The Maker Bullet project

[rebel]

So I have some guys here locally following a Pied Piper who claims he is the authority on sub BLK. Talked a lot of boys into buying integral suppressed contender barrels. That's all fine and good except he doesn't know dick about powder or anything else.EDIT - After shooting subsonics at 200 yards and trying to develop an accurate load, it seems we have found that fast powders work really well for some bullets and ultimately lead to solving this issue. So apparently he does know dick and I have to admit I was wrong. So guys are starting to come to me about BLK handloading, ( I never said a damn thing, gun guys just find out stuff ), and are having trouble getting Maker 200 gr. bullets to stabilize at 100 yards. This thread will be about the experiences I have had loading this bullet.
Initially I got about 15 from a customer that said " these are bad ass, see what you can do with them". Somewhere I think I posted expansion results. On that point as good as the Lehigh 194 ME. The bullet did not look as slick as the Lehigh, Flat based, huge HP up front and long. Secondly, the bullet was rough to the touch, measured right at .309 and felt tougher to push in the case. Then I got 36 more from another customer who was unhappy.
In the interest of time, I sent dellet half of what I had. Knew he had a short 1 in 6 and a laundry list of powder for subs.
I figured I had this with 1680 but was wrong. 10.5 gr was unstable at 100 yards. Remember, that's my load for a 220 MK in a 1 in 8 carbine gassed AR. These were in a 1 in 7 RARR bolt. Dellet and I discussed and I decided to reduce my OAL and up my charge a bit. Reduced from 2.25 to 2.12 and charged with 11.1 gr. One , unsuppressed was unstable at 50 yards, the rest were suppressed. One went super, all but one seemed unstable. So at this point, with this powder and a limited supply - I am done. The unsuppressed load chronied at 1029 fps. The fact one went super is a 1680 thing I'll not get into here, but suffice it to say the powder was laying horizontal. Dellet has tried a few more things and will follow up with this. I am not trying to bash Maker bullets, just don't want anyone here losing a $1000 can to them. More to follow.........

[r.tenorio671]

....... The fact one went super is a 1680 thing I'll not get into here, but suffice it to say the powder was laying horizontal. Dellet has tried a few more things and will follow up with this. I am not trying to bash Maker bullets, just don't want anyone here losing a $1000 can to them. More to follow.........

.....that is a revelation I've never considered. My initial thought when I read that was a wondering if an "ancient" technique of using a filler like a fluff off a cottonball over the powder before seating the bullet might help in that regard to keep the mass of powder centered and in line with the primers flash

[rebel]

....... The fact one went super is a 1680 thing I'll not get into here, but suffice it to say the powder was laying horizontal. Dellet has tried a few more things and will follow up with this. I am not trying to bash Maker bullets, just don't want anyone here losing a $1000 can to them. More to follow.........

.....that is a revelation I've never considered. My initial thought when I read that was a wondering if an "ancient" technique of using a filler like a fluff off a cottonball over the powder before seating the bullet might help in that regard to keep the mass of powder centered and in line with the primers flash

It does, but was not used here.

[bangbangping]

Odd. There are lots of longer bullets that folks have no trouble stabilizing. I wonder if the petals are expanding a bit in flight. Maybe a 1:8 or slower would be better.

[rebel]

Thought about that bang, and actually had a couple of holes that may have happened. But I think the issue here is long bearing surface. Bounced this off txr and he agrees. Yeah there are bullets that have a longer oal, but less bearing surface. This creates drag, which results in lower fps. My customers MV was 950. I knew that was slow so built a round that clocked faster figuring that would stabilize. Getting the bullet to that speed was a feat in itself, then to have one pop super.......finicky.

[plant.one]

being these are machined bullets .... have you checked for any inconsistencies in the machining? with a micrometer instead of calipers?

going on the bearing surface causing drag issue - is it possible that the one that went super happened to have a bit shorter of a bearing surface - and therefore less drag?

or the other thing could be a bearing surface just a bit under diameter. as a machined bullet - one that was cut a little skinnier at the early end of the production run mixed in with those a bit larger near the end of the run where the tooling is starting to show wear...

i guess what i'm asking is - could a variance of 0.0005 to 0.001 in diameter from the rest of the lot make enough difference on the drag coefficient to have enough effect to cause that?

