Dan Gough Owner of Valhalla Industries (a Automotive Technical and Diagnostic Training company) and Redline EFI and Performance (his workshop) joins us for an awesome discussion on how to protect your diesel injectors, pump, suction control valve and engine. We talk about; fuel treatments, pre-filters, water traps and the best fuels amongst a whole lot of other important information.
Loving Hunt Shoot Offroad?
We need your help to keep the show racking the rounds! Head over to Patreon to show your support.
Alternatively head over to the Store and grab a piece of merch such as a Brass Goblin Tee or Mug.
Time stamps
00:00:00 How to protect your diesel injectors 00:02:48 Intro 00:05:25 What kills diesels? 00:06:19 Good fuel 00:22:10 Fuel sensors 00:25:14 Diesel heating up in your tank – fuel coolers 00:30:59 Fuel filtration 00:34:52 Diesel pre-filters/secondary filters placement 00:43:33 Diesel bug 00:46:09 Fuel additives/fuel treatments/fuel savers – F10, BlueChem PowerMaxx, BG Premium 245 Diesel fuel system cleaner 00:55:03 Water damage – Diesel pump, injectors and suction control valve (SCV) 00:57:06 Pre-filter vs Post filter 01:05:04 Identifying diesel bug in your system 01:06:20 Dirty fuel damage 01:07:44 Keeping your tank full 01:10:03 Filters and filters – appropriate microns 01:18:38 Hose clamps/fuel fittings 01:26:21 Keep your workstation clean 01:27:27 Filling your new filter with fuel 01:28:18 Clean fuel = clean oil 01:31:23 Drain your water trap 01:37:17 The best diesel on the market 01:40:51 Burson Garage 01:47:06 Give away – Direction Plus catch-can and pre-filter from Burson Garage 01:49:14 Outro
National Australia Bank (NAB) has unveiled itself today as anti-gun. We suspected as much being the Foundation Partner of the Alannah & Madeline Foundation huge anti-gun lobbyists.
It has been revealed that the NAB has dumped Boonah gun store Smiffy’s Guns & Ammo for “the risks associated with providing banking services to customers involved in certain industries” . Read the full article here.
So as gun owners, we must unite and stomp out this nonsense. Here is how we can do it.
Write a letter to NAB advising that we will be avoiding using their products and
Write to their clients and advise them we will not by purchasing from them.
This simple strategy can hurt them even if you don’t have a bank account. If you see a business that you frequent uses an NAB EFTPOS machine cancel the transaction. Then ensure you inform the business verbally as to why your cancelling the transaction. Then follow it up with a letter to the head of the organisation.
The more dissatisfied customers stores have, the stores will have to raise issues with NAB. The smaller the business, the bigger the impact.
We are a minority, but plenty of minorities have their voices heard. Time to raise a shout! Let show them – Get Woke Go Broke!
How long before they stop you being able to buy firearms or accessories with your own credit card or cash, just because “we don’t like your sport”. Enough is enough.
Here’s a basic template to copy and paste into a letter to send to the NAB (It’s reply paid so it’s costing them money). Try to change the wording as the more individual the letter is the more effect it will have, but copy and paste as a minimum.
Send to: National Australia Bank General Manager NAB Resolve Reply Paid 2870 Melbourne VIC 8060
Dear Sir/Madam
I’m writing to you in disgust over your treatment of gun shops.
To withdraw your services from a rural business is disgusting.
As a law abiding licenced firearm owner owner I am personally offended.
As such I will be avoiding using your services moving forward.
This means I will be ***closing my bank account and*** boycotting your clients that use NAB EFTPOS machines or online payment portals.
I will be notifying these business in writing as to why I will not be purchasing from them and laying the blame with the NAB.
Before you even begin reloading you need to understand load developement. This is a method of developing a load that is optimised for your firearm. By stepping through the process, not only will you have a safe load for your firearm but it will be far superior in both accuracy and stability.
Load developement is the the most important step in reloading. By ignoring load developement, you could potentially; damage your firearm and/or cause yourself an injury.
The advantage of load developement is you are going to optimise the round for your firearm and situation. This will mean you will have a more accurate and stable round then any factory manufactured option.
If you are considering reloading, load developement is your number 1 priority. If you don’t have time for this, then you shouldn’t be reloading.
Common reloading mistakes
I can personally testify of 2 friends that did not develop a load for their firearms and as a result both quit reloading.
