So it finally came to be when I added my last 444 rifle a couple months ago that I would try and set this one up to shoot in CBA matches in the "Light Hunter" class . Guns can weigh 9 1/2 pounds , be bedded , floated and have trigger jobs as well as shoot any scope you desire .
So I changed the springs in my trigger to lessen the weight of pull a bit and make it smoother and more consistent . WHich it does I might add for the grand total of $8 . I then mounted a Leupold Vari XIII 6.5-20x with a 1/8" target dot reticle .
I decided early on that I was going to use one of four possible bullets , the Ranch Dog 432-265GC , the Ranch Dog 432-300GC , the Saeco #432 (265 grain GC FP) or the Saeco #433 (300 grain GC FP).
After testing with several powders (H322 , IMR8208 , XMR2015 , H4198 , RL-7 and H335) I pretty much whittled it down to H322 and IMR8208 with all four bullets . Now to be totally honest all four bullets shot equally well with their preferred powder charge from the two mentioned . After I saw this I kinda decided I wanted to campaign a Ranch Dog bullet as a did a few years back in lever silhouette with the Ranch Dog 311-165GC . So I cut the two Saeco bullets out of further testing . At that point I started to look into the recoil/fatigue factor . The loads I was using were warm like my hunting loads so it stood to reason I should most likely be better off with the RD 265 grainer .
And that boiled down to the RD 265 with 52 grains of H322 or 53.5 grains of IMR8208 . I had mostly been shooting for group on paper at 100 yards and not CBA score targets . So yesterday I started shooting score targets for both practice and to see where I was at in the Grand Scheme of things so to speak !
Shot a score target with the H322 yesterday that was a 35 out of possible 50 . Let me explain in a normal CBA score match you shoot two shots at 5 different bulls during a relay with a possible 100/10x . To cut back on paper and target costs I shot 5 at a bull for a possible 50/10x . So anyway my first target was shot with H322 and scored 35 not terrible but not great by any means either .
Next I shot a target with 53.5 grains of IMR8208 and got a 43/1x and to be honest I was kinda happy with that .
![Image](http://i50.photobucket.com/albums/f316/6pt-sika/444%20Marlins/5-31-11RangeTrip005.jpg)
After that I shot another target with 8208 and got a 38 . So a decent start with plenty room for improvement . I also pretty much decided then and there to use IMR8208 .