Why Not Use Wads?

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  • Last Post 25 October 2014
John Alexander posted this 17 February 2014 

   Some of the CBAs best shooters use wads behind the cast bullet. I haven't had any luck in getting better accuracy by using wads.

  What do we know about wads?  What do they do to improve a smokeless powder cast bullet load? Do they act as a seal behind the bullet in case the fit of bullet to throat doesn't quite do it?  Do they help wipe the bore so there is a uniform condition for the next shot?    When Merrill Martin was experimenting with cast bullets and writing for the now defunct Precision Shooting magazine he had good luck with them with plain-based bullets in fixed ammunition.  He claimed they helped seal and also protected the soft base of the bullet from being damaged from high speed powder grains.  He had a lot of photos to show how they prevented both kinds of damage.  If I remember correctly he used sixty mil high-density polyethylene most of the time.   Others have used fiber wads of various sorts and claimed success.   Can wads improve our cast bullet loads?   What is the best material and what size?   Or are they just one of those things some of us do because we think it is logical and we could stop doing it and shoot just as well?   John

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99 Strajght posted this 17 February 2014

I have never tried wads with cast bullets but I tried graphite wads with jacketed bullets in the 220 Swift when it was all the rage. They didn't work from what I could tell.  Accuracy went down hill and pressure went up. Nothing I tried worked so I quite.

Glenn

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Tom Acheson posted this 17 February 2014

John,

Merrill had a few key details in his research.

First, he used straight wall cases a lot. There was a risk in a bottle neck of the wad falling down into the case and contributing to a “ringed” barrel.

Second, he focused a lot on the design of the lube groove. Radiused corners did not work as well as square corners. He wanted the bullet to collapse the grooves as it went down the barrel, to help uniformly extrude the lube onto the ID of the barrel.

Third, alloy was really important. It had to be soft enough to contribute to the lube groove collapse. He looked at the load pressure in PSI as compared to the pressure needed to collapse the grooves.

Lastly was barrel condition. To optimize accuracy and take advantage of the first three items above, the smoothness of the barrel was critical. He sent out barrel lapping kits to a few of us to experiment with. These were small containers of varying grit value abrasives. You were to start with the coarsest and work your way to the finest.

Yes, it was 0.060” LDPE wad material that was seated with a “wad seater” because if you used the bullet during seating to seat the wad, you could deform the bullet. And there was to be no airspace between the base of the bullet and the wad.

I made copies of most of those articles but now to try to find them. There is much more to this and the above is strictly from memory.

FWIW

Tom

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.22-10-45 posted this 18 February 2014

Wads are funny..I tried various materials and thicknesses in the Hornet & .222..all degraded accuracy. With either black or smokeless in the .38-55 same thing. Now the .40's, either .40-50 B.N., .40-70 str. (2 1/2") or .40-70 B.N. (2 1/4") all show accuracy improvement with a .030 veg. fiber wad under bullet. The verdict is still out on a .25-25 Stevens that I am using only black in..more testing needed.

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John Alexander posted this 18 February 2014

Tom Acheson wrote: John,

Merrill had a few key details in his research.

First, he used straight wall cases a lot. There was a risk in a bottle neck of the wad falling down into the case and contributing to a “ringed” barrel.

Second, he focused a lot on the design of the lube groove. Radiused corners did not work as well as square corners. He wanted the bullet to collapse the grooves as it went down the barrel, to help uniformly extrude the lube onto the ID of the barrel.

Lastly was barrel condition. To optimize accuracy and take advantage of the first three items above, the smoothness of the barrel was critical. He sent out barrel lapping kits to a few of us to experiment with.  I made copies of most of those articles but now to try to find them. There is much more to this and the above is strictly from memory.

FWIW

Tom Tom, you are right that he though bullet lube was a lubricant and squashing the grooves was critical.  Lots of shooters for good reason (one being that some of the things we use for bullet lubes aren't very good lubes) doubt his views on this.  I personally think he was off the trail with that we have two many good shooters shooting linotype or HTWW which are probably too hard to squaze.  We don't know for sure because nobody but Martin catches bullets and he was committed to that theory.  On the other hand he may be right.

I believe I have saved most of his articles and will look but I can't remember him using straight walled cases.  If you can't find your copies I would be glad to send copies of the ones that I have.

I will also check my memory about wads but I believe his conclusion was that they helped with plain based bullets in fixed cartridges but not when bullets were gas checked. 

