My guess (and it's a total guess
) would be that Bob is going to revive the .223 Weatherby project.
Basically, that case is the .223 Ackley Improved with Weatherby's signature Powell-Miller venturi shoulder. The case capacity is identical to the .223 Ackley.
Nosler's Ballistic Lab did all of the development work on the .223 Weatherby and I have several of the Oehler printout sheets on it. Keeping chamber pressure UNDER SAAMI for the .223 Remington, the Improved case yields a cool 4,000 fps with 40-grainers, 3,700 fps with 50s and 3,500 with 55-grain bullets.
Weatherby was about to introduce the round and I even wrote a cartridge profile for the
Nosler Reloading Manual ... when Weatherby suddenly decided to drop the project.
Frankly, it was a huge waste of my time and effort, trying to help the folks out. Water under the bridge now, but it was a bit of a piss-off.
Rumor had it, at the time, that Weatherby supplied one-million Norma cases to Nosler for the cartridge load development. Maybe Nosler held onto the cases and decided to go forward with the project themselves.
Anyway, that would be my guess.
God Bless,
Steve
PS. I was sworn to secrecy about the .223 Weatherby project at the time. It's now several years later, so I guess it's now OK to talk about it. By this time, both the folks at Nosler and at Weatherby have totally forgotten about an elderly has-been minor gun writer, so "It don't mean nothin'".
