Enjoying your escapade. Do tell more.

Not done yet. This has become my opus. The major lesson is yet to come...

Well done Janfred and great write up! Sounds like Dave is a great teacher / guide!

I assume you drove down with your rifle?

Great writeup! Its making me horribly lus.

After placing the hollowed out piggie in the shade, we continued on to a camp where Dave had seen a lot of warthog before. This prime location had a lot less bushes allowing us to see quite far, and there was nothing. And so we returned the way we came.

As we passed the little piggie, Dave had pretty much realised that impala might not be on the cards. As we continued down the road we were looking for warthog under the bushes and through the lanes; nothing. When we got back to the empty skaap kraal, the decision was made to go back to camp and start again later in the afternoon. This was around 1130 and we have been walking for a good 12kms, if not more.

As we were coming around a bend close to a farm gate, Dave froze and me following suit. One thing I learnt is if Dave stops, I stop, even if I don't know why. When I looked up there was a big impala ram standing right in from of us in the middel of the road; approximately 30m away. I just started to get my rifle off my shoulder when Dave hissed at me to stand still. That is when I realised that this was Cody's white whale; One-horn himself. Half a minute later the spell broke and One-horn gracefully jumped over the fence and disappeared. Gathering our wits about us, we spotted a kudu cow 20m further away watching the commotion and a young bull around 150m away. Unfortunately kudy was not on the menu; not yet anyway.

We passed through the gate and continued down the road next to the fence, just to see more kudu! Mid-day is apparently the worst time to find impala. Dave, probably thinking me to be very unlucky with impala, conviced me to go for a kudu. Of the road we went to stalk closer. We did not go 50m before Dave froze again and told me to get ready. In front of us were a herd of impala!

Dave setup the shooting sticks and I got ready finally settling the croshairs on a  ram when started walking. It disappeared behind a bush and came out on the other side. When it stopped side on, only the head and neck was above the branches. 1kg of pressure later the side of the head turned into a red mess and the impala dropped.

A short tracking exercise for little Asterix later and I saw again the results of my handiwork. The ram turned out to be a ewe. I have no idea how I missed it unless there were two impala behind the bush. Also, even though most of the brain was gone, the heart was still beating. And so my education continued as to where and how to cut an antelope throat. The gutting process was slightly easier than the piggie, just required slightly more effort to remove the organs. Also learnt that if you do not want blood on your clothes, either remove it before gutting or hunting is not for you.


With that job done and the carcass left in a shaded area to drain, we continued on towards the camp. We did not walk 10 minutes before we saw another ram behind a bush looking towards us. Again the ram was behind bushes with some branches obscuring the heart-lung area. I cannot say I consciously aimed for the head, but that is where I found the crosshairs when the trigger broke and the impala went down. The bullet hit just off to the center and in line with the bottom of the right eye. What was weird about this one is that its neck was broken. When we finally dragged the carcass to the road Cody have caught up to us having already picked up the "massive" warthog and the previous impala. Probably because the guide did not want to wait for the 10 minutes I require to gut an animal, he asked Cody to do the task. And, yes, Cody is much fater at the task than me. Three minutes later we loaded the carcass on the back of the bakkie and made our way back to camp at the speed of sound...

I made prototype number three of the speed loader carrier and I'm done with development. Well almost, I made the 'skirt' below the retention fingers too short to accommodate 357 field loads so that part needs to be 6 mm deeper but that will be sorted in the template.

It works like a bomb and with a template will be easy and quick to cut out. I will not be finishing the 6 I need by hand as it's a ball ache but will rather deburr and polish them in my wet brass tumbler.

When I think of how much of a mission this design is to make from sheet I can understand how the guy I stole it from was charging 70 dollars a piece. Making it from a PVC pipe is a couple banana exercise by comparison and I think that 2mm thick PVC is actually a better material for the application than Kydex as it's stiffer.

His design rendered in Kydex required a complicated arrangement to allow a double layer in the belt hook, I assume to stiffen it up enough while using material thin enough to make the loader releasable with reasonable force.

Quote from: zguy on Jul 25, 2024, 08:23 PMI see Lyman makes a mold that looks like like a Diablo style.
I wonder if that shape I more accurate compared to the lee slugs.

Handsize grouping at 50m is pretty good, especially for zombie shaped targets.

I have one of those in 525 grain if memory serves. It is significantly more accurate than the Lee slugs because it has a very nose heavy bias, just like the air rifle pellet it resembles. It's also a sub bore slug and you put it in a standard wad shot cup. If I was hunting for single slug mold now and couldn't get the svarog stuff it would be my pick. 

I see Lyman makes a mold that looks like like a Diablo style.
I wonder if that shape I more accurate compared to the lee slugs.

Handsize grouping at 50m is pretty good, especially for zombie shaped targets.

Lots of bolts

BRNO ZG 47 and ZKK-600 differences

Some history

Basic Information

The factory

CZ 600 Series

Perhaps an email to them will elicit an answer to the problem ?