Greetings,
After months of visiting the site on a regular basis, I've finally started to go shooting regularly enough to post some relevant info and questions. During this latest day at the range I finally got to shoot my M95 Rifle and Carbine with my first attempts at bullet casting, with some success.
For reference, I learned the basics of bullet casting from Lee's "Modern Reloading; Second Edition" and the how-to articles on casting from surplusrifle dot com, in particular their article on producing #2 Alloy from wheel weights and tin solder. For starting loads I referred to the C.E. Harris article on military cast-bullet loads, stickied at the "Cast-Boolits" forum, and a specific thread there on loading 8x56R.
For my first try, I made up loads of 22gr H4198, 24gr IMR 3031 and 17gr of H4227, launching a gas-checked,lubed Lee 205gr bullet sized to .329 inch. Brass was Graf's/Prvi Partizan ordered from bcredneck dot com, with Win LR primers. I only picked up a caliper a few weeks ago and did not slug either bore beforehand, though it did not seem to end up being a problem with these rifles. As the Lee dies for 8x56R did not come with a crimp die, I excluded the step of belling the case mouth with their expander die before seating the bullets, which would have been preferred. I also did not have the use of my rifle rest and had to settle to shooting from a bench with my left hand resting atop of wooden blocks before practicing further from the sitting position.
Both rifles were fired with five rounds of each load from the bench at 50 yards. The 4198 loads were the most spread out, with the 4227 loads a little tighter, but surpassed by the IMR 3031 starting load of 24 grains. All were otherwise a pleasure to shoot. The M95 carbine began developing a hairline crack in the upper handguard beginning from the muzzle end and was put away after the initial testing at 50m, while the rifle was given a try at 100m benched. The trends continued with IMR 3031 performing the best by far. The loads shot to point of aim at 100m (bottom of the darker bullseye section of the target, some perhaps about 2-3 inches below centre with the sights on the lowest setting of 500 paces. I continued using up my H4198 loads in the sitting position, from which I'd miss about 1 in 5 shots at 100m, likely I believe on account of the lesser accuracy of that load.
Despite the lack of a proper rest to test with, and a recurring problem of the failure of the rifle to strip cartridges from the magazine usually around the fourth or fifth shot, the day was largely a success. The rifle grouped three rounds of the 3031 load into .84 inch at 50yrds with a flier spreading the group to 1.92 inches. At 100m, I managed four shots of the same load into 1.3 inches, with a flier spreading the group to 3.7 inches. I saved the last 10 rounds of this loading in case I'd get to use the rifle on small game like groundhogs or coyotes within 100m, and think that it has the greatest potential. Though the 4227 load has potential, and the H4198 might do better with filler, I plan on sticking with the 3031 load for now, and might one day reload up to 30gr for practice up to 200m and as a small, medium range game load. The only caveat I'd have about dissing the 4198 load is that they were all loaded with a different batch of bullets from my first attempt at casting, which might not be as consistent as the latter batch that I produces with less difficulty.
Just to close with a few comments about the rifles themselves, they were both arsenal refurbs with good bores, which were thoroughly cleaned beforehand to remove traces of copper. The sights were admittedly less than user friendly, though I have a new prescription for glasses that might factor into that. Trigger pull was comparable to but felt a bit better than on my Mosin 91/30. I'll withold final judgement until I figure out how to fix the feeding problem off of the stripper clips, but otherwise am happy to have paid the $210 for the two rifles as a pair.
With Regards,
FrankInformation
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