pjifl wrote:depth, now I’ve never tried adjusting neck sizing diameter to change tension, except unintentionally by skim turning necks in a factory chamber.
What do you feel is the largest return on investment for reducing ES ?
Neck tension adjustment?
Bullet pull?
Powder Charge?
Primer selection?
Case selection?
Headspace via Fls? Ie
not the one between my ears
I believe one must be more focused in that it depends somewhat on the distance and the number or shots in a string. Like 15 and 20 shot strings, especially beyond 700 y benefit more from finer tolerances. Most important is to never spend too much time on one factor and neglect another. BALANCE is essential. Best SD is always useful beyond a certain point but strive for balance.
Maybe I am going off on a tangent because low SD is only one factor in many.
Some things like powder charge and case consistency always matter but are not too hard to control - They are less important for the short and midrance shooter. Cartridge concentricity is another but a good seater is essential and usually solves that one.
Firstly, get the best cases you can. If reused many times, shoot then the same number of times.
Bullet pull and neck tension are more or less the same thing. I believe the most consistent neck tension goes hand in hand with quite low neck tension. Some lubrication may help with consistency. Annealing, in theory, may improve neck tensio but I doubt it is worth doing every shot and a good collet die - used on cases shot the same number of times - is a good substitute. Collet dies work the neck far less so they work harden less.
I have used both a carefully made custom FL die and cheap Lee Collet dies and I cannot really see much difference on the target. Cheap commercial FL dies are, however not a good idea. Have a policy of avoiding donuts at all costs and Lee is most useful in this regard - thus neck tension becomes more consistent.
I have watched with interest the use of moly but have never used it. I do not believe it improves accuracy and is an added complication. As someone mentioned, in other forms is as old as the hills going back 100 years. One 'molyed' each bullet individually by wiping it against the little finger immediately before chambering the cartridge. It may have other benefits but I consider them quite small. The modern craze for moly was really driven by commercial interests. I does not extend barrel life very much.
Primers - I would not know. But beware of inadequate testing that only reinforces myths.
What it eventually comes down to is learning to manage an accurate rifle in a balanced way and make good decisions when actually shooting.
Some barrels seem to thrive despite the worst attempts by shooters to mismanage their rifle.
And most lost matches are due to the nut behind the butt. A top rifle is useless in the wrong hands. Try to analyse your performance - this is very very hard to do.
Sorry - I have drifted away from SD. It does become more important at the longs where you cannot achieve sufficient compensation with a stiff barrel.
Peter Smith.
Great post Peter. And as you say none of these things exist in isolation. Shooters are apt to get myopic about some stuff and not know what's actually affecting thier performance.
Where you say ... "inadequate testing that only reinforces myths" .... is absolutely true. Lots of myths and wivestales have persisted in this game for a very long time.
Just imagine someone wanted to get really serious about testing primers and thier effect on SD/ES. To do that test even half arsed would take a good deal of time and effort. You would need to first rule out the shooter, so a machine rest would be required. You would need to test each primer/powder combination at the same barrel fouling state. You would need to weigh/volume check the cases to be used ..... the list of controls required actually goes on and on.
Anyway Rich, have u checked your scales ? I checked my bloody old Ohaus 505 scales against a mates very expensive electronic scales. I just weighed out 5 powder charges and took them to his place and all my charges were within one kernel of his. So that's ticked that box. Mind u I have done a 'mod' to my Ohaus scales which has really helped. I shall get a pic up of that.
I suspect nk tension has very little effect on ES/SD only because annealing ( which CAN - and I believe should - do the shoulder too !!!!!!!! ) tests have shown no real gains for this.
I went to a shoot the other day ( the first one in over a year ) and watched an F Open guy set up his gear on the mound. He has been F shooting for about 15 years. He plonks down his very light low-inertia value front rest. Then he puts his matt down and sits his light steel plate on top of the mat. Then he sits his light poxy bouncy-mid-section rear bag on the plate and gets it all lined up. I really really wanted to say something !!! To help the guy. To help others over here shooting with dodgy gear or shooting with good gear and then not setting it up properly. I could go on and on but I'd end up with less mates than I already have hahahah. My dog loves me !
This forum is good because there is very little personal abuse type writing and that's important because we all have different backgrounds and moods and blah blah blah. Cheers Rob.
, just trying to prioritise my time expenditure for maximum return, I’m a crossbred mechanic- machinist- cocky and I’ve found diagnostics skills to be the largest payoff in time returned over the years so I’m trying to apply that here and concentrate on whatever will give the largest payoff first, whether it’s gun handling, rest refining, ammunition or a large press to squeeze the demons out of my headspace problem that led me to thinking, I can do this 
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