Ammo Costs

[nielsenammo]

I think if you are shooting the heavies at that speed my slugs would shoot around 750 fps or so.  Slugs have more rifle engagement so it slows the muzzle velocity but down range do not slow down as much and therefore travel faster at longer ranges.  The further you shoot the more benefit the slugs has. 

The biggest advantage of a slug is in windage adjustments.  When you hold over for wind with a pellet you are holding over much further than a slug.  Slugs will help with accuracy in hunting situations where you have to make wind adjustments and since you have less holdover/correction to make you have less error built into your shot placement.

I do not make lighter slugs than listed.  I can, but they take a multistep process that would add to the already higher cost of slugs.  Slugs are not for everyone or every gun.  I make slugs that I believe make sense for guns capable of shooting them.

Everyone is different has different likes and needs of their gun or ammunition.  I know others shoot slugs in the velocity range you mentioned with good accuracy.  That does not mean your gun will shoot them accurately.  Because there are so many barrels specs from manufacture to manufacture and even changes within a model year of some guns there is no way for us to know what guns will shoot slugs or not.

I wish there were standards in which we could make slugs around because the manufactures would use standards in which to make their barrels.  For example, if 22 cal barrels were all a standard diameter such as .217, .218 or .223 or what ever standard could be adopted.  If twist rates were used that would be representative of the guns power as well.

A prime example of twist disparity is the Bulldog at 1:14 vs say a TJ barrel at 1:26.  Huge difference and the 1:26 is a much better fit to airgun power.  Hard to make bullets for airguns when barrels have that big of twist difference and on top of that have different diameter requirements.

Some of this is in follow up to thread as to cost of ammo for airguns.  When it is a free for all on the gun specs we as ammo manufactures can not spend a lot of money on any one design and instead need to spend a lot of money giving a larger variety to offer ammo for all guns.  If we had to offer less options, we could invest money into the cheapest way to produce a smaller offering.

In the powder burner world there is a vary large audience to sell to and standards in which the guns can be built around.  Therefore it is a good financial investment to have machinery and infrastructure to mass produce that ammunition.  They make popular, cheap ammunition on large, outrageously expensive machines by the millions.  In our sport, currently, there is not a big enough audience and coupled with no standards investing the millions of dollars this would require is not a wise investment.

[dcmeyer]

Thank you for the rare, and complete response to the question.

I think by what you stated it's worth a try to see the accuracy potential and plans to bump the fps are in the works for this rifle as well. I know many factors are in play when it comes to BC but do you have any numbers for these 34.7 slugs I can plug in to chairgun?

Again, Thank You for your time.

[nielsenammo]

You could use a BC of .09 to get you in the ballpark.  People think BC is a factor that is absolute and in reality it is not.  BC changes with velocity and even a less talked about factor is how accurate the bullet shoots in your gun. The shortest path is a straight line so a more accurate bullet in a given gun will have a better BC in that gun when measured.

It also changes as your distance changes.  The measured BC of bullet shooting from muzzle to 50 yards will not be the same BC when you measure from muzzle to 150 yards.  That is why I try to phrase my BC numbers as a starting point.

Often times BC is listed at the bullet's potential but actual measurements are needed for you gun.  In the powder burner world I think manufacture listed BC numbers are more relevant because the gun barrels are built with standards giving a more representative value for a larger audience of guns.  They are also listing it on a box of loaded ammunition which is representative of it's expected velocity based on the powder load.

We do not live far apart.  I live in La Verne and I see you are in Apple Valley. Perhaps we can meet up at some point.

[dcmeyer]

You could use a BC of .09 to get you in the ballpark.  People think BC is a factor that is absolute and in reality it is not.  BC changes with velocity and even a less talked about factor is how accurate the bullet shoots in your gun. The shortest path is a straight line so a more accurate bullet in a given gun will have a better BC in that gun when measured.

It also changes as your distance changes.  The measured BC of bullet shooting from muzzle to 50 yards will not be the same BC when you measure from muzzle to 150 yards.  That is why I try to phrase my BC numbers as a starting point.

Often times BC is listed at the bullet's potential but actual measurements are needed for you gun.  In the powder burner world I think manufacture listed BC numbers are more relevant because the gun barrels are built with standards giving a more representative value for a larger audience of guns.  They are also listing it on a box of loaded ammunition which is representative of it's expected velocity based on the powder load.

We do not live far apart.  I live in La Verne and I see you are in Apple Valley. Perhaps we can meet up at some point.

Thank you.

Yes, a powderburners load BC is almost entirely based within its carried charge having only barrel length and resistance to change it.

With that BC as a reference and estimating they would shoot around 750fps it doesn't give much advantage in fpe over the JSB KH, around 43fpe and slightly less drop. But if I could increase that by 100fps it jumps to over 55fpe and that would be awesome.

As far as meeting up I am always looking for a shooting buddy or otherwise. I would happily do product reviews or testing Lot's of free open space here to play, hunting, shooting and my wife is very understanding of my hobbies  well, she at least tolerates it.

