Home Forums Reloading Varmint Rifles sierra 65 gr SBT .224 in .223?

Is anyone shooting these? What loads and powder have you had luck with? Thanks and I have Varget, AR Comp, BCL2, and TAC to try.

I shoot them out of my Montana. I use 24.4 grains of H4895 and get a hair under 3000 fps with a 22" tube. Accuracy is good. I haven't used them on any game yet though. I did all my killing this past season with the 70 grain Speer.

I use 25 grs. of Varget with CCI 400 primers. 25.5 will work, but the groups opened a bit for me. This load shot 5 round 100 yard groups in the .5 to .7 inch size using a Winchester 70 Heavy Varmint.

The Sierra 69 gr. MatchKing is more accurate, but for game I'd prefer the soft point. Best groups from the 69 used 24.5 grs. Varget and BR-4 CCI primers.

I would work up to around 25 grs. of TAC with magnum primers..

Accurate bullet.. Works very well on deer.

Reloader 15 is a very suitable substitute for Varget if your rifle doesn't like Varget. My buddy swears by 15 for both his ARs with that bullet.

I haven't tried it in my boltguns yet, but if I remember to take a .223 to the range, I'll borrow a few from him and give them a try.

The 65gr Gameking is a cool bullet! It UN-hinges small furry stuff but still retains enough integrity to take on deer. Just don't expect exists on the deer everytime. I have a 12" twist 223AI that manages to stabilize them and can push them to 3200fps via RL-15. Killed lots of small furries and big deer with this rifle. You can do a lot at that velocity and after a lot of years of shooting 75gr A-Maxes through faster twisted 223's I have come to realize that this bullet weight is near perfect for the case capacity.......

If starting a 223 or AI from scratch I'd likely go 9" or even 10" for the Gameking and save the A-Maxes for the 22-250 AI and up....That said, RL-15 and Varget get the most from 65+gr bullets via 223........TAC may stack well too but I have no experience with it in .223's yet............


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AR-Comp. 23.6 to 23.8 is as high as I have tested with the 65 GK and was the most accurate powder tested. Both loads resulted in 3 holes overlapping.
H4895 and 8208 were a close second. 23.6 of 8208 showed ES of 4.66 and SD of 2. H4895 @ 25.2 gr was very accurate also.
Varget, RE15, and Tac groups opened up to around 3/4 inch or so.

Don't remember the load off the top of my head but my Tikka likes them on top of BLC2.

I settled with 25 grains of Varget. 26 grains of BCL2 was decent. I still have a little AR Comp, will give it a try.

I did not find the sweet spot with Varget yet but I stopped at 25.4, same load I use with 69's. A buddy tells me his AR shoots the 65 very well @ 26 gr. That is getting close to book max. I plan to go up a bit and see if I can find that higher node.

I have a Ruger Predator/.223, and it shoots the 65gr Sierras like a champ. I have used BL-C2, W748, and AA2460 so far, and used starting loads for each from the middle of the range recommended by the Sierra tech guys. No optimization attempted. They all shoot 2"-2.5" for five @ 300yds from a rest. these are not max loads by any means, and typically W748and BL-C2 turns in the best accuracy at or near the top end of the load range.

I bought one box to try 'em, and another 700 when I was done with the first trip to the range.