Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Ackley Improved = Ain't Improved

So what's the deal? Stuff still dies whether it's improved or not, right?

I like ammo in pretty colored boxes, cash and carry..

Longer case life , higher velocity.

Don't like paying for ammo when I can build it for much less.

16 bore is straight walled. Can't be improved.

Oh well.

Headspace matters.

Case life matters.

Precision matters.

Accuracy matters.

Hint..................

Walmart folk gotta eat too..

Stupid...ain't never smart..................

I've shot more factory ammo in the 223AI than handloads. That's the beauty of it and having more horsepower in reserve doesn't hurt a thing.

I shoot 'em all and then some.

Pass the 22 Grendel in a S/A 700 wearing a DBM fed by AR mags...because theCOAL is favorable.

Hint.......................

I’ve never owned an A.I. Cartridge.

Or had a First Fhuqking Clue.

Congratulations?!?

Hint.

Laughing!................

I like mine. Easy keeper and fun.

Hint... go screw yourself sticko

Love my .243 AI
Will never own a vanilla .243 now that I got it AI’d
Next on the list .223 AI

Berry's sells pretty colored ammo boxes.

www.berrysmfg.com

I've seldom seen a rifle that wasn't more accurate with properly crafted handloads than factory ammo, AI or not.

Good to know, I'll make a note in the file.

I did quite a bit of killin, with a few stellar critters in a couple different countries, and coulda killed everything with a open sited 30/30..... but I tend to “hunt”..... Hint

Best coal vs mag length usually not equal unless someone does something. Can often shoot sub optimal though and many do.

Sometimes you never know what's going to bite...

Have some, have had some others... never an issue and sometimes they made a serious difference...

Maybe not MORE accurate, but the fiocchi 50gr vmax loads in my Kimber .223 shoot unreal accurate. Shot two groups Sat. Between strings of 7-08, one 30 rds. and one 25 rds. both groups right at MOA at 100. Ordered it bulk through the sporting clays range who's a fiocchi dealer for cost since they needed a certain size order to get pricing down.

I've been wanting to try that stuff myself.

16bore, I hope you're not a fisherman, because you'd starve to death if you had to live on your trolling catch.

Good stuff sells itself....................

Who needs AI when you can have this?

Fascinating.

Bless your heart.

Laughing!.............

Nice to have a shoulder for finite headspace control,on the K-Hornet.

They crack schit hard.

Hint.............

Win/Win.



Hint..............

Damn, they must have sold out already. AmmoSeek shows nuthin.

Was it a Walmart special?

Does that tip melt?

It's caramel....

K-Hornet Buck and Baby 35gr V-Max Forming Load at 3030fps.............

What do you do with all of this stuff .?

That deers tine is freaky , did you throw a fishing line up over a limb and pull his head up ?

I'd like to have a CZ 527 hornet with the chamber hollared out to Ackley .

Had a 35 Whelen AI. Was ok but I cannot say it offerwd a significant performance improvement over my standard. Eventually someone wanted it more than I did and it went down the road. I don't miss it.

Improving a 35 Whelen isn't worth it. Not enough gain to be had. No shoulder to start with.

Should be obvious.


But it will make for trimming less.

All this Whelen talk may have just inspired me to take the Whelen out hunting tomorrow. Well there hasn't been that much Whelen talk but I also haven't had it afield yet so it's due.

What's that good looking case next to that slope-shouldered pencil necked geek?

That doesn't look Ackley Improved, that looks more like a gibbs design

Yeah, an Ackley should have the neck/shoulder junction in the same place. It also looks like there used to be a magnum ring around the base. miles

It is a .30 Gibbs.

Correct Boatanchor.

The .30 Gibbs was my favorite cartridge for over 20 years.
Many elk, a couple of Shiraz moose, a mountain goat, and a couple of Alaskan caribou found their way into my freezers because of that cartridge.

The gunsmith that chambered my .30 Gibbs used an Ackley reamer and cut it in to the Gibbs depth.

I just got the .30 Gibbs a little over a week ago. It is on a Enfield 1917 action.




The barrel is just under 23" long and the scope is a Weaver K4 with a post and reticle crosshair.

Love my AI, and have for almost 30 years. Never had much use for a “pretty box”.....that falls under different subject matter! memtb

I'm on my first AI cartridge now. Earlier this year I bought a Ruger Ultralight online in .257 Roberts in advertised 'perfect' condition. Alas, the barrel turned out to have corrosion in half a dozen places. The perils of buying sight unseen. I knew my gunsmith had a .257 AI reamer so rebarreled to that. I already had two standard .257 Roberts' so thought I'd try something different. I wasn't really concerned with case life or extra speed but it was an opportunity to try a new cartridge that I haven't played with before. It was fun fireforming the brass too.

