Home Forums Reloading Varmint Rifles Got a couple reloading questions

Just wondering how often are you guys trimming your brass and how or what do you choose to change first when your working up loads? I was loading and shooting the swift today and my 3 loads were all the same with the exception of the powder charge. If you find a load that looks promising do you alter the powder charge first, the OAL, the bullet, what?

you're over thinking it....
if you find a load that works great.. smile, load and go shoot it...

How so? How or what process are people using to get say from a 5 shot group that measures 6 tenths to a group that measures 4 tenths? What makes or doesn't make the "grade" to warrant further work, ie changes? And if it does warrant further work, what work do you do?

^^^^^^^^^^^ This

Your rifle may not be capable of that sub .5 consistently and .6 out of a factory ruger isnt bad.
What most people dont realize is that even with a bullet going 4000 fps just a little puff of wind will blow your .4 to a .6 real quick.
Use wind flags and good repeatable bench techniques to tighten whats already a good group.

Look at it this way....

I shoot sage rats, usually from 100 to under 250 yds...

mostly use a 223 chambered rifle, which I have multiples of...

take them to the range and they are tack drivers, with my handloads and give nice small tiny groups at 100 yds...

yet I've got one barrel from ER Shaw, that wasn't such a good deliverer of tiny groups... I was pretty disappointed in it to tell ya the truth....

but I still took it out to the varmint fields to see if I could get it to work at least at some distance, probably just for the closer shots...

well a 500 round afternoon proved one thing... even tho it wasn't as accurate as most of my other 223s, it scored just as high of percentages on sage rats out to 250 yds as did any of my best shooting 223s, connecting about 85% of the time....

So in the real world, for hunting or varmint shooting...one that groups 4/10s of an inch vs 6/10s of an inch isn't going to mean a hill of beans...

unless you are competing with it ( and 4/10s of an inch isn't a competitive barrel).... then as I said above, don't overthink it, smile and just go out and shoot it...

The barrel will usually be more accurate than most shooters are about to take full advantage of it..

jaytee... It really sounds like you already have it dialed in. With what you have given, I normally would play with the bullets seating depth ,like you said, next and nothing more. You,re on the right track.

It really depends.

If I have a couple kegs of a single powder, I'll start with them min load, and max oal for several bullets and see what looks the most promising. I will then increase powder charge, up to max, and if necessary adjust OAL, but always reducing it as to not increase pressure.

If there's a specific bullet I want to work with, I'll put half dozen powders behind it at min and see what looks good, then work up as above.

That's basically the way I do it too, except sometimes after I find the most accurate load with bullets seated as far out as possible, I'll try a different primer before playing with seating depth, especially with spherical powders.

How do you guys measure the distance to the lands? I'm using the Hornady inline gauge that uses a modified cartridge case and the bullet of choice. So Mule, you put more "weight" on the primer choice then OAL? Why so? And Antelope, are you going by max OAL from the books or from your particular rifle?

No, you misunderstood. The way to test factors is to alter only one at a time.

If using extruded powders (which ignite easily) with any charge up to about 60 grains, the primer usually doesn't make much difference. But spherical powders often ignite more consistently with a hotter primer, even in very small cases. So if I'm using an extruded powder in charges of less than 60 grains, I'll play with seating depth before changing primers.

But with spherical powders, in any size case, the primer can be more of a factor.

I knew a guy who was never satisfied and was constantly trying this and that and different load variations of the most picayune in nature. He was retired, and drug his hotrod .22 centerfires out to the range two or three times a week and expended a couple hundred rounds weekly, year 'round. More than once he lost the gilt edged accuracy of a barrel before he found "The Load". Some of us were dumbfounded that he couldn't live with what was to us outstanding accuracy in a couple instances. He would just smile and say "ain't it great?", as he boxed up another gun for re-barreling.

Thanks Mule. I get the only making one change at a time method. I think I'm down to just one brand of primers, CCI's so I guess its time to get some more.

Well it was another nice calm morning here at the farm so I drug out the ol swift and flung a little lead. I had 3 different loads that I had worked up several months back so I decided to give them a go. All were loaded with H 380 and 55 grain Sierra Spitzer BT's and CCI 200 primers. First load down the tube was 38 grains of powder and an OAL of 3.414 and it printed 5 shots at .734 and 4 of those at .261! The other two were also pretty good with 5 shots right at an inch. Time to load up some more of the 38 grain loads and see if I can get close to that group size again!!

Jaytee I was trying to keep my example simple, but I can certainly provide some additional color.

Just by happenstance, most of my rifles tend to be long throated, so I usually start at magazine length. If the bolt won't comfortable close at magazine length, I uses to seat deeper half turn of the seating step until it does, and call that max. Now I measure with the former stoney points, now hornady case length gauge.

As for primers, I'm a big believer that primers can make a huge difference. My practices tend to mirror Johns. With traditional stick powders I start with a mild standard primer, typically a CCI 200/400, until the case capacity get into the magnum range.

For spherical powders, I always start with either a magnum or benchrest primer. If it's a powder I've worked with, and understand, I may start closer to max as well, since it's they tend to produce their best groups at or near max.

Some of the modern, very fine stick powders can be a little more fickle regarding their primer preference, so I may try both a standard and magnum behind them, or just start with a benchrest primer.

Usually OAL is also the last thing I mess with, unless I'm getting the dreaded "2 in, and one out" at which point I'll start moving it in to see if I can alleviate that specific issue.

Still, too much time and money is wasted on small groups. The groups most guys post here wouldn't even make the top 1000 shooters in a bench rest competition. To shoot something from a gopher to an elk, you don't need that kind of a group to accomplish that.

Don't worry about your groups worry more about your shooting. You will find you can kill more as a rifleman than you can with a rifle...