TargetTalk

Everyone discusses the various Ely, Wolf and SK brands of ammo but do any of you shoot Lapua. Specifically the Midas+ type.

Recently did some ammo testing with different types of Ely and Lapua ammo. Shot Ely black box eps, Ely Club, Lapua Midas L, MasterL and Midas M. Hands down, my Anschutz 1913 with scope shot the Lapua into little holes at 50 yds. and that was prone with a sling.

Any recent experience with the new Midas+ ammo?

Bob

The Midas + shoots great and is on par with the best Eley and RWS if you take the time to match a lot to your rifle. I started using this last year and to date have a 1200 and three 1600's with solid x counts.
-ken

I'm extremely happy with the performance I have been getting with the "entry level" Lapua Centre-X. The Lapua shoots the best for me when compared to Eley and RWS for my 1907. I can't yet afford the Midas+ or the X-act.

For us Canucks up here north of the border, the Centre-X costs about the same as the Blue Eley (Team) from various distributors ... but for my Anschutz, the Lapua is performing the best thus far.

I have finished my last of the old Lapua Master ................. wish I had more since that stuff just "thread the needle" each time. Amazing ammo. Very satisfied with Lapua.

I have 8 boxes of Lapua Midas and 1 box of Lapua MultiMatch for sale if you are interested. $130 shipped
Randy

Lapua had a batch testing facility at our National Championships at Bisley last year and gained quite a few converts - myself included. Many people were very impressed by CenterX but it was all gone by the time I got to test.
I ended up with two batches of Midas which both shot acceptably small groups - there was a batch of Xact which was marginally better but the difference in price was too high for the small improvement.

A couple of weeks ago I went back and tested again and this time settled on a batch of CenterX that grouped about as well as the Midas from last summer...
For the price, it's superb.

I've previously used R50 with good results but I've never had great results with Eley which I put down to how my barrel has been chambered.

Ken.

Bob3700 wrote: Shot Ely black box eps, Ely Club, Lapua Midas L, MasterL and Midas M. Hands down, my Anschutz 1913 with scope shot the Lapua into little holes at 50 yds. and that was prone with a sling.
Bob

Which of those 3 Lapua did the best for you?

Getting good results with the Center X also, and a lot cleaner than Eley when you come to clean the barrel

I've been a big fan of the Lapua Centre X since they released it. Not gotten a chance to try any Midas + just yet but hoping to get something batch tested this summer with a pinch of luck. I just don't really think there's much point buying decent ammo off the shelf. I'm also a big fan of RWS and will hopefully be testing it.

I'm with Dave IRL on this, there's no point in buying the most expensive of any make unless you can batch test it.Just because it's the top brand of that manufacturer doesn't mean it's going to perform any better in your barrel than the less costly one. But don't buy the really cheap stuff and expect it to perform well though.

I too also had a chance to shoot four matches with Midas + throuh my 1913 and my barrel liked them!!!
I also had a chance to try Midas M and the results were badly...
My barrel also like Eley(club,black EPS and Tenex)

I've batch tested twice at the Lapua factory in Shönebeck and the best results I got was with Midas+, second best with Center-X.
Not great, but good (13,2 mm / 13,5 mm over 4x10-shot groups).
A friend of mine found a batch of X-act that had 11,2 mm avg, and that is good (but expensive :-)
I guess Lapua has the same procedure as Eley: All ammo is produced in the same way (to become X-act), but the factory test shootings then decide how to label the different lots (Center-X / Midas+ / X-act).
Also: the latest ISSF Prone final in Sydney was won with Midas+ (106,4). Pretty OK ;-)

Colin wrote:I'm with Dave IRL on this, there's no point in buying the most expensive of any make unless you can batch test it.Just because it's the top brand of that manufacturer doesn't mean it's going to perform any better in your barrel than the less costly one. But don't buy the really cheap stuff and expect it to perform well though.

I have to say, I was always a snob about ammo, but lately, I've been shooting a lot of the Eley Sport (Been a dry time for decent ammo in college) and I've been shooting great with it. Probably averaging about 392/393 ex 400. Only get a strange shot every few hundred rounds. Very impressed with it.

The range I shoot at has a machine rest available for ammo testing. I recently tested multiple brands of ammo just to see what I should test further.
RWS R50- the lot I had shot ok. but I would have to shoot other lots to determine if it was good ammo.
Lapua Center X- Shot like crap in my rifle
Lapua Midas +- shot ok but not well enough for the price
Eley Tenex- Shot the best out of all the ammo I tested but not much better.
SK Standard plus(Lapua product)- shot slightly worse than the Tenex but was by far the best for the money.

I am currently lot testing Eley black. It is shooting well.

I can provide lot numbers if asked. I might still have the targets.

The coolest thing about Eley EPS ammo is the little holes it leaves. :)
Matt

Dave IRL wrote:

Colin wrote:I'm with Dave IRL on this, there's no point in buying the most expensive of any make unless you can batch test it.Just because it's the top brand of that manufacturer doesn't mean it's going to perform any better in your barrel than the less costly one. But don't buy the really cheap stuff and expect it to perform well though.

I have to say, I was always a snob about ammo, but lately, I've been shooting a lot of the Eley Sport (Been a dry time for decent ammo in college) and I've been shooting great with it. Probably averaging about 392/393 ex 400. Only get a strange shot every few hundred rounds. Very impressed with it.

Thinking more of the bean tin sk were you have 500rnd loose.

Ah yes, have no experience of that and no desire to get any. :) I really like the facility Lapua offer where you can test their various grades of ammo and buy accordingly, so you can have your batch of Midas+ or Xact for competition, but you can also have lots of their SK Rifle Match, batch tested, for training purposes, which gives you cheap ammo, which, yeah, might throw a flier here and there, but you should be able to call them, and the trigger time benefits are enormous. http://www.tenring.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=98 is an example of a review of the batch-tested Rifle Match, which complemented a batch of Midas+ tested at the same time. I'm currently waiting to hear back from Lapua about the possibility of sending them my rifle by courier for testing and receiving back both rifle and ammunition thereafter and if that's going ahead, then the majority of what I'd take would be Rifle Match, for testing. You can see Miroslav Varga testing the same stuff at http://www.youtube.com/user/Varga600?bl ... J-pnETYnCU

matchguy wrote:

Bob3700 wrote: Shot Ely black box eps, Ely Club, Lapua Midas L, MasterL and Midas M. Hands down, my Anschutz 1913 with scope shot the Lapua into little holes at 50 yds. and that was prone with a sling.
Bob

Which of those 3 Lapua did the best for you?

The Midas M was the best followed by the Midas L. Older ammo that is not available now. Going to try some of the Midas + as the gun shows a preference for Lapua ammo.

Shot some of the older Federal 711B and at 50 yds, it shot nice small cloverleafs for groups. Pretty impressive really. Wolf ME performed the same.

Went to 100 yds yesterday with my collection of ammo. Shooting my 1913 with a 20 power scope off a sling. Didn't find anything that would shoot 1" groups but the wind was a factor. Two best ammos were the Midas M and the Fed 711B. Both produced about 1 1/4" groups at that range with the wind. Vertical was the lowest with both of those brands.

Bob