Why weren't any Ackley Improved cartridges ever put into production?

[WardenWolf]

I did some reading on the Ackley Improved cartridges, and it seems he definitely managed to make some real measurable improvements. This makes me wonder why no firearms or ammunition manufacturer ever started officially supporting them. A number of other former wildcat cartridges eventually made their way into production, but none of these did, despite some distinct advantages over their parent rounds.

 

[GCBurner]

I couldn't say for sure, but as I recall from reading some of his articles. P.O. Ackley could be kind of an abrasive old coot, and wasn't shy about passing on his criticisms. Maybe the ammo manufacturers decided they just didn't want to deal with him, or pay him any royalties for using his name on a product they were already tooled up to make. The improvements were incremental, not revolutionary or industry-changing.

 

[cal74]

.280 AI is to a limited extent

Kimber is also supposed to be producing a factory offering, hope so anyways...

 

[GLShooter]

I believe because while they do provide better performance the amount extra is not worth the $$'s for tooling etc for limited sales. The whole 223 family of 222, 222 Magnum and 223 is about as close as the factories appear to want to get.

Of course reloaders like us don't mind having to use special dies etc but perhaps the confusion of marketing 223 AI, and 25/06 AI's and 257 AI's would make major headaches in the world of inventory and just plain customer issues. After all, we all hear about the guy buying 380 ACP instead of 9 MM. One is a 9MM short so it ought to work. Right?

Greg

 

[Dr T]

In addition to the personality and royalty issues, I would also suspect that there would be some manufacturing and liability issues. The improvements typically involved straighter case walls and a greater shoulder angle. While these improved the case capacity, they may also adversely affect chambering and extraction in field conditions, and may also cause some hangups in the manufacturing process. Cartridges are tapered to allow them to feed smoothly from a magazine and provide a bit of wiggle room when chambering and extracting from a dirty chamber. The net result is that you get an extra 100 fps or so.

While I like the IDEA of a 257 Roberts AI, I am not sure it provides a compelling margin in performance over the standard variety.

 

[BWB]

One of many reasons would be the 40 degree shoulder. Not impossible perhaps, but impractical and expensive to produce on the necessary high speed machinery, especially years ago when these cartridges had most of their press and popularity.

 

[rcmodel]

In addition, Ackley looked into his crystal ball most of the time when developing loads and divining pressures.

Once real pressure testing was done on his cartridges, as well as a lot of other wildcats of the day, it was found they weren't all they were cracked up to be at safe pressure levels.

rc

 

[WardenWolf]

One of many reasons would be the 40 degree shoulder. Not impossible perhaps, but impractical and expensive to produce on the necessary high speed machinery, especially years ago when these cartridges had most of their press and popularity.

Why would that make it impractical or more expensive to produce? Many cartridges have different shoulder angles. They're not all identical.

As for pressure testing and such, the testing was probably performed on fireformed cases, which, of course, won't be as durable as originally manufactured cases because of the stretching.

 

[45crittergitter]

Nosler

http://www.nosler.com/Ammunition/Trophy-Grade.aspx

http://www.nosler.com/Ammunition/Custom-Ammunition.aspx

 

[JerryM]

In addition to those things posted, some of the old wildcats were chrono. using 30 inch barrels which did get higher velocities.
I once chronographed a .30 cartridge based on a 30-06 case and blown out with the shoulder set forward. The developer claimed .300 Mag velocities. My own chrono results were that it was about 50fps faster than a 30-06.

Unless one just wants to play with some of the wildcats most are not worth the trouble. I would rather get a 7MM Wby than go to all the trouble to form the cases and get less than from the 7 MM Wby.

I have used and liked the .338-06 and .35 Whelen. They do not require much work to get them loaded, and get excellent results plus 5 in the mag instead of 3.

Regards,
Jerry

 

[snake284]

As far as I'm concerned as to what I have read, the only three that are really worth it are the .250 Savaga, .257 Roberts, and the .280 Remington. I have seen the data on a 30-06 and it is counter productive IMO. The couple I've seen there was no difference in the factory and improved version.

