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Quickload & Quick Target Ballistic Programs

Quickload & Quick Target Ballistic Programs

Bruce Potts checks out the highly sophisticated Quickload and Quick Target Ballistic programs – and reckons that they are possibly smarter than he is…

I would not be without my Quickload and Quick Target ballistics programs, which I have used for over 10 years.  I am no computer expert but it is easy to use and even addictive. I also use its sister program Quick Design for all my wildcat creations and it has been invaluable.

Spec Sheet

For £125 you get Quickload, the loading part or interior ballistics bundled with Quick Target the exterior ballistics program, with data generated and saved being able to move between one and the other. Broadly speaking there are 1200 cartridges stored in its data banks with new factory and wildcats updated all the time, so it’s all there. You also have over 230 differing powders, some of which I have never heard of, so you can try near everything just to see the ballistic changes. Bullets are comprehensive with all the major and independent manufacturers stored with some 2500 choices. The real beauty is that it will allow you to understand the effects of pressures, velocities and energy by changing single or multiple variables in the reloading procedure.

Predictions regarding barrel length, temperature changes, bore friction, bullet seating depth can all be loaded to see the changes safely without firing your rifle. There are limitations such as no primer choice but used wisely you can load up your favourite cartridge and simulate its ballistics and trajectory with just a click of the mouse.

Getting Started

With the program booted you have a ‘main functions’ sheet in front of you that remains the same. However, there are windows to change parameters with a variable section to display pressures, velocities barrel times or burn rate as a graph.

First up, access the cartridge window and click and pull down the tab revealing 1200 calibre choices -  amazing!  Let’s choose .308 Win, click on this and then all the data is then projected into all the other windows such as seating depth , cartridge length, max pressure, cross sectional bore, capacity and useable case capacity. Also below the main cartridge window is a cartridge spec icon, click this and you access the diagrammatic profile with all the minute measurements for COL, neck length, rim thickness etc.

Now the .308 Win is loaded you can change the barrel length to suit your rifle, or even see how it performs shorter or longer. Then choose a bullet from the main window, again the choice is mesmerising. Load this and again the seating depth, shank depth, COL and bullet length windows all change to reflect your choice.

You can then alter the COL and thus seating depth to suit how far you want your bullet off the lands. As you change this data the useable powder or case capacity window changes to show how much space the bullet is taking up and how much powder can be loaded.

Powder Changes

Let’s say we want to know about a 150-grain Nosler Ballistic Tip with a seating depth of 0.408” and a 24” barrel.

Go to the right of the screen for all the powder changing windows. This allows you to select one from a broad choice of makes, plus relevant data windows including heat of explosion, burn rate and load density.

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Most importantly however are the filling, showing load density, charge weight where you input your preferred powder weight, which is shown in grains and grams. With a charge of 46-grains of Alliant Reloader RL15 you now press the ‘apply and calculate’ button.

Miraculously Quickload calculates the data you have inputted and then shows its predictions in the lower right boxed window. Pressure is shown in psi and bar and is colour-coded; yellow -mild, pink- ok and red - too high. There are 15 windows but the main ones are; Amount of propellant burnt to see if the powder is all burnt in the barrel; Muzzle velocity; Muzzle energy; Ballistic Efficiency - anything above 30% is good. Also this data is displayed as a graph in the large left hand window for a visual guide.

With the above load I had 54,605 PSI (pink) with 97.34% filled case and 2860 fps /2724 ft/lbs. Change the seating depth from 2.800” to 2.765”COL and the pressure now rises to 61,673 psi (red) and a warning appears and it changes velocity to 2932 fps and energy to 2863 ft/lbs. Cut the barrel to 18” and muzzle velocity reduces to 2679 fps/2391 ft/lbs and 2-grains extra powder raises the pressure to over 62,913 psi and well into the red!

Inputting

Now you have a load you can transfer that data into Quick Target that now shoots it and gives you a predicted external trajectory path. Click the Retrieve Data from Quickload button and your data is transferred showing bullet diameter, velocity and ballistic coefficient (BC). This can be changed or modified for multiple BC`s at down range distances but that’s an advanced feature. To the left of the main window you can input point blank range or more importantly sight height above bore axis and then zero range, range increments and maximum range you want calculated.

You have a choice of wind speed, direction and shooting angle i.e. up or down hill, and finally atmospheric data for temperature, pressure and air density. Click ‘Apply’ and a new box appears with your results tabulated. You can also change the sight adjustments from metric to imperial, MOA or targets to display the results as a visual graph on a target rather than a table. You can also show the tabulated data as BC versus velocity, BC versus flight time, peak trajectory and a lot more.

In fact there are too many variables to list here but importantly the data on downrange trajectory is matched to your Quickload data and own rifle setup to give an accurate prediction of the load.

Advanced Features

Once you have mastered all the buttons and variables, you can make minute changes to the data to hone a specific load. There are some very useful buttons to further explore ballistics such as Propellant Table setup accessed from the task bar at the top of the main page. This allows you to specify calculation parameters.

The best of these is the Barrel Timing predictions. Many people believe that if you have a load that shoots accurately and are pleased with this then it will have a specific barrel time of combustion. What Quickload does is to predict all the other combinations of loads i.e. powders that will match the barrel timing and thus give as good or better accuracy. Barrels all harmonise to a specific load so this feature is very useful and does work. My 46.0 grain RL15 load with 150-grain Nosler

Ballistic Tip also has the same timings, 1.095 milliseconds, as does a load of 50.3 gr of H414 or 47.9 grains of IMR 4007 SSC.

Another really useful alternative using the same button is to choose a specific maximum pressure as the parameter and Quickload will then tell you all the other loads that match this pressure of the original load you like, which saves you altering all the parameters one at a time. The same load as above and Quickload tells me that a new load of 43.8-grains of

Hodgdon Varget, 42.8-grains of Hodgdon H4895 or 41.8-grains of IMR 3031 powder will give me the same pressure, so is worth a shot, this data is plucked from 130 options given to you!

Conclusions

Quickload and Quick Target Ballistic programs are very easy to use, fast and I have found accurate but you must be sensible; when Quickload predicts a certain load I always load a few rounds 15 % below - just to check. Some data also needs to be checked as correct, as some bullet weights or diameters are wrong for some of the bullets, so best practice is to measure the bullet to check the default data. As new upgrades come out I have to say it is reliable and an extremely useful piece of kit and well worth the price of £125. For further information or to purchase, contact JMS Arms on 07771 962121 or 01444 400126. GM

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