Thanks Gary
Smith called and said they bore scoped the gun and it looks fine---no excessive throat erosion or fouling. Said the barrel looks fine! They then test fired it with some factory ammo (couldn't get which brand---me being deaf and all) and said it shot fine.
One thing the smithy did mention is, they are wondering if my loads are hot enough to cause bullet instability. I don't know why the loads would suddenly be hotter. Same jug of Benchmark as was used working up the original loads. The bullets are from a different lot---?? Maybe that is it?
The rifle always shot Berger 35's really well, but was a stinker about needing several fouling rounds to get "settled." Also shot 32 Sierra's pretty good at max load with Benchmark. Well, a few weeks ago, it started key-holing with the Sierras. Brought it home and researched the issue, and found some posts in another forum about 32 Sierras key-holing unless loaded about 1/2 gr less than max with Benchmark (this was recommended by the tech support at Sierra Bullets). Loaded some rounds as recommended, and they key-holed and some didn't even hit the paper.
I have the targets that I originally shot when working up the Sierra rounds. 1/2 groups at 100, and at 200 yards was getting 1 1/2 groups with a light wind. So the mystery deepens. And some of the Bergers began key-holing later. This is almost like the gun is possessed. I can shoot the 22-250 or 222and they are shooting just like always, so it isn't some kind of uncontrollable flinch or something.
Head space is good. Brass FL sized and trimmed to length. 7 1/2 Remmy primers as always. Rifle cleaned same as always. ????
So, back to the bench and then out to the range. All fun but damned puzzling.