Having said this I am having a build done as we speak right now on a Mauser action to .257 Roberts AI. It will supposedly give me about 200 FPS improvement on average. That's a reasonable gain. I also have a .280 Remington on a Mauser action I am considering having improved. That will put it within reach of a 7 Rem. Mag. I also have a build I did on a Howa 1500 action with a Krieger 25.5 inch barrel in .250 Savage that I was considering improving, but it's so accurate and it pushes a 117 grain bullet at about 2850 FPS that I didn't want to take a chance on screwing with it. It's already pretty sweet.

 

[Silent Sam]

The real question is why would they? The methods he used have been incorporated into new cartridges.

 

[DM~]

I talked to Parker Ackley many times, even spent more than a few hours with him in his shop, talking guns ect... I liked the guy a lot, BUT those who answered that he used long bbls. and higher pressures to get those big velocities are correct.

Some cartridges did get some decent gains, like the 30-30, as AI-ing that case increased the case capacity quite a bit. In the case of the 30-06, it's the increasured pressures that does most of the gains.

Yea yea, those that own AI's swear by them, BUT they don't own pressure testing equipment either...

DM

 

[steelshoot]

Ackley seems to have done a lot of specialized work with the military. We may not hear about it for another 50 years. Note the mention of higher pressures, velocities, and longer barrels. Those rounds wouldn't have been developed for shooting whitetail.
Continuous casting of jacket material, digital control of processing, modern slowburning powders, double button and broach rifling etc., etc., etc., have all contributed better bullet construction, accuracy, and velocity. As accuracy improves there may not be a reason to choose a body shot at close range instead of a headshot, but over the years a heart-lung shot in an area the size of a pieplate has been a reliable method of harvesting meat for the table. It seems that Jack O'connor was very happy with the 3" vertical spread at 100 yards. http://www.gunsandammo.com/content/jack-oconnors-rifle
Who would be happy with a 3" spread today?
Ackley was all about velocity for the simple reason that when velocity is doubled the foot pounds of energy delivered is quadrupled. I don't quite understand why anyone would sniff at an increase of 100 or 200 FPS when one considers the corresponding increase in energy delivered and decrease of bullet drop and wind drift. When Ackley was busy all the available metals and alloy descriptions were contain in a book about the size of a dimestore novel. In 1973 there were three main volumes in the metallurgist reference library the size of a huge phone book. A few years ago that number had increased to 24. You gotta wonder what ackley would do with ultimate tensile strength steels approaching 300,000 psi. today.
It doesn't matter if you missed with a Red Ryder Daisy or an M1 Abrams.

 

[atblis]

Ackley was all about velocity for the simple reason that when velocity is doubled the foot pounds of energy delivered is quadrupled. I don't quite understand why anyone would sniff at an increase of 100 or 200 FPS when one considers the corresponding increase in energy delivered and decrease of bullet drop and wind drift.

Law of diminishing returns. 2800 ft/s kills the deer just a dead as 3000 ft/s. To get that extra couple hundred ft/s requires too much effort and doesn't really do all that much. Anyways, the energy thing is debatable. The main wounding mechanism is putting a hole in something. For deer, the best cartridges all fire medium/large bullets at moderate velocities. 308/270/280/30-06/30-30 etc.

So yeah, I don't care about that extra 200 ft/s.

 

[Slamfire]

Ackley was all about velocity for the simple reason that when velocity is doubled the foot pounds of energy delivered is quadrupled. I don't quite understand why anyone would sniff at an increase of 100 or 200 FPS when one considers the corresponding increase in energy delivered and decrease of bullet drop and wind drift.

You are talking kinetic energy. KE= mass times velocity squared. But KE is not conserved in a collision. Momentum is conserved. ME=Mass Times Velocity. I do not believe that the big increased in KE which happens when you square a small velocity increase really translate to an equivalent increase in stopping power.

I do believe that a velocity increase is good from a trajectory view point.

Some things about the AI’s I think are good ideas, the increase in case capacity and the steeper shoulders. I have a 35 Whelen. It has a slight shoulder and I believe that was a contributor to the misfires and hangfires I experienced in cold weather. I believe the slight shoulder just did not hold the cartridge or cushioned the firing pin blow. A steeper shoulder would have provided more resistance.

Corporations are interested in maximizing profit. If the interest was there they would have chambered rifles in AI’s.

Go to a gun show and see how well those older rifles chambered in AI cartridges sell. They don't. Bubba wants a rifle in a cartridge he recognises. Like 30-06, 270, 30-30.

