Newsletter: The next issue of the "Shooter" will go out near the end of Mar 1996. The cutoff date for material to be included is Mar 15, 1996.
Tournament Sponsors: Please get all applications for State Championships and a listing of all other tournaments approved and submitted before Mar 1, 1996. We will publish a listing in the Mar 96 issue of the Shooter. Submit all items (before Mar 1) to MSSA, PO Box 10170, Columbia, MO 65205. Please include name, address, and phone number of contact person. We thank all clubs and sponsors for helping provide this service for competitors in Missouri.
Membership Information: Please check your mailing label for correct spelling, address, zip code, etc. If there is any error, mail your old label with corrections to MSSA. The code on your label indicates the year and month in which your membership expires. The first two digits are the year, and the middle two digits are the month. Members with expiration dates prior to this issue will be deleted from the association roster one month after delivery of this newsletter, unless a renewal is received.
Daniel Bub (Previously of Arnold)
Thomas Murph (Keytesville)
David Hoselton (Milan)
Robert Ciuffa (Brentwood)
Frances Lopata (St. Louis)
Alphie Wright (Mountain Grove)
Harian Watson (Eureka)
R. Monahan (Larkspur, CA)
Donald Christie (St. Louis)
Factory Win 7mm mag 160 gr Fail Safe - 2833 FPS
Factory Win 7mm mag 175 gr Power Pt - 2884 FPS
Factory Rem 7mm Mag 150 gr Core-lok - 3014 FPS
We were a bit surprised at the velocity of the Fail Safe ammo, thinking it was a bit slow. However, it shot better groups in the Ruger than the other two, at just over an inch. All ammo shot extremely well in the Win model 70. My friend simply made an adjustment to the BOSS before each type of ammo was used, and all ammo produced groups of about an inch. I've read articles about the BOSS, but seeing is believing. Later in the fall, my brother sighted in a Win mod 70/BOSS in 30-06. Same results, excellent accuracy (less than an inch) with all factory ammo tried. The two 7mm rifles accounted for 3 whitetails using the Fail Safe ammo this year. We were hoping to retrieve a bullet, but as expected, the bullets exited in all cases.
The club is non-profit, member supported, MSSA affiliated and 100% NRA. They offer MO Hunter Ed classes, NRA basic marksmanship training, and beginning and advanced practical courses for civilian, police and military groups and individuals. They put on regular matches in conventional, silhouette, action pistol & IPSC, ranging from club shoots, through State & Regionals, right up to the NRA National Action Pistol Championship - the Bianchi Cup. They host the MO Show Me Games, the Glock Regional, and each year teach 4 dozen high-school students in Missouri (plus their teachers!) to safely shoot rifles, pistols, and shotguns as a contribution to the Mo Conservation Honors Program.
The club has an extensive training schedule for 1996, and the dates will be published in the Mar 96 "Shooter." Dues are $6 per month. For more info write: John Skaggs, 4350 Academy Road, Hallsville, MO 65255, or call the club office at 573-696-3738.
Once the matches are over, and the deer and ducks are in the freezer, all you have to do now is reload over the winter for next season's matches, or possibly give chase for rabbits, and that will end soon enough as well. What's a person to do for shooting entertainment in the dead of winter; I'm talking Feb/Mar stuff, while it's still pretty cold. Well why not try an extra pair of long-johns and an electronic game call for varmints. No, skunks are not varmints; more on that later. Now we're talking some serious training here. You need to shoot year round; all 12 months with no break. NO, not training for you; SPOUSE training! (this could be a wife OR husband) Has your spouse ever pouted when the shooting season "starts", similar to a golf widow(er)? Well the answer is to never let it end, so it can never "start," and you and your spouse will be much happier. Oh, I know what you're thinking, it would never work for you. Well if it doesn't, go ahead and pamper you spouse, saving your marriage is important. Offer to take a break from shooting and take them fishing!
Several years ago I bought a Johnny Stewart electronic game call, and read up on the subject. I was determined to carry my shooting through those awful months, and make my spouse happier at the same time. Anyway, I learned that the season on fur bearers (fox, bobcat, etc) ends in early Jan, but coyote carries right on through. I purchased videos on varmint hunting, as well as a number of cassette tapes for the call (rodent squeals, cottontail rabbit, baby woodpecker, they got everything you can imagine). I learned that keeping your spouse happy can be expensive. I went out for coyotes, and the call did work pretty well; I got coyotes to come in on several occasions, but nothing liked I had hoped for. Then I made a discovery, a real find. I purchased a cassette tape called "Fighting Crows," and took the shotgun out instead of the rifle. Boy, did I hit the mother lode! Within 60 seconds of turning the machine on I had crows flying all over me, and they didn't get cautious when the shooting started. This turned out not to be a fluke. Every time I went out for crows, it was the same thing; turn on the machine and crows were suddenly everywhere.
