Still working on my .30-30 experiments. Today I tested a series of loads with differing bullet jumps - the distance the bullet travels before it contacts the lands of the rifling. You can read about a very interesting experiment here. My efforts with my Winchester Model 94 are very modest by comparison. I loaded a series of cartridges with differing bullet jump then headed for the range this morning for a test. The weather was perfect. No wind. This time of year, unfortunately, the sun rises right over the target which makes aiming a challenge. I chronographed them all. For my records I have started keeping a photograph of the test targets, and that has worked very well.

So what is the bottom line of this experiment? It looks like the normal seating depth is as good as any, which makes things easier for reloading. There is one other thing that I have observed several times before. I had two sets of the normal load which I chronographed separately. The first set I just loaded and fired as normal. The second set I tapped the cartridge to settle the powder back then loaded and fried carefully so as to not disturb the powder. The second set had less than half the variability of the other set. I have observed this before, and I think I will pursue that avenue of research for the next session.