Update Post 18 with Savage 10FP 1/31/10
Mods, please move to the general area. I didn't mean to exclude non-members. Thank you.
Hey everyone, I just wanted to share with you my amazing experience earlier today with firelapping our 10/22. First off, anyone who is currently loading or considering loading cast bullets, the "Beartooth Bullets Technical Guide - A Comprehensive Guide for Attaining Unsurpassed Performance Using Cast Bullets" by Marshall Stanton is one of the clearest and most complete summaries to getting the best performance from your cast bullets. Link: http://www.beartoothbullets.com/bulletselect/book.htm
For those of you who are unfamiliar with firelapping, it is simply the process of smoothing out constraints within your barrel and polishing your barrel's unseen imperfections smooth. This will not only increase accuracy significantly in virtually all types of guns, but will also reduce leading, copper fouling, and also makes it easier to clean. The process is easy, cheap, and can only help improve your firearm. After I watched my grouping on the 10/22 shrink, I am convinced that almost everyone on here would benefit from doing it themselves.
To firelap you will first need:
I started with a well cleaned bore without any trace of lead or copper fouling. It is necessary before you begin to clear any traces of copper from your barrel. The process we followed was to cover the bullet with a thin coat of clover compound with care to avoid getting any on the brass. I shot 10 of these loaded one by one and then patched the bore until I was sure all of the grit was removed from the barrel. I then shot a ten round group. (looking back on it I should have shot a group before any lapping for a baseline but I wanted to start with a clean barrel). I then fired 10 more lapping bullets, patched the bore and then fired another 10 round group. This process is typically repeated until the group does not shrink any further. After 3 rotations of 10 lapping shots, patch cleaning, and 10 round grouping shots, it shot more accurately than I could. I shot these from a benchrest at 50ft rapid fire and the improvement is apparent:
After the first ten lapping rounds: (you can only imagine what a grouping with no lapping shots fired would look like)
View attachment 8322
After twenty lapping rounds:
View attachment 8321
After thirty lapping rounds:
View attachment 8320
Our next project is our Savage 10FP which has been very accurate but is starting to show signs of copper fouling. The gun has been well cleaned and any trace of fouling has since been removed. For this we will be using fireformed brass, decapped without sizing. Bullets are soft lead casted, rolled between two metal plates with clover compound to embed the grit into the lead. These bullets are then inserted into the unsized brass over 4 grains of bullseye without any crimp. They are shot singly with the bore patched after each shot. Groups will be shot after each 10 lapping rounds to determine when to stop lapping. I hope this information helps and again I highly recommend all of you to try it out and see your accuracy improve. It can only help![[smile]](/xen/styles/default/xenforo/smilies.vb/001.gif "Smile [smile]")
UPDATE 01/23/10: Ruger MK3
Well we had a chance to go to the range today with the intent of firelapping our savage 308. It fired fine but for some reason after one firelapping shot, it refused to chamber any more firelapping rounds, however shot regular rounds with no problem. Hopefully we will be back out there very soon with some improved reloads to get the job done, but in the meantime I can share some more results with our ruger MK3 target that we were able to firelap instead. Both targets were shot at 50ft benchrest (awkward but I managed).
First the baseline (no lapping):
View attachment 8424
After ten lapping rounds:
View attachment 8423
Note that I did shoot a third target, but it was the same grouping as the second so I stopped lapping at that point. I'm sure the gun at that time was shooting much more accurately than me, at 50ft it was difficult to tell the difference from a 10 or a 9 but again, the grouping shows significant improvement overall. I called at least one of the flyers on the second target, between the cold (outdoor range), awkward pistol benchresting, and not being able to see the target I think I'm allowed at least one or two, so be kind![[wink]](/xen/styles/default/xenforo/smilies.vb/002.gif "Wink [wink]")
I'll post the savage results as soon as possible, [STRIKE]once we figure out the issue with the load [/STRIKE] It was an issue with the non-fireformed brass as we suspected, about half of them were not fireformed and apparently each time I grabbed for any to test fire I happened to pick the non-fireformed ones. I'm confident the savage will show an improvement, but I'm still anxious to get out the range and see what it can do
Mods, please move to the general area. I didn't mean to exclude non-members. Thank you.