In both cases the same mistake was made. They purchased the projectiles, powder and primers. Looked up the data for their stock and proceeded to reload the maximum recommended charge wait.
The first mate had nothing but dramas; grouping was worse than 150mm and all the cases were jamming the chamber after firing the round. The second mate was getting terrible groupings of about 100mm and then having issues resizing the cases afterward (as the cases had stretched).
The first mate has never revisited reloading.
The second mate came to me some time later with his issues. After asking if he had done his load developement he stated that he had. However, upon investigating his methods of load developement, it turned out he had not (only selecting the maximum charge weight from the chart).
He then did a proper load developement and has had fantastic results ever since.
If you want to have a pleasurable experience with reloading you need to do a load developement. Don’t take any short cuts, don’t waste your time or money thinking you can use someone else’s data.
Getting data off of Facebook is not load developement it’s a meme.
Why do your own load developement?
Every gun is different. Barrel length, twist rate, barrel material, barrel profile (thickness), land depth, crown shape, chamber size, bolt face, firing pin, tolerances, powder, primers, projectiles, cases and the list goes on. These factors all change the performance of a projectile.
The tools used to machine the chambers and barrels wear over time. This means there are micro differences even between firearms that may be considered the identical.
Are you shooting in an area with; high humidity, cold, hot, windy or wet? External factors of your environment can affect your bullet performance even for an identical firearm.
You need to work out your own load specifically for your firearm under your local conditions. Do not get your load developement from Facebook or somewhere else. You do not know what “load developement” means to them and their firearm is not yours.
A successful load developement will get you punching clovers!
How to do a load developement
Most powder and projectile manufacturers will provide the data required to assist in developing a load for your cartridge. ADI which would be the most popular and common powder used in Australia have this available on their website.
All you need to know is the powder, type and weight of projectile you would like to use (selecting the right projectile is a whole topic on its own and I wont touch on it here). Find the right powder and type of projectile from the list and record the details.
I’m going to use .223REM as the example, loaded with Sierra 55gr soft point boat tail (AKA Sierra Super Roo load #1365) and ADI 2206H.
It important to note you need to choose a seating depth before doing the load developement. As changing the seating depth, changes the pressures in the case and the end results. In this example I used ADI’s recommended length of 2.2 inches (this can be changed, but is a whole other topic) which will allow it to fit all magazines.
ADIs current recommendation is a minimum of 25.0gr and a maximum of 26.0gr of 2206H for a 55gr SP (as at the date writing of this blog). So to get a good range of loads to find something consistent I’m going to load in 0.2gr increments (for larger calibres I might load in 0.5gr depending on the recommended min/max). I will load up 5 rounds at each increment: 25.0gr, 25.2gr, 25.4gr, 25.6gr, 25.8gr and 26.0gr (aim for having between 6-8 different load weights spread evenly across the min/max range).
It’s really important to take your time and make sure every round has the same powder weight.
Clearly identified which rounds are what weights.
Once loaded up you will need to head to the Range (hopefully without wind) and fire the rounds on paper. Five rounds of the same weight at 1 target. Let the barrel cool and fire the next five and the next target.
This is why you don’t want to burden yourself with too small an increment as the length of time to cool the barrel and check the targets will take way to long (especially if you have to weight for ceasefires).
Check every case after firing. If you see a flattened primer stop! This means there is to much pressure in the case and you should not be using that weight of powder in your firearm.
Checking the load developement results
Now you have your rounds fired onto the targets it’s time to review the results. Typically you want to select the tightest group in the middle of a set of 3. You don’t want to select the “most powerful round before the primers flatten”.
I settled on 25.1gr in between my 2 best results (this was under extremely windy conditions)
What you want is the most stable load. The load that allows for the greatest variance with minimal change. That way if the powder drop is slightly more or slightly less than intended there is no change to the point of impact on the target.
Once you have found that perfect middle ground it’s time to load away!
Other concepts to consider for improving your groups (tighten your groups/accuracy) are:
Seating depth
Primer type
Consistant powder drops
Neck tension
Matched cases (identical cases)
Powder selection
For the purposes of hunting and saving money the above can be ignored, however selecting the seating depth is something I would definitely consider recommending from the start. But this is an introduction to people considering reloading and the seating depth is not a deal breaker, you’ll still out perform factory loads following this guide.
