First off I'll say that shooting 300gr JHPs at 2300fps from a bench with a crescent butt plate and naught but a T-shirt on does start to sting one's shoulder despite the weight of the ten pound behemoth.
Anyway, I proceeded with sending my rounds. I was struggling with my sight picture a bit today, so my groups weren't as tight as the last time I fired this rifle. We were only working at 50yds and the primary mission was to test these rounds for velocity and safety. All went pretty well except for the fact that I'm likely going to have to replace the front sight once again with another that's yet one size taller. Running Hornady's ballistic calculator it seems I'm right on for a 200yd zero which is a bit more than is useful to me for the majority of my shooting. I'm running about 2.5"+ high at 50yds. The calculator predicts 4.4" high at 100yds.
All in all, it was a good day though and I just love shooting that 1886!
Targets shown in order of charge level increase in increments of 1 grain.