Browning in 28 Nosler keyholing at 40m

mspben

mspben

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Hello,

Looking for some help troubleshooting this rifle.

Last year I picked up a Browning max long range in 28 nosler to mess around with the cartridge and 195 bergers.

Rifle has a 26 in barrel, and a 1 in 8 twist.

When I started load development I was getting a few bullets keyholling at 40m. Pressures were under control, but still keyholing. I assumed it was the berger 195's at the time, and I shelved the project for the time being.

Life has calmed down a bit and I just got back to it. It is also keyholing with 175 berger elite hunters.

Load info:

I have tried 71 to 76 grains of H1000, with the 175's loaded 10 thousandths off of the lands. During load development it was getting worse as I went up in charge, but may have also been heat related.

MV's with these loads were between 2900 and 3000. 75 grains is mid to high 2900's.

Symptoms:

Seems to put 3 rounds into a group ok before the keyholing starts. I'm wondering if it is heat related as the rifle gets hot in 3 rounds.

Things I have tried:
-Lower pressure rounds (71 grains seems pretty low for a 175 in this cartridge)
-checked the crown visually (doesn't appear damaged)
-checked the muzzle brake. Shot with and without, same situation.
-checked the twist with a tight patch, is around 1:8.25 to 1 in 8.5 roughly, so not totally off base. Should be able to stabilize these bullets.

I'm going to call Browning Canada tomorrow and see what they want to do, but I thought I would post here to see if I was missing something.

In my experience with much more expensive rifles, this shouldn't be this hard.

Any help appreciated, I'm pretty well at the point of either sending it to browning to have a look or having it re-barrelled.

Ben
 
It sounds like you're over heating the barrel. Does it group okay if you let it cool down after the first 3 round group?
 
Thanks for the response!

The first 3 rounds of the day are OK, then when I take a normal break (and let it cool off for a bit) and shoot other rifles it doesn't seem to help much. I'd say it cools off to warm, less than warm I guess.

Other than leaving it for a long time (over night) I haven't let it get stone cold before shooting again.

Going to be tough doing load development if I have to treat it that gingerly. Depending on what Browning says I'll test that out a little bit to see if I can get a routine that works.

Ben
 
It's a really hot round, and a not very heavy barrel. Do yourself a favor and take the time to not shoot it quick enough to heat up. Browning will almost certainly tell you "Well, it's reloads."
 
Is the barrel badly jacket fouled? To the point the bullet is slipping, not getting the full twisting?
 
rkm456 said:
It's a really hot round, and a not very heavy barrel. Do yourself a favor and take the time to not shoot it quick enough to heat up. Browning will almost certainly tell you "Well, it's reloads."
Click to expand...

Thanks for your help. I'm curious to see what Browning has to say and I do expect blaming it on reloads as you say.

It's definitely on my list to shoot it slower; I've never had a rifle that can't shoot more than 3 rounds in a row without having issues.

guntech said:
Is the barrel badly jacket fouled? To the point the bullet is slipping, not getting the full twisting?
Click to expand...

This is interesting. I'll have a look at this too; I don't anticipate this being the case as it has 80 rounds or so through it, maybe less.

I'll give it a good cleaning before the next session.

Ben
 
Last edited:
80 rounds and no cleaning... it is quite fouled for sure... whether that is the problem we don't know yet...

Use a copper specific solvent... not Hoppes #9.
 
guntech said:
80 rounds and no cleaning... it is quite fouled for sure... whether that is the problem we don't know yet...

Use a copper specific solvent... not Hoppes #9.
Click to expand...

Apologies if I mispoke (typed?). It would have been cleaned during the testing last year but I'll hit it with some copper solvent and report back.

Ben
 
Seriously? A bullet tumbling at 40 meters is not going to stabilize at a greater distance. It has passed any chance of stabilizing...

I think the op needs to report back on what is going on... and to define what he means by key holing... pictures would be better...
 
Hi,

A quick update. I took the rifle to the browning warranty gunsmith in the province and he also had problems with it shooting factory ammo (I was purely shooting hand loads). He has sent it off to browning to have a look at. We'll see how long it takes to hear back and what they say.

Apologies for not posting sooner to the above request. Below is the image I sent browning customer service when I was having trouble last year. When I say keyholing I mean the bullets are going through the target sideways in a large pattern (probably a 6 inch group at 40m?).

