Home Forums Hunting & Shooting General Big Game 6mm remington and deer/antalope

Our experience with the NBT's at our deer hunting camp is too much expansion on impact. So, the trend locally has been away from NBT's on deer. They are super accurate and I do use 180 gr. NBT's in my .300 Win Mag, but at 3,050 fps. Heavier bullet, not at excessive velocity. Still, that bullet is pretty explosive. It's OK on deer, quite lethal. On head shot hogs, WOW. It looks like a Claymore mine blew out the bullet entrance side of a hog's head. But that's OK, dead hog is a good hog in Louisiana. The SST's, even a 140 gr. in a 6.5-284 will blow a hole through a hog's head with an exit. It holds together and doesn't blow up.

With my .240 Wby. project, I would think the NBT would be too friable at those velocities and I would be concerned using that bullet in the .243 Win./6mm Rem. on deer. It's hard not to use them due to their extreme accuracy. But IMHO, I'll have to pass on NBT's for light, fast projectiles on deer sized game. Now, for 'yotes and other pests, great choice.

DF

sorry guys i was asleep today "working graveyards". the rifle barrel is free floated and the bullets that ive found best are flat base bullets. this rifle will put 5 in the same hole on a rutine basis with the 75's @ 3300. im looking for the best accuracy i can find and an 1.5" to 2" group with the powders ive tried with ths bullet is not accectable. i know the rifle and i can do much better. i'll try some differtent seating depths and see if that helps.

No need to apologize - you've given all of us 6mm Rem fans a reason to yak about a favorite cartridge!

Guy

thanks guys for all the comments i really like the cartridge. i have its sister rifle a mdl 70 fwt in 257 roberts that i love shooting, it likes 117 gr sierra gk's and hates 100 gr ballistic tips. go figure

Antelope tells me you may get opportunity for long-range shooting, so: My advice is to strongly consider the heavier bullets (I know, there are some blank faces out there ). Find one that shoots well in your rifle. If you run some bullets through a ballistic calculator, you will see that at long ranges, the heavier bullets are not inferior to the lighter ones in trajectory and energy on target, even though started at lower velocities. Lets use a 225 yard zero and a 1.5-inch sight height. For instance, the Speer 75-grain flat base (BC = 0.234, if that's the bullet you are speaking of), if started out at 3500fps (near-max velocity from the Barnes manual and 75 grain bullet), will be about 37 inches low at 500 yards, while the 85-grain Barnes TSX started at 3300 fps (BC = 0.333) will be 33 inches low at 500 yards, and the 100-grain Nosler SP Partition started at 3100 fps (BC = 0.384) will be 35 inches low at 500 yards. The energy of the 75 grain bullet will be about 495 foot-pounds at 500 yards, the 85-grain barnes will be about 775 ft-lbs, and the 100-grain Nosler will be about 905 ft-lbs.

I've always been a heavy-bullet guy. I shot two large-bodied whitetail bucks at about 50 yards with a fast-loaded 95-grain Nosler partition out of my 6mm. Both bullets "came apart" with no exits. They killed the deer just fine and likely would hold together and exit at longer ranges, but I changed to the 85-grain TSX, which holds together and exits. I wish Barnes made a heavier 6mm, but what the hey.

Anyway, many folks don't understand the long-range aspects of lighter vs heavier bullets (have no idea if you are one of them). I always encourage folks to look at the ballistics involved.

Good luck!
Bill

yes 100 dollar bill i like heavy for caliber bullets and understand the ballictics involved. i shoot a lot of 180's in the 308 win 117's in the 257 bob, 250's in 338 win for just that reason. its just got me bumfuzzled why i can't get my 6mm rem to shoot the heavys. back to the reloading bench

I've only loaded for 3-4 6mm Remingtons, but one of the powders I always try with heavier bullets is Reloder 19. It doesn't work every time, but it works a lot of the time!

i just got off the phone with a friend and that was the same powder that he recomended rel 19. got some and will give it a try. it's been dang hot here in s e texas, and having to wipe sweat out of the eyes and off the stock make for funky load development.

thanks keenan

Also my favorite with heavy bullets in the 6mm rem.

Same load I use, although I use 100 gr Core-Lokts. I would also be inclined to try the 90 gr. Accu-bond, any of the good 100 gr. bullets, or the Sierra 85 gr. BTHP.