We will take a look at these 5 reasons see if you think that you may be ready to start reloading. Because the biggest step is buying the reloading equipement at the start and ultimately how much you want to spend on this initial purchase.
Budget reloading
Now when I’m talking about budget reloading, I’m talking about saving money due to the quantity of ammunition required. I’m not talking per box of 20, we are talking more like 100 rounds plus.
So this might fit you if your doing tons of varmint shooting, roo shooting or heading down to the range regularly. It would be nothing for me to head out on a cull in western Queensland and use 300 rounds in 3 nights.
Anyone that says you can’t save money reloading has never crunched the number. In a future blog I’m going to show a couple of examples of just how much money can be saved.
If your shooting large quantities of the same type of round, then you should start reloading.
Competition reloading
There are a few shooting competitions that require specific types of ammunition to be used when competing. The 2 examples that I can think of off the top of my head is; F Class and Single Action/Cowboy shooting.
Now I can’t vouch for F Class as I’ve never been involved in it at this point. But I know that you need to use NRAA approved ammunition. They have limits on factory ammunition you can use and the projectiles and powders that can be hand loaded. Having limits on the factory ammunition you can use could cause you issues with availability, which we will talk about later.
However, I am involved in Cowboy shooting and there are SASS rules for ammunition. These include minimum and maximum powder chargers, must be a lead projectile and must have a minimum power factor of 60 (see the SASS shooters handbook for full details).
Now you can buy Cowboy loads but they are extremely expensive in some cases, which goes back to point 1 reloading for budget.
Projectiles
There are so many types of projectiles and every type of projectile has a different purpose. Different; weights, expansion rates, tips, partitions, materials and much more. Not all of these projectiles are available in factory loads.
Different projectiles have vastly different internals affecting what happens after impact.
Maybe there is a certain projectile that you want to use for a specific game, type of shooting or you’ve heard it has really good results in your type of firearm.
Sometimes these projectiles you would like to shoot can be very expensive to buy in factory rounds, once again back to budget. Then now would be the time to start reloading.
Precision/Accuracy reloading
If you are chasing improved accuracy or precision shooting, factory ammunition is not an option. Maybe your doing precision shooting or long range shooting up to or over 1,000 metres.
In my experience even the most basic reloading can have exceptional accuracy improvements. The reason for this is due to the fact that by going through the load development phase of reloading, you are optimizing the round for your firearm.
Factory rounds are constructed to to be a good middle range for all firearms, hence why people that shoot factory rounds will try several brands and types of rounds to find what shoots best in their firearm.
Precision and long range shooting is a whole other kettle of fish. These guys can go to extremes chasing the perfect result. Because of the different; barrel lengths, barrel contours, twist rates, calibers, powders, primers and projectiles there are never ending combinations. If your OCD, this is the perfect sport for you!
Why would OCD people love shooting? Well you get to;
weigh every grain of powder,
measure every case length,
drill every flash hole
weigh every projectile
check the eccentricity
measure overall length
and the list goes on (please note this is not required for basic reloading – this is extreme).
By reloading you are tailoring your round specifically to your firearm and the results will be amazing. If you are wanting to do precision shooting or just want to improve your firearms accuracy (reloading cannot fix poor shooting skills) than reloading is for you!
Availability
When I first purchased my Remington 7600 35 Whelen I was told I could readily get ammunition for it. True most gun shops had a box or two, but in order to get a 10-20% discount you need to buy a carton of 200 rounds.
When I went to get some rounds when the gun finally turned up between 3 stores that I regularly frequented at that time I could only get 1 from one store, 2 from a second and 2 from a third. So between 3 stores I could get 100 rounds at full price.
35 Whelen is not even a particularly rare cartridge. But what happens when you go west and run out and have to go to town to get some more rounds? You’ll probably be lucky if they have any stock. Not to mention it might not even be the same brand, which will require sighting in again.
So if you have an obscure cartridge or a wildcat cartridge that you are going to shoot a heap or regularly it’s probably a good idea to start reloading. Because otherwise consistency is going to be hard to achieve.
Conclusion
Look these are just a few quick dot points for reasons to start reloading, no doubt there are thousands of reasons to start reloading. But if your hands on, being doing the sport for a while, have some down time and tick the box for any of the above reasons. Go get yourself a basic reloading kit and get cracking!
Nothing but the endless pursuit of precision ahead!