Hey everyone, I just wanted to share with you my amazing experience earlier today with firelapping our 10/22. First off, anyone who is currently loading or considering loading cast bullets, the "Beartooth Bullets Technical Guide - A Comprehensive Guide for Attaining Unsurpassed Performance Using Cast Bullets" by Marshall Stanton is one of the clearest and most complete summaries to getting the best performance from your cast bullets. Link: http://www.beartoothbullets.com/bulletselect/book.htm
For those of you who are unfamiliar with firelapping, it is simply the process of smoothing out constraints within your barrel and polishing your barrel's unseen imperfections smooth. This will not only increase accuracy significantly in virtually all types of guns, but will also reduce leading, copper fouling, and also makes it easier to clean. The process is easy, cheap, and can only help improve your firearm. After I watched my grouping on the 10/22 shrink, I am convinced that almost everyone on here would benefit from doing it themselves.
To firelap you will first need:
Soft lead bullets oversized to the bore by from .0015 to .0035
Clover compound 320 grit
- Loaded rounds to enough velocity to ensure that the bullet leaves the bore but not much more. For the 10/22 this meant that we got solid lead subsonic rounds
I started with a well cleaned bore without any trace of lead or copper fouling. It is necessary before you begin to clear any traces of copper from your barrel. The process we followed was to cover the bullet with a thin coat of clover compound with care to avoid getting any on the brass. I shot 10 of these loaded one by one and then patched the bore until I was sure all of the grit was removed from the barrel. I then shot a ten round group. (looking back on it I should have shot a group before any lapping for a baseline but I wanted to start with a clean barrel). I then fired 10 more lapping bullets, patched the bore and then fired another 10 round group. This process is typically repeated until the group does not shrink any further. After 3 rotations of 10 lapping shots, patch cleaning, and 10 round grouping shots, it shot more accurately than I could. I shot these from a benchrest at 50ft rapid fire and the improvement is apparent:
After the first ten lapping rounds: (you can only imagine what a grouping with no lapping shots fired would look like)
View attachment 8322
After twenty lapping rounds:
View attachment 8321
After thirty lapping rounds:
View attachment 8320
Our next project is our Savage 10FP which has been very accurate but is starting to show signs of copper fouling. The gun has been well cleaned and any trace of fouling has since been removed. For this we will be using fireformed brass, decapped without sizing. Bullets are soft lead casted, rolled between two metal plates with clover compound to embed the grit into the lead. These bullets are then inserted into the unsized brass over 4 grains of bullseye without any crimp. They are shot singly with the bore patched after each shot. Groups will be shot after each 10 lapping rounds to determine when to stop lapping. I hope this information helps and again I highly recommend all of you to try it out and see your accuracy improve. It can only help
UPDATE 01/23/10: Ruger MK3
Well we had a chance to go to the range today with the intent of firelapping our savage 308. It fired fine but for some reason after one firelapping shot, it refused to chamber any more firelapping rounds, however shot regular rounds with no problem. Hopefully we will be back out there very soon with some improved reloads to get the job done, but in the meantime I can share some more results with our ruger MK3 target that we were able to firelap instead. Both targets were shot at 50ft benchrest (awkward but I managed).
First the baseline (no lapping):
View attachment 8424
After ten lapping rounds:
View attachment 8423
Note that I did shoot a third target, but it was the same grouping as the second so I stopped lapping at that point. I'm sure the gun at that time was shooting much more accurately than me, at 50ft it was difficult to tell the difference from a 10 or a 9 but again, the grouping shows significant improvement overall. I called at least one of the flyers on the second target, between the cold (outdoor range), awkward pistol benchresting, and not being able to see the target I think I'm allowed at least one or two, so be kind
I'll post the savage results as soon as possible, [STRIKE]once we figure out the issue with the load [/STRIKE] It was an issue with the non-fireformed brass as we suspected, about half of them were not fireformed and apparently each time I grabbed for any to test fire I happened to pick the non-fireformed ones. I'm confident the savage will show an improvement, but I'm still anxious to get out the range and see what it can do
Last edited:
![[grin]](/xen/styles/default/xenforo/smilies.vb/041.gif "Grin [grin]")