Muzzleblast: I have not used the 75 grain Speer H/P's on game so I won't comment on them - but I have used both the 95 Nosler Partitions and the 95 grain Nosler Ballistic Tips from my various 6mm Remingtons on both Deer and Antelope.
Both of the aforementioned Nosler 95 grainers are supremely lethal on Deer and Antelope!
DON'T let ANYONE tell you they are not!
In fact I use Nosler bullets almost exclusively for Big Game in an arsenal of Rifles from 24 through 33 caliber (this includes those in various 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 30 and 33 calibers!
One of my most accurate game loads in my 6mm's uses the Nosler 95 grain Partitions and IMR 4831 powder.
Give this a try.
I hope you can get your Rifle to shoot one of the 95 grain Nosler offerings up to your liking.
If you can't then might I recommend the Sierra 85 grain HP/BT bullet - I use this bullet in my modestly loaded custom 240 Weatherby Magnum and it is like a laser on the Antelope Prairies and is quite lethal as well.
Best of luck in your search and on your Wyoming Hunt this fall.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

Muzzleblast: I've only seen one antelope taken with a 6mm Rem--it was with a 95gr Partition at 252 yds. The antelope suddenly didn't feel well and laid down and died.

I can't recall the powder that was pushing it. PM me if you want me to look it up.

I have killed around 60 plus deer with the 6mm Rem and 90 % of them where taken with the Hornady 100 gr SP or the Sierra 100 gr SPT both where loaded with H4831. Any bullet your rifle will shoot 85 gr or bigger will work great on deer.

IME, I have found that rifles that don't shoot heavy bullets tend to respond well to a little "adjustment" in the barrel/forend interface. Try this: take the forend in your left hand and the barrel in your right, then try to pull them apart and move them around. If the barrel touches the stock at all, the best condition is firm upward pressure and no lateral movement between stock and barrel. The worst situation is where the barrel only barely (lightly) touches the stock, and where you can easily move the barrel sideways in relation to the stock. I call this "ambiguous bedding" because the contact is not well-defined and - well, ambiguous. If this is the case, you can do a little experiment without making permanent changes to see if the rifle will respond well to a tune-up in that area. Take a book of paper matches. Shove one between the barrel and forend at the 4-o'clock position, and another one at the 8-o'clock position, leaving the match heads hanging outside. This cradles the barrel in the stock to eliminate lateral movement, and provides upward pressure against the barrel. You want about 5 lbs upward pressure, so if one thickness of match won't provide this amount, insert two matches in each place for more lift. Now test-fire a couple groups with the rifle. Be aware that the rifle will probably shoot higher than before, so you might want to put up two targets stacked vertically and aim at the bottom one so you are sure to print the bullets on paper. If the groups shrink notably, then you can go back and make a more permanent pad in the forend with epoxy and/or layers of card stock.

If the barrel does not touch the stock, but the gap is very, very close, then the vibrations caused at firing may actually make the barrel move enough to touch the stock. This is really bad! If the barrel is to be floated, then there should be enough gap to prevent contact when firing. A good example of a floated barrel can be seen on a Kimber 84M rifle. Some guys object to that amount of gap for aesthetic reasons, but you definitely do not want the floated barrel to slap the stock when firing as it will fling your bullets all over the target.

Good luck!

My experience with 6mm is limited to one, and it was a bit fussy with longer bullets. I never had great luck with spritzer 100 grainers or bullets like the Ballistic tip. However, the blunter Sierra 100 SMP shot very well, and even the 95 Partition was a fine shooter and very excellent performer. The Sierra 100 SMP with 46.0 grains of H4831 was a match made in heaven, not exactly where it delivered so many caribou for me.

I've used the 87 Gr Hornady with 4350 with great results.

The Hornady 87 gr BTHP and Win 760 is my present deer load today in my 6mm Rem.

I (my wife really) run 85 grainers in a Rem 600 6mm and it's done fine on deer and pronghorn out to just past 400 yds. We tend to run mid-weight slugs in an effort to get both speed and some knock down power.

well i got to digging around on the bullet pile and came up with a box of 85gr sierra hp gamekings if forgot that i had bought. going to run a ladder test on monday with some rel 19 and 4831

yep. Fooled around with a fair number of combinations in my 6mm but keep coming back to 85 hpbt Sierra's (stellar results on game) with modest doses 40 or 42.5grain of IMR 4350.