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  1. #41
    Contributing Member ssgross's Avatar
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    Bullets came in the mail yesterday...super fast and deserving of a shout out to https://www.bluecollarreloading.com in NC. First time I ordered from them, or even heard of them. Prices are low end of the spectrum, and shipping was flat rate. Downside is they don't ship powder/primers.
    She feeds beautiful and smooth with the 220 RN. 35.5gr of IMR4064 should get me somewhere between 1900-2000FPS. My Lyman manual says this is well below max. My Hornady manual starts at 29.3 @ 1600 FPS. I'll start there and work up to 35.5 and see what happens.
    Thanks, butlesrangers. I'll be measuring the tenon to make sure it has the right one. The seller sent the CMPicon certificate with it, and said it was a VFW turn in. CMP's website says these are all mixed-masters so there is a chance it has the wrong side plate on it.

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  3. #42
    Advisory Panel browningautorifle's Avatar
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    We can't get factory 220 RN now, used to be able to get Hornady I think. No requirement in Canadaicon I guess. I was told about a man that hot swaged his own RN FMJ but never got to talk to him about it.
    Regards, Jim

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    Legacy Member butlersrangers's Avatar
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    The "carrier/follower assembly" for the model 1896 Kragicon is different than the one for the model 1898 Krag, (which I think has two variations). A mismatch in these parts could cause problems.

    FWIW - I took some pictures (Saturday) of the early movement of a cartridge as the Krag Bolt "picks it up" at the magazine-opening.

    Attached: Three shots of a FA cartridge made in 1898 and three of a reload with a 168 grain Sierra MK. (Both rounds feed in this model 1898 action).

    Attachment 111010Attachment 111011Attachment 111012Attachment 111013Attachment 111014Attachment 111015
    Last edited by butlersrangers; 09-14-2020 at 02:42 AM.

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    Legacy Member jon_norstog's Avatar
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    My bad on those loads

    Can't edit the post. It was a Hornady 220 grain RN, not 200 and I found that recently I have been using 42 gr. of H 4350, weighing each charge.

    My deer load is a 150 gr RN and 44 H380, which is in the same league as the 30-30

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  9. #45
    Legacy Member butlersrangers's Avatar
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    "Jon" - Could you comment more about the "Remington-Lee you use to hunt with".

    I am assuming it was in .30-40 and with the forward 'locking-lugs' you felt the action strong enough for near .308 loads?

    Was your Remington-Lee a factory sporter or a cut-down military configuration.

    I have seen a number of cut-down model 1899 Remington-Lee rifles, that were from the Michigan National Guard contract. The stocks are often split at the side of the wrist, behind the action.

  10. #46
    Contributing Member ssgross's Avatar
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    Range Report

    Many thanks for the very detailed information butlerangers and Jon. I will take a look at poyer along with your info to see if I can confirm that my feed parts are correct.
    I loaded 180 SP with 34.2 gr of IMR 4064 to get on paper and get some fouling shots through. My 10th edition Hornady manual reports ~2000 FPS. After playing with the windage at 25 yds, this rifle put 5 shots in overlapping holes!
    This same load was all over the place at 100 yds.
    I then switched to 220 RN, and shot multiple 5 shot groups at 100 yds with each of the loads
    29.3gr IMR4064 (~1600 FPS)
    31.0 (~1700 FPS)
    32.7 (~1800 FPS)
    34.4 (~1900 FPS) - max load in Hornady manual.
    The original army load is reported at 2000 FPS, and my Lyman 50th gives a max load with IMR4064 at 39.5gr, ~2120 and 39,000 CUP. So my max load in this string was loaded to
    36.5 IMR4064, hopefully at ~2000FPS or a little under.
    I find on average the Lyman start and max loads for same projectile and powder to be much hotter than any other manual I've looked at. Most of their data though was collected from a universal receiver and a test barrel.
    32.7gr IMR4064 was a clear winner
    29.3gr and 31.0gr were about 50% worse, and 34.4/36.5 opened up, with the latter spraying the page. My setup was a front tripod rest and a rear bag off a bench at my local indoor range, which has 100yd lanes.
    Attachment 111087Attachment 111088
    Some of the flyers were my fault - getting used to the drag on the trigger - it's smooth, but a lot of drag before it breaks - and the sights. In the first group above, I called the 5th shot when the trigger broke much earlier than I expected. I got into a nice rhythm letting the rifle settle up with a bottom hold during the long take-up.
    The open sight, set all the way down, was way high - off the page on every load but the 29.3gr. I was bottom hold, with the front sight post level with the top of the rear sight. Perhaps I needed to just let the front sight "peek" in the bottom of the notch.
    The peep sight is harder to use than the 1903. I could see my aiming black with a bright point from the orange dot clear as day, until I tried to look at it through the peep and all I would see was the white page. I found that leaving my other eye half open made the black and the orange dot show clear through the peep, and my groups.
    I took the day off and spent half the day shooting ~150 rounds. I finished the day using up all the 180SP's getting a feel for how the rifle would behave in my hands in a vintage match course of fire. I found that shooting offhand with the peep sight impossible, and the long drag on the trigger makes it more difficult than it should be with the open sight. It feels very similar to other front-heavy long barreled rifles, perhaps closest comparison would be a Mosin 91/30. My Mosin has a very early clean trigger and shooting offhand with the open sight is easy peasy to get in a rhythm.
    I did work on the Kragicon's trigger. It was very gritty after I first cleaned it. I then used a fine brass wire wheel on my dremmel to clean it, and all the grit went away leaving a nice long, smooth pull.
    My final steps on this one is to investigate my parts are correct (side plate, follower arm, etc.) using the very generous information you all have given me - perhaps get a new trigger or sear to play with stoning and improving that, and finish cleaning out the grime from the stock.
    I did find on Sun. night when getting my gear together that the bolt stuck a bit on opening. So I cleaned the lugs in the receiver really well, which didn't do much cause I already had done a good job. Some of the patina on the bolt housing was rough, so I used my fine brass wheel on very low speed to clean it...I left the patina on the bolt handle and knob. After a very light coat of RIG, it moves like an egg fried in bacon grease - choose your own favorite analogy - and looks beautiful sliding in the action. I'll say thanks one more time with some pictures after I clean up the stock and other miscellany.
    EDIT: I removed third target picture since I mis-wrote the powder type in the label. It was 30.0gr IMR4064, but I wrote IMR4895 on the target.
    Last edited by ssgross; 09-18-2020 at 11:00 AM.

