Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters An Intermediate 6.5mm Cartridge for Hunting

6.5X55 seemingly checks all the boxes. Especially in the loads that are available from American manufacturers. The 140gr Winchester PowerPoint comes to mind...especially when fired from a 22” barrel instead of 24”. That ammo does put you in the 400 yard/1000ft-lbs realm, but hey, who is to say that you can’t pass on shots past 200?

Steve,
I really like the grendel. If I had to just take one bullet it would be the 120 gold dot. It would be great if this class of bullet had a better b.c. but not really the point. Super cheap, easy to load, and wonderful on game to beyond 300 easily. I briefly tried using the 100 ttsx but wasn't happy with performance or accuracy. I have similar rounds that offer better performance at range, but as you said, not what is being discussed. I really think some of these smaller cases are in a different class. Kids and new shooters love the grendel and similar type cartridges. Without a doubt it is far easier to spot hits with the grendel then it is with a 6.5 x 55 , Creed or similar.

I've been pondering your premise for the last day, Steve, and my eye keeps wandering to the couple of boxes of RWS 5.6x50R factory ammo on the shelf by my desk. (Hey, doesn't everybody have odd boxes of rare ammo for which they own no guns, but have because of a "maybe someday" mindset?) If I were King I would decree that Remarlchester (or better yet Browning/Winchester/Miroku with their retro single shots) would build a rifle and Fedspeerady would make ammo for that cartridge necked up to 6.5 and make it to work with a 100 grain bullet, give or take 10 or 20 grains either way. "Factory" ballistics of the 5.6x50R shows a 50 grainer at 3500+ MV which makes my newly repaired gut think that mid-2000's should be doable with its case capacity pushing a lightweight 6.5 bullet. (Someone else is going to have to do a case capacity/shoulder angle/mathematical analysis. I'm too far into a six pack of German lager.)

Make the first single shot off the assembly line a nicely engraved example stocked with the rarest of thin-shell walnut, and a precision tang sight with auxiliary scope capability and send it up to the royal castle here for me to field test. If I like it I'll make my second decree be that everyone in the kingdom buy one forthwith and surrender their Creedmoors to the Royal Buyback Program to be melted and forged into engine blocks for People's Cars.

Or maybe a shortened version of the 6.5x47 Lapua, then?

Doesn't look like a 6.8 SPC necked back down to 6.5mm would get you much more capacity than the Grendel...

-Chris

I'm strongly considering building a LH AR for the 6.5 Grendel for my two boys to use. I've had very good luck with heavier Scenar's and would try the 108gr 6.5 Scenar on a deer out of the Grendel. That is if I don't build a 6mm ARC or 6X45...

With all the talk of intermediate 6.5,
less capacity than 308,
and 250 Savage in geheral...



How about a 250, necked up to 6.5.
Blow out the taper and sharpen the shoulder.


Give it a funky name, referring to target shooting, that no one can spell.

Set the cartridge/chamber specs pretty tight.

It will be the bestest, worstest, POS, gay cartridge ever.

I have to confess, I have not read through thread thoroughly. Not because the content isn't riveting (it isn't) but because so much is just repetitive. I don't really understand what all the discussion is about. If we are looking for smallish 6.5mm cartridges, there is no need to neck down, blow out, or reform any other cartridge because fine cartridges in this class already exist. The 6.5x54 is a proven performer around the world. The 6.5 Carcano has also proven itself on the battlefield (where some claim they were abandoned by the thousands) and in the hunting fields. I am shocked that I didn't see any mention of another cartridge which is perfectly balanced and beautifully designed. I am speaking, of course, of the 6.5 Jap or the 6.5x50mm Arisaka, for those with a more PC leaning. I used this cartridge, in a re-stocked Type I rifle, 55 years ago. Loaded with 120 grain Speer bullets, it did a fine job of poking holes in deer and putting them on the ground. If not for the fact that manufacturers of brass cases for this cartridge have, for some reason, refused to make it a standard offering, I would have chambered my silhouette rifle for it.
This thread exemplifies the desire of rifle loonies to re-invent the wheel. In this case, by abandoning perfectly round wheels and replacing them with hexagons. GD

I like it! You are one of the few who get it!