[dellet]

Interesting new project Rebel got me into. This bullet is a challenge. I have been able to run it in 1/6, 1/7, 1/10 twist and a number of different powders. So far nothing seems to work.

All shots at 50 yards, as close to 1000 fps as possible. For reference here is a look at the bullet:


All of the loads I tried were proven with other similar weight bullets, either the Lehigh 194 ME, or the Hornady 208 ELD match.

7.7 Grains VV N105, bullet seated at the top grove 980 fps. 1/7 bolt action.


10.5 grains VV n120, loaded at the second groove from the top. 950 fps 1/6 twist.


8.2 grains AA#9. Top hole was not crimped. Bottom hole I tried to bell the case and then crimp. I decided to treat it like a cast bullet since it is .309 diameter, thought maybe the base was being damaged while seating.


Faster was not making a difference, so I tried to slow it down some to see what would happen. 10.5 grains N120 compressed to the top groove. It did what it should have in theory, it got worse.


The load above was shot from the same 18" 1/10 twist barrel that produced the group below with a Hornady 205 ELD, which is actually slightly longer than the maker when the tip is included, slightly shorter when not. That is three shots at fifty yards.



I put three bullets as a sample in a concentricity gauge, they actually checked out very well. There was one thing that caught my eye. That was how much vibration was in the needle of the dial indicator, this is the roughness that Rebel was speaking of. I hand polished a bullet until the vibration was gone. I immediately noticed the lack of force needed to seat the bullet. Hoping this was part of the problem, one more shot of the AA# 9 load.

I got a sonic crack, but the result at the target was the same.

A call or email is in order to Maker in the next couple days, hopefully with some good suggestions. Would love to hear some opinion, thoughts.

[r.tenorio671]

....now that I've seen a picture of the actual bullet and dellets observations, 2 thoughts jump out immediately: (1) the balance point for the bullets weight, and (2) the slots for the petals in combination with the large opening at tip.

....eons back I remember a theory that had been discussed about the "balance point" of bullets in regards to the weight distribution of a bullet. Too much weight in either direction caused instabilities.

....I'm wondering if that large opening in front is acting like a large "air scoop" and when all the pressurized air it's gathering exits thru the slots cut into it for the "mushrooming" effect is creating an imbalance due to inequal pressures or turbulence along it's axis and/or circumference if the slot widths vary in width/length.

[TMD]

....now that I've seen a picture of the actual bullet and dellets observations, 2 thoughts jump out immediately: (1) the balance point for the bullets weight, and (2) the slots for the petals in combination with the large opening at tip.

....eons back I remember a theory that had been discussed about the "balance point" of bullets in regards to the weight distribution of a bullet. Too much weight in either direction caused instabilities.

....I'm wondering if that large opening in front is acting like a large "air scoop" and when all the pressurized air it's gathering exits thru the slots cut into it for the "mushrooming" effect is creating an imbalance due to inequal pressures or turbulence along it's axis and/or circumference if the slot widths vary in width/length.

^^^^THIS^^^^
From the looks of the picture it seems that almost half of the bullet is hollow. Also being a solid copper instead of jacketed they are long for weight to begin with. If the nose is drilled out to the slots or further I could definitely see a balance issue.

[rebel]

....now that I've seen a picture of the actual bullet and dellets observations, 2 thoughts jump out immediately: (1) the balance point for the bullets weight, and (2) the slots for the petals in combination with the large opening at tip.

....eons back I remember a theory that had been discussed about the "balance point" of bullets in regards to the weight distribution of a bullet. Too much weight in either direction caused instabilities.

....I'm wondering if that large opening in front is acting like a large "air scoop" and when all the pressurized air it's gathering exits thru the slots cut into it for the "mushrooming" effect is creating an imbalance due to inequal pressures or turbulence along it's axis and/or circumference if the slot widths vary in width/length.

dellet and I had discussed this. I suppose it's possible, even likely, that it could be the problem.
I have to add, this really surprised me. I have never had a bullet to give me this many problems. If y'all remember the crappy UMC 220 design, long bullet, huge bearing surface and wild velocity shifts, it seems similar. Throw in the ashtray size hole and....... but this is just an educated guess at this point.
I do want to reiterate, I am not bashing Maker. I saw a problem, dellet confirmed and I wouldn't feel to great staying quiet about it and reading one of you guys trashed a can with these things. Hopefully some design changes are in order.