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rutilate

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Posts posted by rutilate

  1. I'm brand new to competition shooting and am interested in purchasing a production pistol that will serve as many purposes as possible.

    I've found the list of pistols eligible for USPSA:

    http://www.uspsa.org/uspsa-NROI-production-gunlist.php

    and for IPSC:

    http://www.ipsc.org/rules/proddiv.php

    It seems as though IDPA is less restrictive.

    Has anyone gone through and joined the two lists to determine which pistols would work for both?

  2. Breaking these numbers down a bit on the proverbial back of the envelope:

    Assuming that you're shooting 9mm, and shooting 150k rounds/year, 5 days a week, 50 weeks/year=600 rounds/day.

    I'm reloading 9mm at $0.124/round, so $74.40/day. 150k*.124/50wks= $357.69/week, $1550/month , $18,600/year. Of course if you're sponsored, the equation changes.

    If you can reload 1000 rounds/hour on your 1050, you spend 3 hours/week, 12 hours/month reloading 12k rounds/month.

    Assume you spend another 3 hours/month sorting, tumbling, prepping brass. (Is that accurate?) That's 15 hours/month.

    How long does it take to shoot 600 rounds each day? I'm new, and making an uneducated guess of < 60 seconds for 20 shots in a stage, so ~30 minutes each day plus 1/2 hour setup/cleanup, so roughly 1 hour/day. Travel time to and fro the range may add another hour. That's 2 hours/day, 10 hours/week, 40 hours/month.

    Add in 2 matches/month with 5 hours at the match and 1 hour drive time each way, you're at 14 hours/month.

    How much time do you spend practicing dry fire? Again, I'm new. Help me out here. People here advocate spending at least one hour/day. Assuming 1.5 hours for dedication, you end up with 7.5 hours/week, 30 hours/month.

    Totals:

    $297.60/mo, $18,600/yr

    99 hours/mo, 1188 hrs/yr

    That's a serious commitment.

  3. I am getting partially burned powder blown back into my face when shooting my M&P .45. Could it be that the Berry's hollow base is deflecting the charge backwards?

    I'm shooting .45 with Berry's 185gr hollow base round nose. I'm loading Titegroup 4.7gr. I didn't have any problem with the same load and Montana Gold 230gr. bullets. I see that this powder charge is similar to what many are using here.

    I'm wondering if it is possible that the hollow base is forming a parabolic deflector and blowing burning powder backwards along the gaps in the slide. Alternatively, is it possible that the bullets are not seated far enough, allowing the bullet to leave the case mouth before the powder has fully burned and only partially pressurized? Any thoughts?

  4. I have both and love them both. With the 550, I can load ~400 rounds 9mm/hour, and with the 650 I can load ~600/hour. I reload the higher volume stuff on the 650 and lower volume on the 550. With lower volumes, it really doesn't matter. I work out of my home and have the luxury of loading 1-200 in the morning, then another 200 at lunch, and another 2-300 at night. Rarely do I spend more than 2 hours at a time cranking out ammo. Thus, either one can be made to work just fine.

    Having said that, I prefer the 650 for a couple of reasons:

    1. Less physical movement without the need to feed cases with one hand while advancing/seating bullets with the other hand
    2. Less cognitive load without the need to visually inspect powder level in each case if you use the powder check add-on.

    The downside is the time it takes to change calibers. You won't have to change from small to large primers, saving you a couple of steps. There are some other complexities with more moving parts with the case feeder, drop mechanism, and station 1 slide, but they either work themselves out over time or you get used to compensating for them.

    If I had the money for a 650 with accoutrements, I'd buy it again over a 550.

  5. I have a Dillon 550 w/ small pistol primers that are sagging out of the bottom of the primer feed tube, and the primer cup is catching on the sagging leading edge on the back stroke, preventing it from retracting back far enough to drop the primer into the cup. I can use a dental pick to lift the leading edge of the primer back up into the primer drop tube and it will return to normal operation.

    At other times, it appears that the primer is catching on the lip of the primer drop tube and turning on its side so the primer is smashed sideways into the primer pocket.

    Any ideas as to what needs to be done to fix this? The screw that adjusts the depth of primer cup travel into the primer pickup well is completely recessed. Thus, there is no possibility that the primer cup is too far back.

    Ideas?

  6. Unless the matches you go to use computers for targets, you might consider dry firing on actual targets. It's more realistic.

    lol. You kill me. Of course it is more realistic. As an amateur, one of the things that I'm looking for is the ability to stay focused on the shot when someone else is sounding the buzzer, and increasing the speed of the target acquisition, firing, and recovery. For this, computer based training is a perfect match. Once my skills improve, I can go out into the "real world."

    Did you try http://gunbot.wordpr...t-dryfire-deck/ ?

    I found it on this forum but I can seem to find it again.

    I did find that one at predatortactical, thank you!

  7. I took a look at predatortactical.com and don't see anything that looks like computer-based training. I also looked in the training section area here and couldn't find anything. The challenge with any type of key word search is that you have to have some rather specific idea of what you're looking for, and I'm not sure that I do. What am I missing? Or, more precisely, what should I be searching for?

  8. Check and see if the spring washer on the adjustment screw is missing.

    Ah, you are so right! I found that the spring washer was put on in the wrong order with the washer on last. Thus, the spring wrapped around the small powder bar rather than tensioning between a standard washer and the bolt head. Much obliged!

    Do any of you use silicone spray lube on the powder bar? And do you drop a touch of oil along the guide ways that hold the upper in place as the assembly is lifted up preparatory to dropping powder?

  9. Someone mentioned that there was a computerized dry-fire training program either provided or linked to from here, but I'm not quite sure how to go about finding it. I understand that it has some sort of random timer intervals as well as targets.

    Does this ring a bell for anyone?

  10. There have been a couple of posts lamenting the fact that everything is out of stock; Looks like Powder Valley has primers again. Small pistol primers are still out but they have far greater availability on everything else than they did last night.

    ETA: This is for CCI primers--everything else is still out of stock.

  11. Wearing ear plugs and muffs takes away a lot of the noise and really helps. Another tip is to shoot at "nothing". Don't use a target, just shoot at the backstop while watching your front sight. It takes away all the other stuff you are trying to concentrate on. Just focus on slowly pressing the trigger without disturbing the sights. It's amazing what you can feel and see when you're not trying to hit anything.

    I took my daughter and her friend to the range last week and had the friend "shoot snow" on the berm. It really did take the pressure off and help her relax. Before doing so she couldn't even hit paper at 5 yards. After "shooting snow" she got every shot on the target. She went from, "I suck!" to, "Hey, this is really fun!"

    Thanks for the advice!

  12. Powder bridging for sure.

    Sometimes the dillon funnels are not well finished inside (rough) and it causes the powder to bridge.

    Remove the powder funnel and look down its bore. If there are even light machining marks, you want to remove them.

    Get a drill bit 1/16" smaller than the opening on the powder funnle, place it in a drill. Place the powder funnel in a vise (non marking)

    Now wind some 0 steel wool around the drill bit so that it is snug in the funnel bore.

    Remove bit and saturate with flitz or cutting polish.

    At medium speed, slowly work the drill in and out of the funnel. Then bore snake the residue out and continue process until the only marks you see are the ones left by the steel wool

    Now. Repeat the process with 00 and 000 steel wool until the bore of the funnel is like a mirror.

    That solves the problem permanently

    What would happen if you were to tumble the powder funnel in either dry walnut media or wet stainless steel media? would that have the same effect as polishing with steel wool?

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