You don't get it!

This thread was a lot of fun. Some of the folks here should hold their breath until they have an epiphany!

I think that we should have a thread on the proper blade length and design for a skinning knife. I am sure that if we butt heads, we can come up with a better edge and grip.

I certainly don't get this either, just old stuff rehashed and rehashed over and over.

I kinda like the 100-grain bullets idea.

Just easier for me to get there by handloading 6.5 Cr if I wanted to do the extra work to get something lower than the factory 120-grain products. Or by looking at the 6 ARC if I decided I needed that 100-grain bullet to work in an AR-15 platform. Or some kind of .25 version in between. Or by looking at a 6.5 Grendel, loading 100s, and accepting whatever it'll do.

OTOH, I can't think of another reason to by a 6 ARC upper, too lazy to handload for the 6.5 Cr... and I've got other handloading projects underway, anyway.

Much of this is influenced by our local terrain, where a 200-yard shot would be way longer than usual... and a 100-yard or less shot might be more likely. And then also influenced by already having other rifles that'll reach out if I ever needed to do that...

I do like "What if?" games, though!

-Chris

This thread served to convince me that I'm on to something with my 6.8 SPC. Now if only my state would let me deer hunt with it

moosemike,

I tried to find the cartridge/caliber regulations in Pennsylvania on-line, but was beaten by the website. How is the 6.8 SPC banned for deer? Energy? Cartridge length? Energy?

Montana has NO caliber/cartridge regulations, apparently figuring that hunters can figure it out for themselves, whether through old family traditions or whatever. You can legally hunt elk with a rimfire here--though I don't know anybody who does. But do know several who use the .22-250, quite effectively.

Sorry I should have been more clear. My 6.8 is an AR-15 and PA is manually operated firearms only for big game

Yes, everything old is new again.

The 6.5x50 was arguably the first intermediate cartridge chosen for the first assault rifle, long before the German 7.92x33. Federov saw its more compact size and moderate ballistics, compared with Russia's service rifle round the 7.62x54R, as ideal for his "Avtomat", a selective fire rifle fed from a 25 round detachable box magazine, which entered limited service over a century ago.

The US also trialled a more compact 6.5 in the 30s, before settling on the 7 mm version (and then cancelling it in favour of redesigning the rifle to suit the .30/06)

Of course, there's well over a century of experience of mild 6.5s in the hunting fields as well, to demonstrate their effectiveness. Several of them pre-date the .30-30.

Choose something which will fit into your chosen platform - rimless for repeaters but rimmed for break actions and others that work better with a rim - and which will give you modest velocity with a good bullet which will perform well at that velocity, and you'd be good for a fair range of critters out to the sort of distances suggested. Nothing particularly new about it though.

I've found that a single shot in 5.6x50R does a pretty sterling job on game up to the size of fallow deer as-is, given a decent bullet and placement. Necked up to 6.5 would give it a bit more oomph, no doubt. There was a bloke named Bellm who developed a rimmed and a rimless version, though IIRC he also moved the shoulder forward. The RWS brass is great stuff too, though you can also get S&B.

moosemike,

Thanks for the info! Have hunted deer in PA and am aware of the regulation that allows "Amish machine-guns."

Have been acquainted with more than one "manually operated" 6.8 SPC--the reason for my question.

Yes. I've been thinking about a bolt action 6.8 because I'd really like to deer hunt with the cartridge and I don't trust my State to get with the times

For the life of me, I don't know why Ruger hasn't put out a Ruger American in 6.8.

I'd buy it

John

FWIW over the border in the Australian state of Victoria, the law mandates a minimum .270" bore/130 gn projectile for Rusa, Red, and Sambar. There again there's no closed season and no bag limit for any of these.

For the smaller Chital, Fallow and Hog deer Victoria mandates a minimum .243"/80 gn bullet.

There are no such calibre restrictions in the state where I live, but there are truckloads of Sambar in Victoria, making it an attractive place to which to travel, so a 6.5's never really going to be the completely all-around deer rifle for me (and that is leaving aside bigger critters like buffalo).