ZERO 185 JHP with TiteGROUP Powder

Greetings,

Tested ammo Saturday.

I was interested in how the ZERO 185 JHP and TiteGROUP would work.

Five ten-shot targets were fired in an IMI NM7791414 barrel.

Mean Radius of the groups were 0.479", 0.517", 0.616", 0.612", and 0.447".

Rather consistent. Velocities measured 780, 783, 783, 784,and 791. (fps)

Not bad for fifty shots.

Below is the backer target containing all fifty shots plus five "sighters/foulers".

Cheers,

Dave

Barrel tester or full gun? Either way looks like I should put some together

Sorry Dave. You don't win the stuffed bear because portions of the X ring are still visible. Nice try though. And good info on the Titegroup. I still have quite a bit of it and Zero 185 JHP I can play with.

Len

Jeeebers!

Hmmm...

Dave, you are determined to mess up all of my planning! All five of those groups were tighter than you recently achieved with my factory ASYM (0.718") and Zero (0.632").

So, is it now your opinion that Titegroup does, as the name suggests, actually produce tighter groups than N310, 700X or whatever other powders are typically being used?

Thank you for sharing, including all the load parameters. The jug of TG has been taking up space

Greetings Roy,

I would not panic, just yet.

Your test ammo was fired in a Colt Gold Cup barrel.

My latest test is with an IMI National Match barrel.

Also, a completely different powder as compared to ASYM and ZERO.

The Mean Radius difference of 0.1" is likely negligible.

Your Zero ammo appears to have been loaded with 700X. I have been able to duplicate the velocity; but, not the group size.

I would expect your ZERO ammo to shoot on call.

Cheers,

Right Cheeky Bugger

My fathers favorite load was 185 grn SWC and 5 grns 700X

That's interesting Dave. Titegroup and n310 have always been good performers for me. I have wondered which would give me a wider "band" to better negate inconsistencies like powder measuring, grip strength, temperature, etc. For example I tested a load with n310 and a coated 200gn swc that gave me 5" to 1" groups over 3 tenths variation. Which powder do you think would have the wider accuracy "band"?

I suppose I could say, "less of a sharp peak" if you plotted a graph of each.

What's your OAL and crimp?

I'm encouraged to see your velocities in the 700s. I threw together 4.6 Bullseye with .469" crimp and 1.205" OAL. I think I'm at about 760fps, which seemed a little slow to me but "meh," now that I see your results.

I don't have a barrel tester, but I trust this load out of the hand of a washed-up has-been when the dot was sitting inside of the black and he shot a 95-99-97 long line with one called 8, especially when it was 104º.

Benchrest tests are one thing; trusting how it shoots out of my hand is another.

(This is why I'm terrified to Random Rest my mom's hardball gun. That thing has some magic in it, and I wouldn't be surprised to learn that it shoots 4" at 50 yards out of a rest.)

I suspect one, just one, of the Zero secrets is the use of new brass, partly because of its sticky properties. The bullet sticks in the case giving it an extra combustion pop. That’s why your expander plug also sticks and is hard to extract. Crimp does similar things but l don’t like to crimp jacketed or short bearing surface bullets. You can duplicate that stick by wet tumbling with pins but you can’t copy the other properties of new brass. My 2 cents.

bruce martindale wrote:I suspect one, just one, of the Zero secrets is the use of new brass, partly because of its sticky properties. The bullet sticks in the case giving it an extra combustion pop. Crimp does similar things but l don’t like to crimp jacketed or short bearing surface bullets. You can duplicate that stick by wet tumbling with pins but you can’t copy the other properties of new brass. My 2 cents.

True. But don't forget length. New Starline brass is .893" to .894". It's surprising how quickly it shortens. I shoot new brass on the long line twice and then start measuring. When it gets below .889" to .888" It goes into the short line bin. I have some Starline brass that I have shot over and over in practice that measures .877". The point I am making is length will affect a consistent crimp.

Bill

@All,

Excellent contributions!!! This it what I was hoping for.


@Centerline. I recently started testing Hornady 0.451" 185 XTP. Four tests of five shots.

All TiteGroup powder, StarLine cases, Fed 150 primers 1.245" No Crimp.

6.04 grains = 984/13/5.6 (Velocity, Extreme Spread, Standard Deviation) = 0.749" Mean Radius
5.60 grains = 907/24/9.0 = 0.306"
5.09 grains = 840/31/13.4 = 0.413"
4.60 grains = 759/33/13.4 = 0.559"

All four groups were X-ring. I will test again to achieve an 800fps average velocity. (Trying to duplicate commercial match ammo velocity.)

Good results for a first time out.



@John Bickar,

The Zero bullet test was 1.203" with NO CRIMP.

The average velocity was slightly lower than the ZERO or ASYM I was trying to duplicate.

Years ago, my friend and I starting building match 45's as the typical backlog from Clark, Giles, et al, was over a year. We testing the ammo with the barrel from the gun and then tested the gun with the barrel back in place. Generally, the Random Rest group was about 1/2" larger. This was attributed to the tolerances needed for the gun to function.

Joe Benner would agree to your shooting out of hand. According to Father-in-law, the AMU tested Joe's 45 in a newly purchased machine rest. It did not group well. Cheesed off, Benner took the pistol to the firing line and shot a 100 Slow Fire at 50 yards. "Leave my gun alone, there is nothing wrong with it." he quipped. (Story verification needed)

I would like to sit down with someone experienced in Dynamics to discuss all the variables that exist within the Random Rest. The Random Rest and I do not play well together.



@Bruce Martindale,

New brass.... Well today, I purchased 100 pieces of new StarLine for a dedicated test session of new vs. fired cases. $$$$$ Grrrrr....

I will also conduct a side by side test of NO CRIMP vs. CRIMP. How much crimp is yet to be decided. I examined all the really good match 45 ammo I have, Zero, Federal, W-W, and R-P and none have crimp.

We need to have Chase consult with us regarding how much pressure is needed to seat bullets in cases with varying conditions. i.e. New, fired dirty, fired clean, etc. He has a precision tool to measure this feature.



@messinger,

Recently, I have been ferreting out all the cases I use for testing that are 0.8895" and shorter. In the future, I will conduct, yet another, test of long cases vs. short cases.



Cheers,

Dave

TiteGROUP seems to be a a powder that’s worth a lot of consideration.  This is a target of my 1911 45 “Longslide” shooting my training load of 3.8 gr TiteGROUP behind a 230 RN cast im using up.gun was held in my hand resting my forearm at 25 Yds.

I