Recent content by Ken Howell

My comment about the 30° shoulder is based on bad experience (mine and others') with the 40° shoulder. I have no experience with a 35° shoulder, which seems to me not distinct enough from either the 30° or the 40° to be worth talking about. Case life ended abruptly, sometimes with the first...

"First does the radius shoulder of a Weatherby really improve efficiency?" No. That old "Powell-Miller Venturi Freebore" (PMVF) shoulder was pretty well discredited before Roy Weatherby became enamored of it and made it a sort of Weatherby trade mark. It has no positive ballistic value that...

Your satisfaction is certainly understandable. I bought a Barr & Stroud from Deutsche Optik back when the Wild cost a LOT more. Then, when the Wilds were all that were left at Deutsche Optik, and the price for a Wild dropped even below the price of the B&S, I bought a Wild, too. Don't need both...

Check the VERY rugged military tripods (for about $80, IIRC) at www.deutscheoptik.com. You may have to adapt or build an attachment. These are excellent, super-strong tripods in new to nearly new condition. I got one (a Wild) for my Barr & Stroud rangefinder, which doesn't put any serious...

Rod, my determined avoidance of lutefisk is absolute -- strong enough to exclude it from even my feeding tube, which has no taste buds anyway. I liquify salmon and tuna (also soy beans) in a Vita-Mix for my daily shot of protein. Can't taste any of 'em -- couldn't taste walleye, either, if I had...

Been a looooooong time, guys -- and it ain't over yet. I promised up-dates but had no suspicion back then what the up-dates would have to report. The Nesika-Richards-HS rifle I described is finally here, with the latest incarnation of the Talbot mount -- and with four scopes (8x Leupold, 12x...

FWTW, a couple of echoes and cobwebs from the void in my gourd. If you were here, we could run some loads through the acoustic target and get a better grip on the de facto, field-derived BC. (I've heard industry people, asked how they get their BCs, say "We figure 'em as close as we can, then we...

I have both a Barr & Stroud and a Wild optical coincident range-finders, and I've found that it's very easy (and mandatory) to zero them from time to time. Just a few weeks back, I zeroed the Barr & Stroud by setting it on a tripod, carefully aligning the two images of Venus, and setting the...

Thanks, p dog shooter! That's the kind of reliable information I was asking for. I've used a friend's Leitz Geovid, and probably will again, but had no idea how well I could rely on what it was telling me. BTW, my son is a surveyor. It's my understanding that in the "total stations" they use...

Just discovered this nugget in a most unlikely source — in the chapter on measurement in Larrabee's "Reliable Knowledge." The "German ballistics expert" cited here was Dr Carl Cranz, whom scientific ballisticians have long considered "the father of ballistics," whose classic four-volume...

"On theoretical versus practical data. I am not too concerned about whether my laser can accurately measure 600 yards to within a yard of a hard measurement...." Dave, you surprise me! Please give us all credit for a little more common sense (and technical sense) than this little put-down...

Just posted this on the "Reviews" forum, below. ______________________ What I need to know about anybody's laser rangefinder is how accurate you've found them to be. Lacking a surveyor's chain or a surveyor's rope (which I use — would prefer a chain), check the spacing between utility poles so...

What I need to know about anybody's laser rangefinder is how accurate you've found them to be. Lacking a surveyor's chain or a surveyor's rope (which I use — would prefer a chain), check the spacing between utility poles so you can "lase" on known distances — from one pole to four, five, six or...

Yote, you've just pinwheeled one of the reasons I don't like variables — because I've found over and over that I can't trust 'em. When I worked for the Army, I mounted and bore-sighted scopes free for anyone on the post, irrespective of whether they'd bought the rifle, the scope, or the mount...