Load Development for a new rifle. The start to finish product

[rockchalk06]

After I got home on Saturday, I decided to stick with 46.9 grains of Varget as my powder charge. Low SD, Decent ES and the group I can improve or retry with better conditions.

Now that I have my charge, I decided to do a small seating depth test. In the beginning, I decided upon a seating depth based off of Jam, then finding mag length and going 003" off that to start.

I started again at 2.190" with 5 rounds, dropped .003" to 2.187" and another .003" to 2.184"

Again, I kept with 46.9 grains as my standard for all 3 depths.

 

[rockchalk06]

Today (Sunday) was a fantastic day to be at the range. All 30-50 shooters at the club must have thought so too. It was a day of pew! 50° today



I fired the first 5 shot group at 2.190" that I had good results from Saturday. Ignore the marked shot. I did a scope adjustment last night and that was a 175 grain load to see where impact was. That flyer to the right was shot #3 at 2833 FPS, but it kicked off good. This is the second time this load has done this. SD was 6 and ES was 17. This has my brain scared with this jump. Maybe that round was longer than the others by a .001" of an inch and my calipers didn't pick it up? I just don't know. It makes me wonder if any longer than 2.190" and the harmonics get wonky.


2.187" was pretty damn stellar. No kickers, no flyers and that far right shot was #1 after the rifle sat for a good hour. Between chatting, going gold for new shooters and some work I did, the can and barrel were cold. I'm good with calling it a cold bore shot. I can 100% live with this. SD was as tiny bit higher at 6.2, but the ES was lower at 15.3.


2.184" started off really really well. First two shots were touching, but the final 3 were low, but still touching. SD was 8.2 and ES was 23.8. That Extreme Spread was just too much for my tastes. If I push this out to 500 yards, that will come back to bite me in the ass.


So today was a great day. Low wind, warm, no rush to shoot at all. Average of all 3 groups were 2836. I could not be happier with this stability. The low SD, decent ES and that little group had me all excited. I almost didn't want to shoot my 30-30 just to get home and measure it.

 

[rockchalk06]

.483" 5 shot group off a Bi-Pod and bag with a cold bore included. 50° down to 24° 2830 it stayed. I currently have this X-Bolt shooting sub half MOA at 100 yards.

Next step is take it out further. 200 and 300 on paper then 328, 437 and 546 on steel. If goes well, I should have one hell of a deer rifle launching a 155 grain bullet 2830 at the muzzle.

It may be awhile, but if we have temps below 24°, I will get back out and run another 5 over the Garmin and see what I get.




Thanks for following along OKBalls. This has been a blast to do!

 

[conditionzero]

Been awesome to watch this!

 

[OkieJoe]

Next step is take it out further. 200 and 300 on paper then 328, 437 and 546 on steel. If goes well, I should have one hell of a deer rifle launching a 155 grain bullet 2830 at the muzzle.

Your entire thread is great, and I appreciate the information that you’ve shared. I was thinking about it all today, and I started overthinking it all and specifically bullet selection and distance. It’s a little off subject, but do you consider what the bullet will do upon impact for hunting purposes. For instance, would you take a shot at a deer that is only 50 yards away with this particular load that you’ve worked up? In my head, I can see the bullet passing through pretty cleanly in the 50 yard scenario. In a simplistic world, I want a bullet to penetrate the vitals, but not have the bullet exit the animal. In the real world, an exit wound is pretty common, but hopefully the bullet has done enough damage as it passed through to drop the deer. When you’re working up a load, do you take into account the average expected distance for a shot while hunting? If you think that I’m way overthinking it, feel free to call me a retard.

 

[rockchalk06]

Your entire thread is great, and I appreciate the information that you’ve shared. I was thinking about it all today, and I started overthinking it all and specifically bullet selection and distance. It’s a little off subject, but do you consider what the bullet will do upon impact for hunting purposes. For instance, would you take a shot at a deer that is only 50 yards away with this particular load that you’ve worked up? In my head, I can see the bullet passing through pretty cleanly in the 50 yard scenario. In a simplistic world, I want a bullet to penetrate the vitals, but not have the bullet exit the animal. In the real world, an exit wound is pretty common, but hopefully the bullet has done enough damage as it passed through to drop the deer. When you’re working up a load, do you take into account the average expected distance for a shot while hunting? If you think that I’m way overthinking it, feel free to call me a retard.

