For the noncompetitive shooter who is trying to develop accuracy but is not in match competition, is it likely that one company's LRN 158 grain bullet will be roughly the same in accuracy as their wadcutter?

Again, not for competition or scoring but general accuracy.

Or, are wadcutters so radically more accurate that they are greatly preferred?

Wadcutter holes are just easier to see. I doubt if you would notice the difference under the conditions you mentioned.

LRN that fit the throats are usually about as accurate as anything, but they are a pain to score on a bullseye or PPC target.

The size of a lead bullet matters more to accuracy than the nose shape.

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Science plus Art

I shoot the Federal 158 gr. LRN in the revolver match at Camp Perry. I have not been able to easily duplicate it's accuracy with my loads. The wadcutter will make cleaner holes in the paper than the RN bullet but I have not seen any accuracy differences.

i believe that the hollow base wadcutter has a slight accuracy edge because at low pressures the skirt easily expands to fit the barrel. Someone in competition may notice this, but i sure won't

I think double-ended and bevel base wadcutters are about as accurate as a RN bullet but, like others mentioned, make a nice round hole.

I have shot several different 158gr lead bullets from different makers that have flat, beveled and recessed bottoms and then you have the RN, FP, TC and SWC designs as well as plain and with cannelures, .357 or .358 dia along with hardness.

Over the years I have found that my M19, 49 and 686 prefer a certain bullet over others but the big thing is usually the powder that is used for the velocity ranges.
For low velocity target loads I like the RN with a small hollow base, if you can find it. 18 or harder BB bottoms seem to work better for me at the higher speeds, but that is just my guns.
I don't go crazy and "Mic" every bullet for Dia. but I do try for "Standard loads" and powders to see how they compare to the Factory folders. When I find a keeper I make a note in my logs books an PC.
I am accually down to 200 158 LRN and just ordered 500 Lswc
just in case.

Good shooting.

SWC is a much more effective anti-personnel round and makes a cleaner hole in the paper. As far as a difference in accuracy, that is highly questionable. The weight and bearing surface of the bullet are very similar.

No, wadcutters are not magically accurate. They are designed to take up a lot of the excess case space that exists when light charges of fast burning powder are used in target loads and to cut those clean holes for scoring. Being a student of Elmer Keith, I always thought the SWC the best compromise but some of my most accurate loads used round nosed bullets.( which irritated me because I liked the looks of SWC's) You can work up an accurate load with any nose shape...all guns have thier favorite load, it's up to you to figure out which one. One thing I am a believer in is a flat base, I never could get better accuracy with bevel base bullets. In all this I'm referring to cast lead bullets. Another bullet to try is the round nosed flat point, developed for cowboy action shooting, I hear good accuracy is possible with them.
I will have to say the hollow based target wadcutter as sold by Speer and Hornady are probably the best for 38 special target loads...but these aren't cast.
Welcome to the wonderful world of reloading and good luck.

Gary

Thanks Everyone.....this answers my question!

I saw a video on "making" your own match grade ammo. In short the recommendation was to sort your ammo by various characteristics, most importantly weight, but also either length or diameter of the rim (I forget all the recommendations, thickness of the rim might have been one). Are you actually making match grade ammo? no - the basic idea is that if you have a bucket of bulk ammo (perhaps especially in 22 LR) there will be variation and that if you spend some time sorting through that variation and making several groups of ammo out of a large pile - where the characteristics of each round in each pile is effectively the same as all the other rounds in that pile then when you are shooting there will be less variation from shot to shot from a particular pile.

I have not tried this myself - but if you were to measure every round in a box of 158 grain ammo - you might get a third that weigh 157 and a third that weigh 158 and a third that weigh 159 (actually all those numbers would higher since the live round weight includes the case and power and primer). I am not sure how much a tiny difference makes but it should be better than having 9 rounds weighing 159 in your magazine and the 10th round weighs 157.

Along those same lines - if you choose to use SWC you would not want to have 9 out of 10 rounds SWC and the last round LRN - because that might have enough of an effect on the ballistics of the projectile to affect your accuracy. The real question perhaps is whether or not the effect of the variation of the ammo is less than or greater than the variation in your grip and hold and trigger pull etc.

Funny you should mention this. I just bought a box of Geco 38 SPL and when I opened the box one of the bullets had fallen out of the casing and the box had a sprinkling of "powder grains" all over it.

So I guess checking for consistency is not such a bad idea.

I always like shooting and reloading the 146 grain wadcutter bullets with Bullseye powder. It's a classic, low recoil, accurate combination. There's a reason Smith & Wesson chambered their legendary Model 52 wadcutter gun for this round. (I still groan when I think about having traded mine away for a Colt .45 ACP).

A lot depends on your intended distances. For short range ~25 yards or so the wadcutter will probably deliver everything you want, but they do tend to tip at longer ranges, killing accuracy. For longer distances, you'll want the RN, or a good semiwadcutter. For all around use, try to find the afore mentioned good semiwadcutter.