It became a favorite sport for me and my brother. We would get up early on a cold Feb morning and go out for crows; he was interested in keeping his spouse happy also. Anyway, one particular morning we had exhausted one spot, and decided to move down the road a mile or two. We knew a number of farmers; here's another sweet part, you never have trouble getting permission to hunt crows, they may think you're weird, but they never mind letting you hunt; so down the road we went. It was about 20 degrees when we started that morning. I started noticing a lot of dead skunks on the road, every so often, and mentioned it to my brother. He said, "Oh yeah, Feb is mating season for skunks, and males get crazy just like buck deer, just walk right out in front of cars, and stuff." I wasn't sure of his explanation, but there WERE a lot of skunks on the road. I said, you know, I'd like to skin a skunk sometime, maybe tan the hide. I collect deer hides, and he had tanned raccoon skins before, so he was interested. Skunks are fur bearers, and not in season in Feb, but we thought there wouldn't be anything wrong with picking up a dead carcass off the road. The big question was the smell, and we discussed this at length. We decided that at 20 degrees, maybe the smell was frozen, and we could skin the animal and wash the hide before the smell "thawed out." Yeah, that's the ticket.
I stopped the truck and we inspected a dead skunk; low and behold, it didn't smell! I threw the skunk in the back of the truck. During the course of the next hour we picked up four dead skunks and put them in the pickup bed. We continued to hunt crows with success, and were having a thoroughly good morning. At the last hunt sight, we had walked about a half mile from the truck, and it was getting on about Noon, we were out of coffee and getting hungry. We decided to call it a morning and go for lunch. It was about 40 degrees now. We started back towards the truck, and shortly started smelling a skunk odor. Hey! Maybe we'll see a live skunk wandering around, that's getting pretty strong. Yeah, but watch out, you don't know what a crazed skunk might do, and you can't shoot it, cause they ain't in season. As we got closer to the truck, it dawned on us; the smell had thawed, and it was rank! At the truck my brother held his nose and told me, just drop me off at my house, you can have all four skunks for yourself! Brothers are like that.
In 1984 the league sent a 13 member team including four juniors to the National Highpower matches at Camp Perry, all expenses paid. Some of these clubs were from West Plains, Sikeston, Jackson, St. Clair, Poplar Bluff, Potosi, and Farmington. The league has kept meticulous records over the years, and Frank reported that as of the end of 1995, there had been in excess of 500,000 rounds fired for record in the league in the three mentioned categories. Currently, only Farmington and Potosi have clubs that are active in competition. HOWEVER, if you have a club in the southeast quarter of the state and want to participate in league competition, contact League Secretary Frank Meyers, P.O. Box 187, Potosi, MO 63664.
I selected the sabot and the T/C maxi-hunter for a test at 100 yards. At this distance, the sabot group opened up to 6 inches, possibly confirming a deformed bullet tip, while the maxi-hunter printed about 3 inches. I decided that the maxi-hunter was the one to use in this particular rifle. I resighted the rifle to print about 2 inches high at 50 yards, which put it dead on at 100 yards. Note the 2 inch trajectory of a 350 gr slug! The loads were chronographed as follows:
T/C sabot with 240 gr JHP = 1584 FPS.
T/C 350gr Maxi-hunter = 1370 FPS.
However, a word of warning on chronographing blackpowder loads with a break-away sabot; on one of the shots, the sabot broke free before passing through the chrony, and put a hole in the cardboard screens. One good thing I can say about using the plastic sabots, I DID NOT experience melted plastic in my bore, as I had heard reported. If anyone out there has experience shooting sabots, I'd appreciate hearing about it; do you experience difficulty in loading? What kind of groups do you get? In conclusion, I need to go back and repeat the tests with a heavier load of powder; the T/C manual suggests final accuracy loads in the 90-100 gr range.
Also in the area of black powder, member Kermit Wilkison reports he picked up a can of "Black Canyon" powder in Doniphan, MO, and has this to say about it: It's a little bit expensive, at $25 per pound, but the retailer told him that everyone who had tried it was pleased as to the corrosive effects. It is a very coarse grain, and is similar to Pyrodex in that due to differences in density compared to real black powder, you get about 20% more shots. Kermit experienced quite a few misfires with Black Canyon, and suggests it not be used in flintlocks. He used a 45 cal Hawken in his shooting. When finished, he cleaned his rifle as usual, then checked it at 3 days, 3 weeks, and 6 months. No signs of corrosion at all.
Pagemasters Note: Reckon that'll about do it for the first Online Edition of the Missouri Shooter. Feel free to e-mail Shooter editor Paul Fitzgerald regarding the contents of the newsletter, circulation manager Bob Sliger with any questions regarding delivery, or pagemaster (love that title!) Steve McGhee with any comments or suggestions (or good links or great .gif files or ???) about this web site.
Back to the Index of Issues
Return to the MSSA Home Page