Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters 250 Savage AI powder load

I currently use W760 Powder and the load is 37.7 grains using a CCI Mag. primer,my question is if one used a regular primer, would one tend to get a higher velocity? I know a hotter primer raises the pressure more , but can one get more speed with a regular primer and more powder? I can only get 2980 fps. and that was before It was a Ackley. The Bullet is a Nosler BT 100 grain. I am hopping to get on above 3000 if possible.
I read here a lot and yes this is my first post here. I know that there is a lot of members here use that caliber and would appreciate their thoughts. Thanks, Jack

How long is the barrel? And what bullet weight are you using?

Sometimes you can get a little more velocity with more powder and a standard primer, but with 760 a magnum primer often gets better accuracy. It also works better when temperatures are cooler.

The .250 AI has just about the same powder capacity as the .257 Roberts, so will get about the same velocities.

Barrel length is 24" and bullet weight is 100 gr. Nosler bt.

You should be able to safely get at least another 100 fps. Are you seeing signs of high pressure?

If you are happy with the accuracy and have the magnum primers already on hand, leave well enough alone. 3000 fps is arbitrary and 20 fps is probably less than your shot to shot velocity deviation.

Tom

I would think that one should be able to load somewhere around forty two or three of that powder in a 250 AI.
I would rather use 4350, myself, and would plan on topping out at around 44 or so. GD

The load that I am using is close to a hot load as the bolt lift gets hard if I load to a 38 grain load of w760 and the primers start to flatten out. I do have IMR 4350 and will try that with a regular primer and work up from there.

Yeah, I would suggest IMR4350 as well. It's much more forgiving near top loads than 760, and more predictable in its performance.

I am away from home so I don't have my data available, but I found really good luck with RL-15 and a couple of different 100g bullets especially 100g BT's

The sierra manual has data for the 250AI and I found that in my rifle their max loads for the sierra 100's worked well with all the 100's I tried (hornady's, 100g BT, 100g NPT and sierra's

RE 15 was my 250 Ackley's powder of choice with 100s - I used both Ballistic Tips and TTSXs. Heavier bullets did best with H4350.

I shoot the 100grBT and 90gr X w/43.5gr of RL19. Great loads and kill deer instantly. 3200fps. powdr

Re:powder choice. In my 6mm/250 with 105s I found alliant 2000-MR offered some great velocities and accuracy. It was more accurate than my standard load of 37 gr of h4350. 35.4 grains for the 105 Amax

I pushed a 105 amax to 2930 fps and the 95gr NBT to 3120 with no issues The rifle was built/throated with an 8 twist 3 groove pac-nor to shoot the 105 class bullets but the 95 NBT shoots in the .2's at this speed so I went with this load

If you can find some I think it would work very well in your rifle.

Start at 39 grains in a .250 ai with 100s and work up

Update: on using IMR 4350 powder. I started at 41.0 and got 3052 I then went with 41.5 and got 3073 which is good but 42.0 gave 3103 and 42.5 was 3158. At that point the Primer was showing some flattening but not bad nor was the bolt hard to lift. This is with using a 100 grain Nosler BT. I decided to stop at that point as that speed is plenty fast enough for what I had wanted. I know that IMR powder is temp sensitive to as it was about 56 degrees and those velocities will climb with warmer temps, hopefully it won't be as bad as the W 760 was.
Thanks Mule Deer and Greydog and everyone else for your thoughts and suggestions. Jack

In my rifle, 46-47.5 RL 19 with 100 gr Nosler BT or Barnes ttsx for hunting.
My most accurate load is 87 gr. Berger (not sure which one, old batch) 47 gr. W760, 3240 fps.

I use 43.5grs of H4350 with 100gr TSX, gets me 3100fps from a 21" tube.

41.5grs of H4350 gives me 2935 with 110gr Accubond.