Even bubba gets tired, 1894 Norwegian

[Glenmorangie]

First trip to the range. 100 yards, 15 rounds, one flyer just off the target to the right. Sights at 200.

All 140gr Hornady SP, but various charge weights of 4895, around 26 grains and 1,800fps, or so, give or take 100 or 150fps. I still have not figured out the sights and the hold, obviously. I hope to get much better with some experience and when I find the load she likes. Really a pleasant rifle to shoot.

[BM1455]

First trip to the range. 100 yards, 15 rounds, one flyer just off the target to the right. Sights at 200.

All 140gr Hornady SP, but various charge weights of 4895, around 26 grains and 1,800fps, or so, give or take 100 or 150fps. I still have not figured out the sights and the hold, obviously. I hope to get much better with some experience and when I find the load she likes. Really a pleasant rifle to shoot.

Are you using loads published in a loading manual or are you freelancing? That seems pretty slow. (You might read the thread on the British krag incidents to see what happens when you go too low.) Secondary detonation issues. I have found that with my Norwegian Krag with their longer chambers and often over sized bores when compared even to the SE Mausers tend to show lower velocities per similar round than the Swedish guns. (Comparing similar barrel lengths to keep it honest of course) I worry that people read all the low powered load advise on the internet and then make ammo that is ridiculously low and perhaps even more dangerous than a slightly hot rounds. Every load I have made using the Hornady book seemed to be about as low as I would want to go. Opening loads are even on the low side I think. Try IMR 4350 or N-160 with 139-140 gr bullets. The Lyman manual seems to be a little better IMO for this gun. The old speer manual seems way too low and out of line with everything else I have seen. I read some place that they blew up a SE mauser when making it....
Have you seen the load data from Norway for safe loads for the Norwegian Krags? They are not hot rounds but they are hotter than you might think.
144 gr sierra MK with between 42.0 - 43.5 grns of N-160. 2449-2492 ft/sec. Those are published loads from Norway

[Glenmorangie]

As promised, another trip to the range.

Rule of thumb: First, get a group, later, move the group to the X...this is a little better than the first go-round.

This is 100 yards, 10 rounds of PRVI Partisan 139gr FMJBT over 14.0 grains of Trail Boss, about 1420fps. Sights at 400.

The recoil on these is very manageable and definitely does not beat up the rifle or the shooter.

The sight may need adjustment, but I shot to the right all day with both an M38 Swede and the Krag.
Usually, low and right.

I think I will stay with the Trail Boss load and try some PRVI 139gr FMJBT Carcano bullets at .268. The Krag slugs to .267
The rifle definitely likes jacketed bullets. My other test load was 30.0 grains of 4895, at about 2,100fps, which produced similar accuracy at a much higher pain level.

The PRVI bullets have an open lead base, which I think makes them obdurate better than the jacketed base Hornadys I tested.
At the higher load the Hornady and PRVI bullets were comparable for accuracy, but at the lower load the Hornadys were about 200fps slower and much less accurate.

I also plan to cast and custom size some of my own and also try some paper-patching.

Oh, and I need to disassemble the entire rifle and clean it, the bolt is sticky and the trigger varies greatly from about 10lb to somewhere North of 40

I will figure out how to make this old girl shoot well again :)

[Glenmorangie]

BM1455, my apologies for not paying closer attention to the forum. Thanks very much for your comments.

The powders and loads I have chosen are because there is information on the Hodgdon web site about safe reduced loads with these two powders.

Wolfe Publishing has an excellent CD with ballistics information taken from a study at the University of Minnesota around 1950 by a guy named Brownell. I don't know if there is a connection to the Brownells vendor or not,but, in any case, he demonstrated that Secondary Explosive Effect is a harmonic reinforcing pressure wave inside the case which occurs when the powder volume is low and the burning characteristics of the powder are slow. If the case is full of powder, the harmonic is attenuated ( even though there are tiny spikes in the pressure inside the case on every shot ). When the powder is slow and the powder volume is low, the pressure can more than double. The effect is difficult to reproduce because is does not automatically occur with some given powder at some given load.

I definitely support safe loading by only using recommended loads with dependable data. In this case, the loads I am using are specifically documented as safe for reduced loads by Hodgdon for these two specific powders.

[madsenshooter]

I would suspect much of your trigger problem to be in the stock fit. Tricky little things, the amount of wood just ahead of the trigger slot controls overtravel. If there's just a hair too much wood there, you get a trigger that don't go, or requires a gorilla trigger finger to get it to go. Paul ran into the problem with epoxy from his stock repair. I've also had to rebuild the area where someone removed wood on one of my stocks. The trigger didn't stop until it got to the back of the guard.

There are sometimes other factors at play into SEE. A rough throat for example. Ask Bob S. about his 4895 reduced load for his 6mm Lee. Rough throat+heavy jacketed bullet-the gas needed to quickly get past that rough spot = higher than anticipated pressure as the bullet momentarily stops or slows. Swedish mausers often get hit with this "take it easy on the old girl" recipe with a big boom being the result.