I kinda like the 23's, but have never seen one fitted with that particular type of 'furniture';-) Hahaha

Am much enjoying the discussion and progress with your Ballard, Michael. Apparently the darkened front portion of your bbl. is not an impediment to its shooting well! Glad it has worked out that way for you. How about a pic of the bullets you've tried to go with the group pics? How much larger than the bore dia. in front of the throat is the 'better' bullet, or is it? Does the bullet up-set any when hand seated or too hard for that?

I will be very interested to see how it shoots when you get the rest of it sorted and have the opportunity to do some serious testing w/o the current aggravations. Thanks for the thread!