My 280ai fresh of the press.

I have a .280 that is almost an AI. It is a .280 RCBS. miles

That's a good one too!

Correct Boatanchor.[/quote]


The gunsmith that chambered my .30 Gibbs used an Ackley reamer and cut it in to the Gibbs depth.[/quote]

Rocky Gibbs would call that a B**tard Gibbs, The Gibbs had a 27 degree shoulder but every time Mr. Gibbs mentioned it he would give out a different angle to throw off other gunsmiths. Sounds like an interesting character.

The best thing about the improved cartridges is more shooting time and more tinkering for me. But the 280 AI does seem to hit a sweet spot for the 7mm bore.

I've been bitten by both the loony and classifieds bug. Putting a 35WHL-AI together now, have a 223AI reamer and dies to go with a Savage Axis.

Only down side for me is the cost of dies. But the 223 set came as a wash.

Kinda fond of the Ackley Improved concept myself, but don't believe he was the originator of the concept. We can blame Lyle Kilbourn for that and I like me K-Hornet a lot. It's an old beat to crap Winchester that he chambered his own self and while I'll say I've not wrung this thing out as of yet it has potential.

Wow, Dan!

Sako AV, 280 AI, Top


ya!


GWB

223 AI







yup!



GWB

I've long thought pigs didn't have much between the ears. Thanks for the insightful photo.

Looks like 10.6 lil gun and Speer or Sierra.

Sweet!

Holy mother of bad ass rifles. Thanks for posting.

What he said!

So... no 270AI? Seriously the 280AI is holy grail of Ackley improved but 270AI is inefficient ?

Speaking of Hornets!





Cooper Model 38's in 17 Ackley Hornet, 19 Calhoon and 22 Hornet


and Kowabunga dude.......



the long and short of it. CZ 17 Hornady hornet and Cooper 22 Hornet.





17 Hornady Hornet, 17 Ackley Hornet, 19 Calhoon, 22 Hornet.


ya!


GWB

Cool guns Gee!!!! I think you might have Shrap and Varmint Guy beat!!

Nah!




I'm just "bush league" when it comes to those guys!


ya!


GWB

Very nice rifles GeeDub!

This is why you should never run with scissors 😎

I used an Ackley reamed out Mod 700 classic 35 Whelen for a tad over 20 years. I always used new, fireformed brass with my hunting loads, but never had a blown primer, etc. I used loads that were truly wildcat in speed/pressure, though you would never know it by the looks of the brass/primer pockets nor bolt lift. IF I was NOT legally blind in my left eye ( after 2002) I would still use it and its favored loads. all it takes is one time to hurt my "good eye". ha. So yeah, I love the Ackleys, the Gibbs, the Shermans...anything like that, but one has to gamble IF you want to gain much speed over the factory round. QuickLoad can help, as a good chronograph. No way to get extra speed without extra pressure...even I know that, ha. But they are a Handloaders Dream....and most of us get to handload/shoot/dream way more than we get to hunt.

Well, the common sense answer is "it depends". The cartridge life issues and other considerations have been well documented and the rifle looneyism exhibited on this site particularly makes this discussion almost a constant drumbeat at times. However, as far as AI rounds being actually "improved" depends on what case you start with.

I've seen several rounds "Ackley'd" over the years that benefitted very little by the addition of sharper shoulders, etc.... simply due to the fact they already had a fairly sharp shoulder to start with and moving it forward gained very little in powder capacity. On the other hand, a good example would be my 300 H&H Improved case, which goes from a gently sloping case to basically a 300 Weatherby case when fireformed, which is a fairly substantial increase in my case. This also results in a fair number of split cases the way I do it. My 223 AI gained a pretty substantial amount in velocity also and the accuracy of the rifle is amazing at times- especially considering I am the one shooting it.

I read in a Nosler reloading book one time about fireforming cases and the author- a well known gun writer and tester who I've forgotten his name at the moment- stated that fireforming can be some of the most accurate your rifle will ever shoot. He wasn't sure why this was so, but his experience- which was substantial- was that this was often the case. I have found this to be true with my rifles. My 300 H&H Improved, 223AI, and a couple others are amazingly accurate while fireforming. Slightly more even than when I load the formed cases and shoot them after. Has anyone else had this experience?