You're a tard, but not because of that

But seriously, yes sir I do. My research and talking with a Berger tech, that bullet there's a minimum of 1800 FPS to reliability expand and they didn't give me a FPS max. I was basically told, you can't push this bullet fast enough with a. 308 to not get some expansion.

Berger Bullets typically hit 2" of penetration then rapidly expand. In a perfect world, if like 100 yards or more for this rifle and have my 30-30 or 45 Colt for 50 yards shots.

When I'm able, I take high shoulder shots. I've never had a complete pass through using Berger hunting bullets with no damage. Caveat to that statement: My sample size is small at 11 deer total with a rifle since using them.

 

[OkieJoe]

You're a tard, but not because of that

But seriously, yes sir I do. My research and talking with a Berger tech, that bullet there's a minimum of 1800 FPS to reliability expand and they didn't give me a FPS max. I was basically told, you can't push this bullet fast enough with a. 308 to not get some expansion.

Berger Bullets typically hit 2" of penetration then rapidly expand. In a perfect world, if like 100 yards or more for this rifle and have my 30-30 or 45 Colt for 50 yards shots.

When I'm able, I take high shoulder shots. I've never had a complete pass through using Berger hunting bullets with no damage. Caveat to that statement: My sample size is small at 11 deer total with a rifle since using them.

Thank you, and yes I’m a tard for many many reasons.

 

[rockchalk06]

Annealing has been a rabbit hole I've wanted to dive down for some time. Cost and lack of experience have kept me from pursing it. Recently I learned that our Club has access to an AMP Annealer and for a small fee or donation, you can you use it when needed. Indoors heat/cooled area that's secured. Made my donation today and here is the sacrificial lamb. Generated a code I used and knocked out the remaining 99 pieces from this lot of brass.

They are in the sonic cleaner as we speak after setting my neck tension to .002" and bumping my shoulders back 001". I believe my chamber is pretty tight on this X-Bolt. This load is near max and all 99 pieces after firing, annealing, setting neck tension and bumping the shoulders back measure my original trim length of 2.005".

 

[ClintC]

Annealing has been a rabbit hole I've wanted to dive down for some time. Cost and lack of experience have kept me from pursing it. Recently I learned that our Club has access to an AMP Annealer and for a small fee or donation, you can you use it when needed. Indoors heat/cooled area that's secured. Made my donation today and here is the sacrificial lamb. Generated a code I used and knocked out the remaining 99 pieces from this lot of brass.

They are in the sonic cleaner as we speak after setting my neck tension to .002" and bumping my shoulders back 001". I believe my chamber is pretty tight on this X-Bolt. This load is near max and all 99 pieces after firing, annealing, setting neck tension and bumping the shoulders back measure my original trim length of 2.005".

View attachment 3969

You know a flame Annealer wouldn’t do that. . Great deal you get to use the amp annealer.

 

[rockchalk06]

You know a flame Annealer wouldn’t do that. . Great deal you get to use the amp annealer.

But I press two buttons and start dunking and plopping

 

[CS Boomis]

All I know about annealing is what I’ve read over the years. In another thread you had an example of a ring separated case that was laying about. Would full length annealing prevent what I assume is ring hardening and case separation?

 

[rockchalk06]

All I know about annealing is what I’ve read over the years. In another thread you had an example of a ring separated case that was laying about. Would full length annealing prevent what I assume is ring hardening and case separation?

I don't know enough about annealing to know if you can anneal much past the shoulder? My guess is you cannot. I've never seen anyone anneal much past where the should meets the case 1/4" past.

 

[Ndenway]

Neck & top shoulder is all I've ever annealed,

that was only on cases I had few of that were hard to find and to affordably replace.

I'm not a benchrest or long range shooter either,

With my best rifle 22-250 when I've drank enough coffee and smoked enough cigarettes I can 5 shot group .5" at 100yards,

if not I can still get sub 1" groups most times, sometimes I'm way off game a herd of buffalo would have no fear