William R. Moore

I was looking for something else (can't recall what) and found an almost full box of Markell 200 gr .357 RLN hard cast bullets. I'm thinking I bought these in early '70s or so, I used to load them in .357 Magnum. Price sticker reads $3.20, for 100. While the price brings a tear to my eye, my recollection of what I was getting paid back then dries it up before it hits my cheeks.

Finding load data was interesting, finally found something (Unique) in a 2000 Alliant data book. The actual velocity was rather short of what Alliant got in a test barrel, but the pressure data showed some hefty spikes for really small changes. I let well enough alone and looked elsewhere. Was pretty close to actual factory loads anyway. If anyone is shooting revolver and needs to make minor power factor this is the way to go. Recoil is much like that of an air pistol.

Hogdon didn't have any data, but HS6 showed some promise. A little work with a calculator and I'm getting close to 158 gr +P velocities and the primers still look pretty good. I'm going to shoot a couple of each to see point of impact tomorrow. IIRC, the faster load is gonna shoot way high. About the only downside to fixed sights.

WaltGraham

Somewhat related...

I'll look for something I need in the basement, the garage, the barn or the shed to no avail.

I know I have it but I can't find it and I really need it.

So after an hour or so of fruitless searching I give up and go buy another.

Within moments of arriving home, the something I sought miraculously appears, sometimes a couple of them.

Save those receipts...

Tangentially related:

Graham's Law - Whatever you drop will transport itself to the most unobservable and inaccessible spot in your immediate locale.

Snake45

Yup. This is why I own three of most things I consider worth owning.

The only other way to find something is to forget about it and go on with another project. Soon you'll be looking for something else you can't find, but you WILL find the thing you were looking for a while ago. To find the second thing you needed, just repeat the process....

CaptainGyro

This has been a well-known phenomenon in cockpits since 1903...whatever you drop in a cockpit instantly becomes invisible and migrates to a place you could never get it to go if you were consciously trying to get it there. In a tactical aircraft you can sometimes retrieve it by going to zero-G and picking it out of the clutter of dirt, wire fragments, washers, insulators, the occasional mechanic's tool, etc. floating in front of you. Then, returning to one-G everything magically disappears again.

In an airliner, you have to sweet-talk a mechanic into opening up the E & E (electrics and electronics) compartment, which is usually directly below the cockpit so that the pilots can be used as heat sinks. There, among a similar collection of clutter, you will find your pen/sunglasses/flashlight patiently waiting for you.

WaltGraham

Ok, that nearly made my spray my keyboard...

Charlie Petty

I'm sure the engineers would say it was done to protect the pilots from those frigid temps and 30+ thousand

William R. Moore

I could be the poster boy/person for that phenomenon. If there's a time restraint, I'll usually go buy the item. If not, I kinda wait a few days and sometimes the mind retrieves the data on previous storage. In a couple of cases, this has led to fiber optic examination of the nooks and crannies of last use area with retrieval of the item. In a couple of other cases, I figured out another, and better, way to accomplish the same task.

And, the muscular 200 gr loads did print about 5 inches high at 25 yards. Another iteration of the Unique loads printed an acceptable 2 inches high. Using primers that weren't as old as the bullets, the loads weren't as powder puffy as the first ones. I doubt it's the age, but the storage that made a difference.

Charlie, most of the engineers churned out in the last 30 years or so would need corporate communications to come up with a line that good.

Diamondback

Probably 40-50... Phil Condit wasn't even fit to tongue-bathe his predecessors Ed Wells and George Schairer's arses, never mind a legend like Hughes or Kelly Johnson...

William R. Moore

I stand corrected, and it's not limited to aviation.

Diamondback

And Pierre Sprey doesn't count either--he's not an engineer, he's an opportunistic ass who specializes in bulls***ing people and getting attached to visible projects and claiming credit for others' work on 'em. I think the last thing close to "genius" in guns was Ted Szabo at Para with the doublestack 1911, or maybe Charlie Kelsey. Definitely don't see Stoners, Brownings or Kalashnikovs the way we used to... and if the industry were smart they'd be picking Sullivan's brain trying to wring every possible drop of wisdom from his brain while he's still among us.

csmkersh

I dislike double stacks on GLOCKS and absolutely hate double stacks on 1911s. Double stacks just don't feel comfortable in my hands. And yes, I do own a GLOCK 23 in .40 Short & Wimpy.

Last week I learned some of the Kilchers carry 10mm 1911s for bears.

Darn, I misplaced the main topic.

William R. Moore

Earlier you ragged on someone as an opportunistic ass. Gene Stoner took credit for work done by others turning the AR10 into something halfway usable. MK stole from the StG44, Garand and Remington model 8. OK, he got the different systems parts to work, but I wouldn't put either in the same sentence as JMB.

Diamondback

WRM, you're right--Stoner and MK were iterative, "Evolutionary" engineers as opposed to Browning's "Revolutionary". Think the F-15E Strike Eagle vs. the F-117 Nighthawk--but even they did more engineering than Sprey, who came in AFTER the F-15 was basically already designed and gamed the bureaucracy.

PS is an engineer like I'm a porn star--NOT.

William R. Moore

BTW, if anyone wondered, I figured out why the 200 gr .38 load had such a miserably low factory velocity. It's what they needed to get it to shoot to the same POI as the normal 158 gr LRN. Remember these were the days when fixed sights ruled.