 

[Dr T]

The point on pressure is a good one. If you carefully note the pressure levels versus the velocity in a reloading manual that lists such things, you will find that the last grain or so of powder (and 100 fps) come at a huge cost in terms of pressure. Thus extracting the potential from a AI would basically mean loading it up to maximum levels. I have few rifles that are at their most accurate at max loads, and bullet placements is far, far more important than impact velocity.

While there are some actions that can handle excessive loads (the Ruger No. 1 leaps immediately to mind), some cannot.

Two things I have not forgotten: The gunsmoke pouring out of the pressure relief port after a primer was perforated, and the first time I had to hammer a bolt open to eject a spent round--both due to excessive pressure using one of the oldtimer's loads. Fortunately, I learned those lessons about 35 years ago without coming to harm, but I learned to take the load data and velocity claims with a grain of salt.

 

[atblis]

Reduced case stretch is one advantage of an AI for certain cartridges. Nice from the handloader point of view.

 

[WardenWolf]

A lot of wildcats have gone into commercial production like .22-250. It just surprises me nobody ever picked any of them up.

 

[CH47gunner]

Comment & question here -
I have no experience with AI rifles tho I had a chance to purchase a customized Mauser .22-250 with an Ackley Improved barrel. I passed on this as it was too much of a project gun.
My comment here is that when I was inquiring on ammunition that the AI brass was "fireformed" using regular .22-250 ammunition.
I have had experience with a couple of wildcat calibers that my Dad & younger had made for themselves. Dad's was an '06 bored out to what he called a Gibbs and my brother had a .220 Swift bored to what he calls a .220 Rocket. Both rifles use "fireformed" brass.
So - my question is couldn't most of the AI calibers be fireformed using standard ammo instead of having to resize brass?

Bruce

 

[artee]

Steelshoot: Reread the O'Connor article you posted. He wanted the bullet to pass 3 inches above point of aim at 100 yards. He wasn't accepting a 3 inch spread at 100 yards. He's pretty famous for advising this technique of sighting in a "high velocity" rifle--sight it at 100 yards so that you are 3 inches high and you will be on point of aim at 250 to 300 yards depending on the cartridge". I'd be very surprised if there is a rifle writing that he authored and doesn't say that.

 

[Pistol Ranch]

Artee beat me to it..O'Conner ZEROED his rifles 3" high to reduce the need for hold-over on long shots.
All of my Winchester Mod 70's are zeroed 3" high, although most of my kills are made at under 150 yards..

P.R.

 

[snake284]

There's an obvious reason nobody has hit on as to why no AIs have been commercialized, well excluding the .280. The AIs have sharp shoulders and straight sides. Now if all rifles were bolt guns and single shots this wouldn't make a dimes worth of difference, but i have to think in Semi's, pumps, and lever guns this could cause feeding and ejection problems. The very shape of commercial cartridges makes them easy to eject (unless of course you experience high presure), being of a tapered design. So I think the gun makers and ammo companies have steered away from rounds like the AIs because of this. I don't think it has beans to do with pressure. They can load around that.

 

[dubbleA]

So - my question is couldn't most of the AI calibers be fireformed using standard ammo instead of having to resize brass?

Dont know if I am understanding the question correctly but with all the Ackley improved cartridges you simply chamber the standard round in a AI chamber pull the trigger and out comes a completely fireform case. it is possible to do this on account the headspacing off the shoulder does not change. With that said there are some chambers that have been improperly headspaced.

Yes, while the Gibbs are fireformed they're a completely different animal than the Ackleys, The shoulder is actually pushed forward about a 1/10 inch and the angle is steepened also. This has to be done in steps and is not as easily accomplished as the Ackley's, IMHO though the Gibbs offer more increase in case capcity.


Ackley on the left, shows shoulder blown out and less body taper.


Gibbs case being formed from an 06 case, note the shoulder.

 

[CH47gunner]

dubbleA -

You answered my question very well, thanks. The OP's original question too I believe - no demand.
The AI caliber users, like a lot Wildcatters I'm sure, would prefer to roll their own. With the reloading education & tools, their homeloads would be way more consistant than factory stuff.

My Pops took a whole bunch of muledeer & elk with that Gibbs. He is still pretty spry at 90 but the Gibbs resides in my brother's safe now.

Thanks,

Bruce