Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Ken Water's "Pet Loads"

Pet Loads is my favorite reloading reference too and I have several as well. I enjoy his writing with anecdotal information, personal experience, and the travails of getting a rifle to shoot properly. I guess some of the newer whizbangs aren't covered but for the most part I am not interested in them anyway. PH

Haven't seen Ken in years and haven't talked with him in almost as long. Probably won't, ever again, considering his age and condition in Connecticut and mine 'way out here.

I'm pleased to see that he's still held in the high regard that he's earned and not subjected to any of the same kind of cheap calumnies that small, spiteful minds love to level at prominent old writers.

When I lived in Alaska I had a 375 H&H with a 24" barrel that I could not get up to speed with 3 different powders. IMR-4350 I couldn't even get enough in the case to make a 270 grain run as fasts as a 300 grainers advertised speed.
I bought a copy of Ken Waters Pet Loads and the Powder that he used that got the highest velocity was W-760. I tried 760 and low and behold I was able to get this rifle to run at advertised velocity

Ken was no dummy that is for sure and for certain

Pet Loads was always a great pleasure to read, and I still refer to it every now & then.

I've read everything I could by Ken Waters and I did learn. I occasionally differed with some of his conclusions, but I admired his painstaking methodology. He lacked modern pressure equipment (it was a lot more expensive then), but he methodically worked up loads and his description and history of cartridges was superb. I always wished someone could have put a USB cable into his mind and download his knowledge.

USB cable?

My ol' friend Ken would never think of owning or using a computer and wouldn't understand your reference.

It's something of a puzzle and a miracle that he uses smokeless powders.

He might fly if airliners ran on coal-fired steam.

(You think I'm kidding? I speak known specifics.)

Well said.......

A couple years ago, I had a friend who was having a hard time finding a certain powder on the shelves. I had a few extra pounds, so I met him at a halfway point to give them to him. He wouldn't hear of not paying me, and then pulled out a copy of "Pet Loads" to give me, said he had an extra copy!!

I haven't read all of it, but I'm working my way through. What's that quote about standing on someone's shoulders?

I always find myself reading Pet Loads, even about cartridges I don't own nor probably ever will. Every loader should own this book, it's a great source of knowledge and information.

I kind of think that a large number of these writers really have only average ability. There are magazines like Shooting Times, Guns and Ammo and such that are basically good enough to line the bird cage. Handloader is better, Presicion Shooter better than that.

Then I think that if some of these guys wrote an article with what they know and put it in front of an editor, that editor might just say "Too long, will fly over the head of our readers, dumb it down."


I think the internet has rendered these magazines obsolete. Much can be learned from sights, and reloading forums. One simply has to be careful in validating anything they read.

+1 on the reference and +1 on the boring new whizbangs.

I have been reloading since 1968 and have the entire archive of Handloader Magazine. It is uncanny, but in nearly all my rifles, I've found MY maximum loads to be almost exactly midway between those of Waters and Hagel.

Whenever I consider getting a new rifle in a cartidge I don't have, I read and see what Ken Waters did with the round in his load work up. Got expensive a time or two but I have some nice rifles in calibers I never would have gotten otherwise.
Mr. Waters once wrote about something and was unable to find the reference. I came across it, the reference from my library and made him a copy. The very nice thank you letter i received proved exactly one thing to me. Mr. Waters is a gentleman of the highest order. Oh yeah, if Don Martin is lurking, his article on the .358 got my curiosity up. Now I have 5 rifles for that cartridge. HIs article on the .280 Remington convinced me I should have one Like I say, he cost me money and I'm not complaining one darn bit.
Paul B.

I've spent quite a bit of time reading through Pet Loads and it's a good source of information, although I find his loadings to be a bit on the conservative side. (understandable)

My main complaint is that he uses lever action 30-30's with 24" barrels and even bolt action 30-30's for much of his data.

The vast majority of 30-30 ammo is fired through lever action carbines with 20" barrels and the velocity data for the bolt rifles and 24" lever actions doesn't translate to the 20" barrels very well.

Yes, indeed. "Much can be learned from sights" on any number of Internet sites.

And some of it may be right. ("rite?" "write?" "wright?")

Yep. I got a letter from him discussing the .32-40 about 10-12 years ago, and from the paper impressions it was clearly a typed letter.

Darn I always figured he was paid by the word, and spelled out stuff for that reason

No, he was paid a flat rate per article � never as much as he should've been paid � no matter how many words it took to tell the whole story. $125 or $150, IIRC � on publication, although it was customary at the time to pay writers on acceptance.

Article-writers don't get paid by the word, anyway. I don't recall ever having had to trim any of Ken's manuscripts for any reason.

I pled hard for several years to get that rate raised to fair and equitable, but the boss preferred to exploit our writers' loyalty. I was finally able to persuade him to raise it a little, from criminal to merely insulting, and even that (I think) slipped back a notch or two when I left. At any rate, Ken would never have made a lot of money, even if he'd been paid by the word.

Well, that's the point, you can't just take someones word. That is the way we all learn. I mean, I'm sure they don't teach ballistics in journalism schools.

To say, "I'm a journalist and therefore and expert" does not qualify the expert status. After all, Katie Couric and Babara Walters are also journalists

'No, he was paid a flat rate per article � never as much as he should've been paid � no matter how many words it took to tell the whole story. $125 or $150, IIRC � on publication, although it was customary at the time to pay writers on acceptance.'

That was pretty much criminal considering the time and effort it took to load, shoot, and write those pieces with such meticulous detail and thoroughness. Did he have to purchase the brass, bullets, powder and other supplies and accessories? Looks like he was losing money doing those Pet Loads columns. Oh I am sure it was pretty much a labor of love but jeez he ought to have made something for all that effort. Hopefully he gets a bit from sales of Pet Loads. PH