Caribou Gear Tarp

Magnetospeed

I never said you couldn’t come up with a good load sans chronograh, but it’s much faster and easier to work with one up front.

I was out at the range yesterday. Tried 3 different powders. 1 of the 3 didn’t produce the velocity that the other two did. I wouldn’t have know that without chronographing up front.

In another gun about 6 months ago, book starting loads were screaming across the magneto waaaay faster than they should, pretty much at book max velocity. Had I continued to shoot up to the max powder charge, I might have been in danger of a blown primer/stuck case or even worse, a blown rifle. Without the chrono, I would have had no idea the load was about to become dangerous.

So it’s not just for chasing velocity. Chronographs can do a lot for your reloading if you pay attention to them.
 
belly-deep said:
I haven’t found it a problem. I usually chronograph the initial charges. When I find the velocity I want, I go reload more, usually at different COAL’s, and test for accuracy without the magneto on. I might re-chrono again after I’ve settled on a load, or I might not.

The biggest advantage of the magneto is shooting at a range with other people around. It saves a lot of time because you don’t have to wait for the firing line to go cold before you adjust your sky screens. It also doesn’t get high readings in sunny conditions or no readings in low light.

If I had the money and wanted to do it over again, the radar model would surely be the best route though.
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I totally agree about the advantages and buying the radar chrono especially since I want to chrono my archery gear too. the magneto really messed with my groups on my 300WSM. It shoots about .75moa without it but inconsistently hits 1.25ish with it on the barrel and I think it's because of the thinner barrel profile. My 6.5manbun isn't affected by it at all but the barrel is over 1" diameter. I'm going to try before and after test before I dive into new loads for my 7mm-08 and 7mag to see what affects it has on those...both are consider heavy/magnum sporter profiles but the 7mm-08 is fluted.
 
Mthuntr said:
I totally agree about the advantages and buying the radar chrono especially since I want to chrono my archery gear too. the magneto really messed with my groups on my 300WSM. It shoots about .75moa without it but inconsistently hits 1.25ish with it on the barrel and I think it's because of the thinner barrel profile. My 6.5manbun isn't affected by it at all but the barrel is over 1" diameter. I'm going to try before and after test before I dive into new loads for my 7mm-08 and 7mag to see what affects it has on those...both are consider heavy/magnum sporter profiles but the 7mm-08 is fluted.
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I would imagine that the magneto would be more likely to affect light contour barrels. Although, I haven’t had it mess with mine, and I’ve been using it on Kimber Montana’s, which have a really light contour. What is your 300 WSM?
 
Some folks have mounted magnetospeeds on rifle rests. Could be the best of both worlds, but one would have to be extra careful with alignment...
 
1_pointer said:
Some folks have mounted magnetospeeds on rifle rests. Could be the best of both worlds, but one would have to be extra careful with alignment...
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Not on the rifle? Somehow I had the feeling they had to be mounted on the barrel. Sound's like a good idea but how do you aline the barrel with it up and down?
 
I like my Magneto speed because I'm not always messing with a chrono on a tripod during cease fires, but it does throw off my POI consistently high of all things. If i'm at a busy rifle range I would consider it to be a courtesy to the other shooters and the RO because the setup is so much easier and 20 people aren't waiting on me to shoot. The magneto speed is nice for a quick velocity check to dial in my long range trajectory, but it isn't quite as useful for load development.

If I did it again I would just fork over for a lab radar, but I'm also on the fence at this point about the time value of reloading my ammo and the sunk cost of load development and equipment.
 
Mthuntr said:
I can see how that would be a complete nightmare to make sure it's all aligned particularly if you have multiple targets setup.
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I'd think some sort of straight "stick" in the muzzle would quickly show any misalignment. In fact, that's what the instructions say to do when it's mounted on the barrel to check that it's parallel with the bore and not too close or too far from the bullet's path.
 
TBass said:
I'd think some sort of straight "stick" in the muzzle would quickly show any misalignment. In fact, that's what the instructions say to do when it's mounted on the barrel to check that it's parallel with the bore and not too close or too far from the bullet's path.
Click to expand...

yup it even comes with a small, square aluminum rod to make sure you have the spacers right or atleast the V3 model does.

To the OP I had troubles with read errors after I forgot it was mounted to my barrel and I dropped the display. It turns out the wire jack for the display is only held on with a small solder/weld. The company replaced it no questions asked. With the exception of my 300WSM, I was quite pleased and my 6.5manbun was displaying single digit SDs during load development. My replaced model hasn't given me any read errors like I had been getting with my traditional chronograph. As I suggested before if I were to do it again I'd spend more $ for the radar chrono so I can measure velocity of just about anything without worry of damage, POI shifts, etc.
 
Get a LabRadar chrono. Accurate, easy to use, and doesn't mess with your point of impact. You can do accuracy and MV testing at the same time.
 
All I know is my old pro chrono chit the bed. A friend of mine offered his magneto speed to use. I want to have an elevation knob made for my 280AI,and need a good velocity. I'm looking forward to not having to screw around with the tri pod. All for sketchy readings. In my case,the load is dialed. I just need to get a 5 shot average and order the knob. If it appears to have merit,Ill order one of my own.
 
