Thread: Seating Depth Test. Waste of Time?

Well I'm going to go against what everyone above says about seating depth.
My "tuning" method is done with 3 shot groups, work up powder charge to see what the rifle likes, adjust seating depth (0.003") with the best powder charge and then fine tune powder and seating depth.

This works with "ACCURATE" rifles, I capitalised accurate for a reason, I wouldn't say this works consistently for factory rifles.

Gimp mentioned "Benchrest" shooters tuning during the match and being insanely obsessed, he is right and the ones that win aren't the ones that are the best shooters with the best built rifles.
If it was, the same people would win match after match and no one else would have a chance.

At a benchrest match all the rifles are built by some of the best "Benchrest" gunsmiths in the USA and all of these gunsmiths have built rifles that have won major shooting matches, while you need a good rifle you also need to be able to read the conditions and "TUNE" the rifle for the conditions to win.

With an accurate rifle firing 3 shot groups at 200 you can see the change in groups by changing the seating depth, I have seen groups go from 1" to 1/2" to 1/4" just by changing the seating depth and you can get this to consistently happen when you alter the seating depth or change the powder charge.

Tune is everything and easy to see with an accurate rifle, Greg who shoots Benchrest will confirm that.
Saying that the same tune isn't necessarily the right tune on two different days.

This is a very interesting video, Erik's videos are very interesting, and he is a successful shooter, his video with Speedy about his first Benchrest match is enlightening.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r2iz3E_Wd1I