I have been shooting the APP (Shockey's Gold) for the last 2 seasons, and was never happy with my groups. I took it out one more time in August and at 50 yards shot basically a vertical stripe on the target. I.e. my windage was near perfect while my elevation gave me a 6 shot group over 12"! Sometimes all the powder would gas, and some shots I would see sparks. That was the last straw, I threw the stuff out and picked up som T7 FFG.

Last weekend I took it out to sight in for ML deer, long story short it shoots much better. I am not a great shot with open sights, but shoot a much better 6" group at 100 yards, and very tight at 50. My confidence in the load I worked up is very high. (Hornady sst 300 infront of 110 grn T7).

Working up my load: It is much hotter than the APP. I got complete gas-out at all charges. So I immediately backed down my powder amount to 80 grn. My groups were not consistent at 80, so then I jumped up to 110, with the thought I would back down from there. I shot well at 110, but the recoil was hard! I got a good 6 shot group at 50yrd and shot a great 4 shot group at 100 yards, so I just left it alone.

One thing I noticed is that a get a horrible hard crud ring down near the breech plug with the T7. When I tried to swab between shots, I almost could not get the plunger back out. Have any of you had that problem with T7?

Will I be able to reduce that problem if I work my charge back down a bit?

Thanks for your input. I have probably put about 50 hunting rounds through my ML this summer/fall getting it dialed in and for the first time feel like I am pretty deadly with it.

Never had that issue with 777.

Really, crap. I wonder what the hell is going on? Sometimes I have to stand on the sling to pull the patch/plunger back out.

I just shoot a few rounds, then clean with T/C's bore solvent letting it soak before I scrub. Maybe it is happening in my gun, but I don't swab between shots.

One thing I do is that after I clean the rifle before the start of the season I use T/C bore-butter to lube the bore, then load up.

I was thinking about what you said. Because getting the patch down is easy, it is getting it back out that is a bitch. You could be pulling off the crud ring with the solvent on the way down the bore. I was using dry patches between shots.

I think I will try what you said, using a soaked patch after a couple of shots. That makes sense.

Are you sure you have the right size patches? I had a whole bunch of 54 cal patches I had from my thunderhawk and tried to use them on my 50 cal and it was really tough. I cut them down a little and they work well. Triple seven burns pretty clean in my ML's, I don't swab between shots either I clean when I get home, unless I am firing mass amounts at the range. Theres a lot to be said for playing with bullet and powder charges. Last season my big horn was squirrley, spent the last few weeks trying several different sabots and powder combos and its deadly now. Same bullseye hole every shot at 50yds 2 in group at 100, never shot like that before. I am so pumped for saturday I couldn't sleep last night, my wife says my new hunting obsession is getting out of hand. Good luck out there.

Yah I am pumped too. Except for the hole I put in my foot last Sunday evening (16d right to the bone, woohoo). I'm a little hobbled up, but getting better by the day.