I too got his fire lapping compounds and used them according to directions on several rifles. The bores got smoother but the accuracy didn't improve.  Others have found the opposite. John

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John Alexander posted this 18 February 2014

.22-10-45 wrote: Wads are funny..I tried various materials and thicknesses in the Hornet & .222..all degraded accuracy. With either black or smokeless in the .38-55 same thing. Now the .40's, either .40-50 B.N., .40-70 str. (2 1/2") or .40-70 B.N. (2 1/4") all show accuracy improvement with a .030 veg. fiber wad under bullet. The verdict is still out on a .25-25 Stevens that I am using only black in..more testing needed. My limited experience matches most of yours.  But why should accuracy go down.  The wad shouldn't be stuck to the base and should separate at the muzzle? How else could they upset things? John

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Tom Acheson posted this 18 February 2014

John,

I think you are correct on Merrill not using gas check bullets.

Some of the BPC rifle shooters put a thin newsprint wad on top of the normal wad (LDPE or veggie), under the base of the bullet, in the hope that this would promote separation of the bullet and thicker wad at the muzzle exit. Hard to imagine how a wad stays affixed to the bullet base as it moves downrange but maybe....

You've got me interested enough to look for my articles. Too much snow and cold here to shoot anyway. But we do have our Frozen Chosin match on Saturday (sorry-jacketed bullets are used). Tom

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.22-10-45 posted this 19 February 2014

John, that is a puzzle..with the .22 I could see a small variation in clearing muzzle, or wad pushing base once bullet has cleared muzzle..there so small and light..but the .38-55 is another story. Incidently, this original Win. 30” #4 oct. High-Wall doesn't like any black powder compression at all..merely dropped with 36” drop tube..and powder just barely touches bullet base in case.

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frnkeore posted this 20 February 2014

I've used 1/16” LDPE wads since Merrill's days. With smokeless, I can't prove they make a load more accurate. I regularly try them in testing but, don't shoot them in matches because they add to the loading time at the bench.

I've tried them in the case mouth and breech seated with the bullet, I keep hoping they will “make” a load someday with smokeless. I still do think that they will but, with HV, PB bullets. I've yet to try them with that as, I'm still getting fairly good grouping w/o them at 1600 fps w/o leading.

Back when Merrill started using them, two of my CBA friends tried them with GC's for a couple of months and found no advantage with them. They also tried them with PB bullets using there GC loads (> 2000 fps) and said they were just ok and stopped using them.

That said, I have had GREAT success using them with duplex BP loads when used in the case mouth to hold the BP. They brought my scores up 3 - 6 points and cut my groups in 1/2, all at 200 yards. I never shoot BP w/o them.

Basically, I think they are a waist of time with GC's but, I think that they hold a promice if you try them with HV, PB loads but, People in this sport are reluctant to change and most CBA shooter don't have many (if any) PB bullets in their inventory to try. If someone does try it, remember that the LDPE wad needs to be at least .002 over groove diameter. It's a low priorty with me because I always have more projects than time but, does show promice.

Frank

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Tom Acheson posted this 20 February 2014

I have 50+ pages of article reprints from Merrill's days. They could be scanned and made into a pdf and posted here in a thread, if anyone would want to see them.

Tom

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frnkeore posted this 21 February 2014

I would diffenity like to see them!!!

Although I never met Merrill, I always watched his results in ASSRA and I have one, maybe two of his NEI molds.

Frank

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JeffinNZ posted this 24 February 2014

I use a 0.030 LDPE wad in my top end .32-20 loads as they use a Lyman 31133 plain base HP bullet. The load is a full case of H4227 for 1800fps and the accuracy is superb. The LDPE wad protects the base of the bullet I am confident.

Cheers from New Zealand

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rockquarry posted this 24 February 2014

I bought a Cabine Tree grease wad extruder ten or more years ago but haven't really worked with it as I had intended. Made a few wads using stiffer bullet lubes like LBT, but never did enough serious work with them to determine anything worthwhile. What's a good material to use in such a gizmo and how thick should a wad be?

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Bob 11B50 posted this 25 October 2014

Merrill Martin used to shoot pretty regularly at the Richmond Rod and Gun Club in Richmond, CA.  When working with his LDPE wads.  He did a  lot of his work with 45-70.  I have a 1917 Enfield 30-06 that had a pretty rasty barrel.  He borrowed it for a couple of months to  clean up the barrel.  He used his various grits on it and it does group a whole lot better than it did. I have not seen Merrill for some time but he was out to the range a few months ago with his grandson; he was in a  wheelchair.  Her does not get around too well now and a friend of mine told me that he has been having problems with early stages of althiemers disease.   Bob 11B50

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John Alexander posted this 25 October 2014

Bob, Thanks for the update on Merrill Martin.  I have wondered about him since he stopped contributing to PS.  Glad to hear that he still goes to the range but sorry to hear that it's in a wheelchair and with other afflictions of old age. He made some great contributions to PS and was always interesting even when wrong.  We need more Merrill Martins. John

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