  11. #47
    Advisory Panel browningautorifle's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by ssgross View Post
    it moves like an egg fried in bacon grease
    And that would be about right...they do that.
    Regards, Jim

  12. #48
    Legacy Member butlersrangers's Avatar
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    Unless it's a writing error, it would look like "31.0 grains of IMR-4895" was your 'clear winner' in the targets posted.

  13. #49
    Contributing Member ssgross's Avatar
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    good catch! The writing on the target was indeed supposed to say IMR4064, which is what is says in my shooter's notebook. Thankfully I toss the targets after I record the results. I removed the picture with erroneous caption in case anyone comes across it and doesn't read on (not that it would be a dangerous load - but would throw one's own experiments off).
    I've debated myself on which I like better. I toss out shots I know to be fliers when I call them, and I was only shooting groups of 5, so that if I botched a group getting used to the sights I still had more rounds to get good data. The other 5 shot groups for 32.7gr IMR4064 looks just as good, and slightly better than that 31gr. target. It just looks good because it's a clean page with no other holes. The other holes in the other pics were me walking rounds on paper. Those 220gr bullets had a huge variance, to the point that 31gr was on the page, and leaving the sights alone put 32.7 gr off the page. I had to bring the target back to 50yds to get a round on paper and adjust (hence the other holes). In any event, I'd be happy tossing a coin between those 2 loads.
    Last edited by ssgross; 09-18-2020 at 11:03 AM.

  14. #50
    Contributing Member ssgross's Avatar
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    one of the issues I had shooting was guesstimating my sight adjustments. The velocities reported in the reloading manuals I used are good enough for printing holes in paper at 100yds, but without a reference on the original sight graduations those calculations were a bit worthless. So here is what I discovered sipping coffee this morning, taking another day off to go shooting.
    Fr. Frog has a nice article here
    The Krag Rifle
    That includes some info on estimates for the original ballistics of the 30-40 Army round. Using his reported BC, and the 0.975 front sight height of my rifle, which has a rear 1901 sight, I get the following table from shooterscalculator.com
    ShootersCalculator.com | 1898 Krag 1901 rear sight
    Range Elevation Vel[x+y]
    (yd) (MOA) (ft/s)
    0 0.00 2000
    100 -0.01 1768
    200 4.87 1558
    300 11.08 1372
    400 18.61 1217
    - Sound Barrier (1128 fps) -
    500 27.61 1101
    600 38.18 1018
    This gives an estimate for the MOA between the rear sight graduations on the leaf. Of course, I would better like to do some math with the sight radius and actual distance on the graduations, but that would involve getting up from my recliner to retrieve pencil and paper, and kicking the sleeping dog out from under the foot rest - both of which I'm not willing to do on such a peaceful morning as this.
    I really wish I owned one of those PJ O'Hare sight micrometers.

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