A friend of mine has a 14 year old daughter who just got a T/C Omega. Even with Harvester Crush Rib Sabots, she cannot get the Hornady XTP bullet seated because of the pressure needed. She is not wimpy; the bore is just very tight. Is there an accurate bullet or bullet/sabot combo that will shoot accurately through an Omega? BTW, she is using Blackhorn 209 which needs a firmly seated bullet.
I am considering Powerbelts, but they shot poorly in my Omega. Haven't tried the Hornady 350 FPBs or the Harvester version of the Powerbelts.
Our season ends in one week, so I am looking ahead to next year.
Thanks,
Leon
I shot Thors from the Omega I used to have. They were very accurate, and it's a Barnes bullet, so terminal performance is all you can ask for.
If you shoot Terry an e-mail he'll send you a sample of different sizes to see which one your barrel likes. Then when you order them you'll know they fit and how hard they'll load.
http://thorbullets.com/
Thanks, I had forgotten about them.
I am sitting in a stand right now with an Omega loaded with a Hornady SST/ML 250g with it's included red sabot on top of Blackhorn 209. It's minute of deer accurate out to 150 yards and easy to load.
I tried the sample pack from Thor and had the .500 drop down the barrel, the .501 barely engage the rifling (afraid of shaking the bullet loose), and the .502 almost need a hammer to get down. I have no doubt it's a better bullet but I want simple and easy.
That's why he sends out sample packs. They don't work in some barrels.
The sample pack was free, and you didn't waste any money buying bullets you can't use. Not a bad deal.
btw..The .501 300gr probably would have been perfect. It fits a little tighter than the 250gr.
Most Omegas will shoot powerbelts well, so just because yours didn't doesn't mean hers won't. Unfortunately, with a powerbelt, you have to "size up" because they are not built that tough. So if you are used to using 200-250 gr bullet with a sabot, you need to use bigger powerbelts because they are soft lead. For whitetail, the 295 would be absolute minimum and 348 would be preferred. In front of 80-85 gr of powder (max of 90 gr), should be a good bullet.
FPBs and Thors probably may be too hard to load for her too, but certainly would be worth trying. The FPB has to be sized with a short starter since it is overbore sized. You can pick the correct size of Thor, but you want them pretty snug too.
Our Omega has a very tight bore. It was a bear to load until I tried Crush Rib sabots. It shoots excellent groups with Crush Ribs and the several weights of XTPs, and Gold Dots I have tried.
try a 295 hp powerbelt ,90grns of blackhorn and a regular win primer.
Check out MMP Sabots. They make a very thin sabot for difficult to load rifles. I had difficulty finding anything that would fit my tight bored TC Black Diamond and the MMP was the answer.
The Barnes 245 gr Spitfire is what you need. The shoot small group with the Blackhorn 209 , easy to load in the Omega and Encore and kill extremely well.
The blue EZ sabots from Barnes are pretty easy to load in my Omega.
I use the Barnes expanders in my TC woods rifle and it is hard to push them down the barrel, but they shoot lights out. I have found that I can seat the sabot and then drop the bullet down the barrel and seat it. It lines up with the mark on my ramrod and I see no loss in accuracy. It is a simple way with these bullets because they have some taper on the base of the bullet and as of yet have not caught on the petals of the sabot. I have not tried this with any other bullet. miles
Thanks fellows. The season ends Friday, so Heather and I will try some of the Barnes and some of the T/C Super glides during Thanksgiving break if I can find any on the shelf.
As far as ease of loading and accuracy in my TC Omega ...
Barnes TEZ 250 gr flat based blue sabot - Loads tight and requires a fair amount of effort/very poor accuracy. Expensive too.
TC 250 gr super glide yellow sabot - easier to load but still poor accuracy.
Hornady 250 gr SST High SpeedLow Drag (red) Sabot - easiest to load and delivers the best accuracy in my Omega. It's also the least expensive sabot/bullet combo. Using the Barnes bullet with the red Hornady sabot results in similar accuracy and POI.
YMMV
FWIW, the MMP (black) hph 3 Petal-EZ and the Hornady High SpeedLow Drag (red) Sabot are the same sabot - just different colors.