Now I need to find another project for the fall shooting season lol.

The picture is showing up massive on my pc so apologies for that.

6eJqb2T.jpg


Ben
 
Looking at the target I would say not fast enough twist for the length of the bullet. Reason I say that is experimenting with Berger 95 grain VLD's in a 6ppc to see how much velocity I could make. Tried 8208XBR and H4895 shooting over a chronograph and going up until it effected bolt lift.

Big target paper at 40 meters. Every single bullet hit sideways and made a ring shaped group about the size of a toilet seat. Berger says optimum twist rate for that bullet is 1:8". The barrel used for the test was 1:13.5" which is about 5 1/2 inches too slow for the length of the 95 VLD.
 
That was my initial thought as well. However, the rifle is listed as a 1:8 twist and Berger lists the minimum twist for 195's at 1:9.

Also, it was exhibiting the same behaviour with 175's. After that testing I measured it with a cleaning rod and tight patch, and it was about 1:8.5 or so. Not the most precise way to measure I'm sure, but it is a bit of an indication.

Something in the barrel is destabilizing the bullets. I'll have to buy a bore scope for the future as that's the only thing I didn't do.

Thanks for the help everyone! I'll let you know when I hear back from Browning.

Ben
 
guntech said:
Seriously? A bullet tumbling at 40 meters is not going to stabilize at a greater distance. It has passed any chance of stabilizing...

I think the op needs to report back on what is going on... and to define what he means by key holing... pictures would be better...
Click to expand...


Well after seeing the picture I have to agree that this is definitely not a stabilizing problem. I was thinking more of a slight keyholing, not complete sideways bullet.

I had problem with 90gr in a 223 that were keyholing at 50yds, but they were shooting 1/2moa at 200 yds.

Hope the warranty Center will be able to fix it or replace it.
 
I am assuming that the groups on the target with the round holes were shot with a different rifle?
Had a guy bring me a rifle once and told me that he was having problems hitting a pie plate at 50 yards. He missed a couple of easy deer that year standing broadside at less than 100 yards.
When I went to test fire the rifle a couple days later after making sure the scope and bases were tight. Reaching into the box of ammo that he left and found 2 rounds of .270 in the box of .30-06. The way your rifle is acting, I am thinking the barrel bore and chambering is not as advertised, or stamped on the barrel.

I have seen these pretty funny result another time a friend was shooting a gun passed down from his dead father. A very nice model 94 Winchester in .32 Special that he was firing .30-30 Winchester out of, missing the target at 25 yards. He thought all model 94's were chambered in .30-30.
 
maynard said:
I am assuming that the groups on the target with the round holes were shot with a different rifle?
Had a guy bring me a rifle once and told me that he was having problems hitting a pie plate at 50 yards. He missed a couple of easy deer that year standing broadside at less than 100 yards.
When I went to test fire the rifle a couple days later after making sure the scope and bases were tight. Reaching into the box of ammo that he left and found 2 rounds of .270 in the box of .30-06. The way your rifle is acting, I am thinking the barrel bore and chambering is not as advertised, or stamped on the barrel.

I have seen these pretty funny result another time a friend was shooting a gun passed down from his dead father. A very nice model 94 Winchester in .32 Special that he was firing .30-30 Winchester out of, missing the target at 25 yards. He thought all model 94's were chambered in .30-30.
Click to expand...

Could be. I did check to see if the bore was larger than it should be and it didn't appear so.

I shot that target last year so I'm assuming the other groups are a different rifle but I don't recall.

Thanks for the help everyone; I'll let you know what browning says.

Ben
 
guntech said:
Seriously? A bullet tumbling at 40 meters is not going to stabilize at a greater distance. It has passed any chance of stabilizing...

I think the op needs to report back on what is going on... and to define what he means by key holing... pictures would be better...
Click to expand...

Contrary to what some believe, bullets don't "go to sleep" and then all of a sudden become stabilized at a longer distance.

So something else is certainly going on.
 
I've had a gun that was marginal on the twist rate, cast bullets would keyhole at 200 yds, but, in that case, they'd shoot 3/4moa at that range and 3/4moa at 100. What he is showing there is a bit more than a marginal de-stabilization. I remember Ruger went to 1-8 on 7mags to run 175's better in the late 80's, had one of those. Definitely something wrong with that barrel, looks like something got mis stamped at Browning, or completely screwed up.
 
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