer. They are not very picky about crimp, have a thick coating and shoot pretty accurately. I have loaded them down to 3.8gr of titegroup for training loads when im putting on small classes instructing people. Its reliable in G22 and G35, but really has very little recoil and we can work on building good fundemental skills without having students flinch as much. Buying them in bulk sometimes you can save more by picking them up at the manufacturer. I try to coincide my Reno gun show trips with a pickup at the MFG. It has been a couple of years since I made my last purchase though.

I had been kicking this around for a few years. I knew the cost savings on regular shot was not worth the time to me. Savings on regular low base bird shot was about .50 cents a box savings. But when I started attending 3g matches that had high slug round counts, I am shooting upwards of 400 slugs a year and was getting tired of surfing the net for weeks trying to find that one smoking deal to keep slug costs low. Most of my purchases for slugs have come in around 189 for a case of 250. I decided to try my luck with reloading my own slugs. I have a large supply of wheel weights and already cast bullets for pistol, so this was where a large savings would occur. I do some trade for Lee slugs, but I decided to purchase a lyman 525 gr mold and use my existing Lee handles for it. I ordered a Lee Load All and picked up a couple of different types of wads based on advice from other slug loaders, but while I was waiting for my Lee Load All to arrive, I found a friend that had a Mec 600 MKIV that was used and missing parts, he had no use for it and gave it to me. $25 in parts from Mec and its running. I still have no bottles for it, but dont need them for slugs as I get my powder off a electronic scale with auto dispenser for better consistancy. With a couple of bottles of powder and wads, primers at scalpers prices these days, I am into my slug reloading setup for around 200, so its a wash this year on savings. Using once fired hulls I have been saving, or collecting from the range (its hard to get enough of one kind though) cuts cost and I figure my slug cost will be in the area of .16 cents per round, instead of closer to .75 If I can save over .50 cents a round loading my own and be able to tune the load a little, I am happy. When primer prices come back down, my cost will drop some too. There are features I like about the Lee press, cost is one of them. Another huge drive for me to go to a shotcup style slug is that my shotgun leads horribly from foster slugs. Shooting the slugs in shotcups pretty much cures that. I am still pretty new into the shotgun loading stage, but am hopeful and it may save my bacon this year. I ordered a case of slugs 3 months ago and it still has not showed up and im off to the Ironman in a few weeks. If the slugs dont show, i will be running my home rolled ones for sure. My shotgun is currently at the Service center getting some warranty work done and is due back anyday, so I can start testing the new slugs I have loaded up. If they are a winner, i will run them instead of the factory ones even if they show up in time. I do have to say that the Mec is a lot nicer reloader than the Lee and If I were to order again from scratch, I would probably pay the extra and order the Mec. One of my friends has used the Lee for almost 20 years though and shoots quite a bit, is an avid duck and goose hunter and has never broke his reloader, so as cheap as they seem, they seem to work just fine. I have both set up side by side on the bench and keep playing with both for different crimps or if im having problems with a crimp with a certain type of shell. 2nd year, should be all savings as i figure it will take about one year for the cost to even out after purchasing the stuff to load.

I got my JM930 to run about 90-95% of the time, but was developing some other issues, like spitting shells out on the follower, not releasing a round from the mag tube when I cycled the bolt etc. It still had a high point of impact, so I decided to call mossberg even though I have a friend that had to send his JM930 in twice to get it working right. Spoke to a guy there at the customer service center, explained the problems, he said to send it in for repair, he wasn't really interested in what the problems were, but told me to put a note in with the shotgun and they would address it. He wasnt interested in the Serial number of the gun, who I was, what address that I was supposed to ship it to, when to expect it or anything else. I was less than impressed with my phone call, they dont offer to cover shipping to their center and Fed Ex charged me $44 to ship it, partly because it requires an "adult signature" upon delivery, I asked them if they expected children to accept the package at the Mossberg Repair Facility, non the less, they added about $10 for the adult signature requirement. I also complained about the point of impact and asked if that was somethign they could address, he said it was and to add it to the note. i asked what the turn around time was, he told me 2-3 weeks total including shipping time. I typed up a small letter explaining the problems and included photos of the factory crooked lifter that was touching the sidewall of the receiver and shipped it off the first of March. I still dont have my shotgun back and its been 6 weeks. I sent a email to them last week and ask for a update on my shotgun because I expected it back two weeks ago, they wont reply. im trying to develop a slug load and have no shotgun to work with. The Ironman is coming up very soon and now im freaking out about having to borrow someone else's shotgun. Mossberg definitely does not get a customer service rating like Springfield Armory. i had a M1a not cycling right and after a concerned conversation with them, they got my email address, name, address, phone numbers, serial # and emailed me a prepaid label for fed ex to ship the rifle to them, 2 weeks later, I recieved a call explaining what they had done to the rifle, they also found that my Match grade trigger was 1/2 lb stiffer than their specs for that rifle, which I knew, but wasnt going to complain, they did trigger work, told me the bolt was out of spec and they installed a completly new bolt and shipped it back to me. the warranty work did not cost me a dime. The rifle works great, like it should have out of the box, which is what we all expect when we pay top dollar for any manufacturers product.

Just got my email, i'm in!

I have even put in for the time off at work already without my confirmation letter. Fingers crossed and hope my close friends get in too. For me, that is what makes the Ironman what it is, its a reunion when we get to hang out for 4 days doing what we love best, and surviving the match together.

rifle length gas systems run better with heavier buffers. Assuming you are running a collapsible stock with a standard length carbine tube and carbine buffer, H2 should get you there. rifle length buffers weigh about 5.2oz. My most recent build consisted of an 18" barrel with rifle length gas system. Since I was running the heavier M16 carrier, I opted for the H2 buffer which is 4.6oz, to get it close to what it was designed to run with. H3 is about 5.6 oz. Lots of variables to cosider though, like the gas port size of the particular barrel your running, the power of load your shooting, whether your running a standard strength spring and like mentioned already, the weight of your Bolt and Carrier. Mine runs 100% so far. I typically design my reloads at around 75% of maximum, but have tried a variety of power levels. Too light of a buffer will still run reliably, but your bolt speed will by high and cause excess wear and eventually start damaging parts. When I ordered my barrel, I emailed Criterion and asked them what setup they recommended as they "optimally designed the gas ports for reliability", they never emailed me back (before the craziness), or at least have not in over 2 months, so I opted for what I knew. So far it feels right, ejection is perfect.

dont forget all of your Lower Receiver Pins and springs, nothing worse than having all the major components and not being able to put it together over a .50 cent part. I just went through the same delimma over a trigger for my new 3gun build, the general consensus was JP. I am not a novice with AR's or at assembling them, but hearing some of the reviews from the guys here, really helped me make my choice as I had very little experience with some of the more recent aftermarket trigger setups. In the end I decided on the JP original. So far I have received the adjustable ambi selector (JP) and am supposed to received the JP trigger, speed hammer, anti-walk pins and springs tomorrow in the mail. I just installed a Timney drop in, in a friends DPMS and it was very nice too. That was my first experience with a timney. His first AR and wanted it to feel more like his bolt guns, which also had Timney's, so it was a apples to apples thing for him.