Had some range time today (not much, not enough). One of the rifles I shot was my wife's .270 using H4350 pushing 130grn Hornady Interlocks. Admittedly I put the chrono a little closer than normal, trying to keep it in the shade, but I got some pretty weird readings even though the groups weren't bad - between 2937 and 3578 fps. I was afraid the rifle was going to explode after that last one... fortunately it didn't. Anyway, the next load I had one that read 352fps (?). I've had some trouble with that chrono before, so I actually came directly home and ordered a magnetospeed on Amazon.

I'll have to fart with it a bit, as with everything, but I'll probably wind up using it to check velocities after I find accuracy nodes. You can't attach something to the end of your barrel w/o altering the harmonics of your barrel; I'm certain of that... that's just physics. But it also takes somebody with much more patience than I to get a reliable reading on a chronograph at 8-15 feet on snow in a Montana winter.
 
Brian in Montana said:
Had some range time today (not much, not enough). One of the rifles I shot was my wife's .270 using H4350 pushing 130grn Hornady Interlocks. Admittedly I put the chrono a little closer than normal, trying to keep it in the shade, but I got some pretty weird readings even though the groups weren't bad - between 2937 and 3578 fps. I was afraid the rifle was going to explode after that last one... fortunately it didn't. Anyway, the next load I had one that read 352fps (?). I've had some trouble with that chrono before, so I actually came directly home and ordered a magnetospeed on Amazon.

I'll have to fart with it a bit, as with everything, but I'll probably wind up using it to check velocities after I find accuracy nodes. You can't attach something to the end of your barrel w/o altering the harmonics of your barrel; I'm certain of that... that's just physics. But it also takes somebody with much more patience than I to get a reliable reading on a chronograph at 8-15 feet on snow in a Montana winter.
Click to expand...

I loved my magnetospeed to verify velocities from factory or for hand load confirmation, it was nice not to have to mess with the optical chrono in front of the firing line. But I found that having it on my barrel made it trickier to really trust small tweaks in load development (and effect seemed to vary by rifle) and that I was starting to shoot loads with and without the magnetospeed attached - one set for velocity and one set for down range precision. It added time and cost to load development. I was almost ready to go back to old optical chrono. But instead I decided to bite the bullet and get a Labradar unit. Wow - a game changer. I would definitely find a way to get one if you do a fair amount of load development - even if it means pitching in with a few buddies at the range to share one.
 
It amazes me that people think they need to have a chrono on the barrel, while developing/sighting in loads. Shoot your loads for accuracy and then attach the magneto speed and check the velocity. Simple. Anything that you attach to a barrel, changes the harmonics and so the poi. I do not even shoot through my pro chrono, UNTIL I have decided that the load is worth developing farther. The Magneto Speed is a a great tool, as it saves going ahead of the firing line, while testing loads.
 
sbhooper said:
It amazes me that people think they need to have a chrono on the barrel, while developing/sighting in loads. Shoot your loads for accuracy and then attach the magneto speed and check the velocity. Simple. Anything that you attach to a barrel, changes the harmonics and so the poi. I do not even shoot through my pro chrono, UNTIL I have decided that the load is worth developing farther. The Magneto Speed is a a great tool, as it saves going ahead of the firing line, while testing loads.
Click to expand...

Some of us are chasing velocity nodes and velocity SDs as we go through various powder loads. With that approach it is very useful to get fps on every shot. So, really not that amazing.
 
sbhooper said:
It amazes me that people think they need to have a chrono on the barrel, while developing/sighting in loads. Shoot your loads for accuracy and then attach the magneto speed and check the velocity. Simple. Anything that you attach to a barrel, changes the harmonics and so the poi. I do not even shoot through my pro chrono, UNTIL I have decided that the load is worth developing farther. The Magneto Speed is a a great tool, as it saves going ahead of the firing line, while testing loads.
Click to expand...


It sound's to me like a number of guy's re using a chronograph to watch for pressure. What would you guy's have done back in the 60's and 70's before chronograph's became affordable to most? The advancement's in the shooting sport's has been terrific but not one thing has come along that replaces good loading practices. The only real area for velocity to matter is in trajectory and I can get more than flat enough to shoot out to normal hunting ranges which is under 200 yds. But then even if you got enough to shoot 500 yds fairly flat, most people that try it are going to run up against the shooter, themselves, that really isn't qualified to take the shot in the first place! So much for velocity! As a measure of pressure, don't think it's gonna work! I have seen listed loads that in some rifle's were pretty hot but I have never seen or heard of a listed load that was to hot. I've used some of the loads in P.O. Ackley's handbook's and they are pretty hot but don't blow up rifles in good order. I have a couple rifle's that are using over listed max loads with no problem's, imagine that. To many people get into reloading and go right after the top loads, some of them blow up rifles! Most people tell new people the get a whole bunch of different books and read them all. I believe that is awful advice. Get one book for the bullet you think you want to use and learn to reload. All that other crap is well ahead of you. Imagine your first day in math class in the first grade and the teacher is teaching calculus or some other form that say's 1+1=3! No different learning to reload, don't cut corner's!
 
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