[wimpanzee]

You could use a BC of .09 to get you in the ballpark.  People think BC is a factor that is absolute and in reality it is not.  BC changes with velocity and even a less talked about factor is how accurate the bullet shoots in your gun. The shortest path is a straight line so a more accurate bullet in a given gun will have a better BC in that gun when measured.

It also changes as your distance changes.  The measured BC of bullet shooting from muzzle to 50 yards will not be the same BC when you measure from muzzle to 150 yards.  That is why I try to phrase my BC numbers as a starting point.

Often times BC is listed at the bullet's potential but actual measurements are needed for you gun.  In the powder burner world I think manufacture listed BC numbers are more relevant because the gun barrels are built with standards giving a more representative value for a larger audience of guns.  They are also listing it on a box of loaded ammunition which is representative of it's expected velocity based on the powder load.

We do not live far apart.  I live in La Verne and I see you are in Apple Valley. Perhaps we can meet up at some point.

Thank you.

Yes, a powderburners load BC is almost entirely based within its carried charge having only barrel length and resistance to change it.

With that BC as a reference and estimating they would shoot around 750fps it doesn't give much advantage in fpe over the JSB KH, around 43fpe and slightly less drop. But if I could increase that by 100fps it jumps to over 55fpe and that would be awesome.

As far as meeting up I am always looking for a shooting buddy or otherwise. I would happily do product reviews or testing Lot's of free open space here to play, hunting, shooting and my wife is very understanding of my hobbies  well, she at least tolerates it.

When i was testing Nick's .217 slugs in my mutant, 21gr slug moving 800fps had several inches less drop at 100 yards than an 18gr pellet going 880. The better BC really does that, even when significantly slower.

[starlingassassin]

You could use a BC of .09 to get you in the ballpark.  People think BC is a factor that is absolute and in reality it is not.  BC changes with velocity and even a less talked about factor is how accurate the bullet shoots in your gun. The shortest path is a straight line so a more accurate bullet in a given gun will have a better BC in that gun when measured.

It also changes as your distance changes.  The measured BC of bullet shooting from muzzle to 50 yards will not be the same BC when you measure from muzzle to 150 yards.  That is why I try to phrase my BC numbers as a starting point.

Often times BC is listed at the bullet's potential but actual measurements are needed for you gun.  In the powder burner world I think manufacture listed BC numbers are more relevant because the gun barrels are built with standards giving a more representative value for a larger audience of guns.  They are also listing it on a box of loaded ammunition which is representative of it's expected velocity based on the powder load.

We do not live far apart.  I live in La Verne and I see you are in Apple Valley. Perhaps we can meet up at some point.

Thank you.

Yes, a powderburners load BC is almost entirely based within its carried charge having only barrel length and resistance to change it.

With that BC as a reference and estimating they would shoot around 750fps it doesn't give much advantage in fpe over the JSB KH, around 43fpe and slightly less drop. But if I could increase that by 100fps it jumps to over 55fpe and that would be awesome.

As far as meeting up I am always looking for a shooting buddy or otherwise. I would happily do product reviews or testing Lot's of free open space here to play, hunting, shooting and my wife is very understanding of my hobbies  well, she at least tolerates it.

and what a shooting buddy to have, you lucky dog LOL 

[makoda]

Big bore ammo is priced the way it is mainly because it is produced on low level production machines or by hand.  Comparing that to commercial ammo that is made by the millions you will not be able to get the costs to the same level.

There is not enough airguns shooting big bore ammo to justify millions of dollars of investment to be able to make the ammo by the millions.  Tack that to the fact the manufactures can't use a standard for barrels so just about every gun needs specific bullets made to shoot in their gun.  This means even more options for the same caliber needs to be available.

I looked into having a company make bullets for me.  They are only interested if the order is more bullets I would sell in a decade.  Our market is too small to be looked at by the "big boys" in the ammo market.

I don't know what ammo is $1 per round, that is an extreme example of airgun ammo.  My ammo right now is all made one by one and runs from about $0.14 to $0.38 a round.

For small caliber rounds I have invested in a machine to make the rounds quickly and reduce my costs for those rounds.  Don't plan to use for larger calibers, at least not for now.  This is a huge investment, risk and will be the first high speed small caliber airgun slug machine.  This custom machine is expected to be built by end of February.

What do you think you will be able to get the cost down to?

[nielsenammo]

I won't know until I can do some test runs and see how long the new process will take.

[dcmeyer]

and what a shooting buddy to have, you lucky dog LOL

These days I'd be happy to go shooting, any shooting with anyone who shares the interest. These days just talking with someone that's not afraid of the word "gun" is refreshing.

Besides, I wasn't really trying to get free samples but would be willing to make an order for delivery and save the shipping then of course go shoot it.

[nielsenammo]

I will PM you.  I am tied up this weekend with wife's Bday and don't think I will shoot this weekend but we can get together.  I can have my kids send me some ammo and we can go shoot em up.  The ammo is no longer made here in So Cal, moved it to No. Arizona.

[triggertreat]

I have some 39gr and some 45gr Nielsen swaged ammo in 250 to try.  I would like to know the BC of each.  They are $0.23 each to shoot in the 100ct pack.  A little more than the JSBs but for hunting, if accurate out of my Marauder, I would like to use these.