I've tried two 30-06 Improveds, with disappointing results. One was a 24" barrel, the other was a 26". I didn't have any of the new wonder powders though. I also had a 22" 280AI ( reamed out Mod 700 Mtn rifle) it was finicky, only liked two bullets, the Nosler 150BT and the Speer 160HC. I got 2950 with the Nosler and 2800 with the 160. Only about 50fps better than standard. It was a worthwhile experience, and I and a buddy killed lots of game with it. I wouldn't want one with less than 26" today. But that's just me. One great benefit I see of any Improved round is you can load to "optimum velocity" of the standard round but with less pressure. 50-100 fps over the standard would begin stretching primer pockets in the old 35 Whelen. With that long throated Remington I gained powder space by (a) seating the bullets way out and (b) Ackleyized. Sure, you can run them pretty hot, but, as said, at a risk. I did the same thing with a Mod 700 Classic (24"bbl) in .257 Roberts. It was my "first" experience with the Ackley. I had it set up right with a crush fit chamber for standard rounds. I seated the Hornady 120HP way out and "even used" Ackleys loads from his book! Wow! I never chronographed it, but it had to be humming, ha. It was a death ray on crows and deer in East Texas! Lots of fun. Needed? nah...I went on and played with the 25-06 ( very, very good 25 caliber round) and the "real sweetheart", the 257 Weatherby...."now that's a 25 caliber"! ha. My only gripe with the Weatherby is the soft Norma made cases. Federal wasn't much better back then. I didn't even try to make them from .264 WinMag WW cases, but that certainly is an option.

Sheister, to answer your last paragraph. I have very limited experience with improved cartridges, but have found this to be true when fireforming for my .375AI. At 100 yards, it was just making a ragged hole. Wish I had measured that 20 round group! memtb

I gave up on Ackley improved in 2002 after formed cases took too much effort and hot loads gave them loose primer pockets.

2002 with 3 other guys we built (4) 257 Roberts Ackley improved rifles on surplus Mauser actions with Lothar Walther heavy varmint barrels.
2012 I built a 257 Roberts Ackley improved rimmed rifle on a Uberti 1885 falling block action and shot 4 deer with it.
2015 I bought a 250 Krag Ackley reamer and have done nothing with it.
2018 I built a 280 Ackley rifle on a Win M70 action and shot a deer and 3 antelope
2018 I built a 280 Ackley rifle on a Sav 110 action
2018 I bought a 280 Ackley Kimber 84 rifle and shot a deer with it.

In 2018 I was back into Ackley improved.
What changed?
I could buy Nosler 280AI brass

Positive headspace on the form load, not so positive on the AI load depending on how you size the brass.

16bore, I was improving a belted case (.375 H&H), maybe the fireforming loads at over 1000 fps less velocity helped some. memtb

Could be I reckon. Don't The forming loads for a belted AI still have a crush on the shoulder?

16bore, If I understand what your saying....when fireforming “belted” cases, I think they chamber upon the belt. Maybe that helps in the forming process! Correct headspacing, etc.

It must be pretty simple.....or I would have screwed it up! memtb

Most belted brass is 0.195" or less.
Most factory belted rifles are headspaced at 0.200" or greater.
That is a lot of stretching.

I prefer to headspace my belted rifles to fit a lifetime purchase of brass.

I managed 10 reloadings, on my last batch of 100. I had one separated in front of the web.....tossed the other 99! memtb

Mines the same way. Federal 300 grain Partitions will stack shots on top of one another from my rifle. It’s nice to have an accurate factory load if I ever needed it.

Nominal minimum headspace on most belted case chambers is .220" Most belted brass will measure between .213" and .216". Very rarely, one will see brass at less than .212" and greater than .217" GD

Thanks greydog..

That was on the 8th.

They injected me with Fentanyl IVP 100mcgr and Propofol 360 mgs

The doctor warned me that for the rest of the day I should not make financial decisions, drive,.... he did not mention internet posts.

So... no internet and no heavy equipment! At least you have a valid alibi. When I make mistakes (often), that's me at my best and my only excuse is that I'm just not that smart. GD

I feed belted case Virgins,the same as any other...with a false shoulder and of course headspace same.

Hint.......................

Big Stick, Mr. Nobody, get yourself a lathe as fix those factory belted magnum headspace jobs to fit the brass.

$5k with DRO and 50 sq ft of shop space... you can do it.

Having a machine shop is like having a microwave. You will not be able to live without it.

I'm spread thin,with pursuits of interests as is...and only get 6 months of vacation a year.

No thang to initially reap finite headspace control on belted hulls,at the reloading press and do so throughout the life cycle of said Lot of brass/ammo.

Hint.....................

Those that cain't for themselves...simply MUST plagiarize.

Hint.

LAUGHING!................................

I'm purty hip,on Alpha 22 Kreedmire Virgins,as 22-250AI Form Vessels. Now you can say you've "seen" same...you "lucky" kchunt.




Though I prefer the 22 Kreedmire SALAMI,if only because I shoot it all.




Hint.

Plagiarize as you MUST.

Laughing!........................

BINGO!.................