Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles hunting bullet for a 'slow' 6.5 Creed

Best I've been able to do with 147's is 2700' through my 20" CTR, pushed by RL26.

Pay no mind to the barrel length fetishists, the Creed does fine with shorter barrels, and shorter barrels are the correct answer when hunting suppressed.

I didn't catch what powders you're loading with, but RL16, RL17, RL26 and 6.5 STB are good bets for velocity for pressure. Also, I'd try some 140gr options if you can find them, in my 18", they are not much slower than 129gr at all.





I've played with 129gr Interlocks a little recently just because I was actually able to find them, and use them in my Grendel as well. They really aren't much faster than 140gr though. I like how ABs perform at different speeds, but I mostly used the 140gr, did a little workup with the 130gr and found them to be slow for pressure.





These are my chosen loads for my 20" Kimber. The same 127gr and 142gr loads run 2,735 fps and 2,680fps respectively when fired from my 18" Sig.



Bullets I'd try in that rifle: 140gr AB, 142gr ABLR, 140gr BT, 140gr Gold Dot, 129gr ABLR, H Interlocks, etc.

2680 is awesome! 🤣

Gtscotty,

Thanks for posting actual info rather than speculating and quipping about hairstyles. I actually had a couple barrels done by Ecco Machine on your recommendation and he does great work.

I did lose ~150 fps with the chop but most of my existing loads are a couple grains below max except the 127 LRX which is now ~2650 with 40.8g of RL17. I have RL15/17/26, H4350, and Hunter to play with. I still want to stick with 130's rather than the heavier bullets and am pretty confident I'll be able to get into a 2700 fps range with these weights. Those are some good #'s, but if I'm reading right, you are loading a little hotter that I am comfortable.

It's hard to shake my reluctance to hunt a mono at much less than 3k (even LRX), so started this thread just to hear some actual field reports. Experimenting is tough right now with 6.5 bullets so hard to come by.

A 140 ELD at factory speeds will catch up with a 123 just past 350.

But everybody exaggerates Creed speeds on the internet....

I'm pretty much anal retentive when it comes to terminal ballistics and while it's difficult for any bullet maker to design bullets of different calibers to all perform alike at the same given velocity, this is what I've collected over the years:

Barnes LRX: 1600
Barnes TTX, TTSX: depending on who you get on the phone 1900 to 2000
Federal Edge TLR: 1350 (a true long-range bullet), most other current Federal hunting bullets like Fusion, including the new Terminal Ascent: 1800
Hornady InnerLock: 1800
Hornady GMX, InterBond, SST: 2000
Nosler Accubond Long Range: 1300 (another true long-range bullet)
Nosler Ballistic Tip, Accubond, Partition: 1800
Sierra Game Changer: 1600
Sierra GameKing & ProHunter: 1800
Swift Scirocco II: 1700
Speer Boattail Soft Point: 1600
New Speer Impact: 1800
Woodleigh WeldCore: officially 1900 but most expand well down to 1700

Hope this helps; just remember that expansion is dependent on bullet construction, impact velocity, AND target medium resistance, which is how stout your game is; for example, a bullet that may expand beautifully on a thousand-lb elk may blow through a 100-lb whitetail doe leaving nothing more than pencil holes in and out.

Lol! Nope. 🤣🤣🤣🤣

I just ran the numbers and I own and shoot a Creed, and have tried various bullets...Take the Scenar for example:

A 123gr Scenar with a BC of .547 is traveling 1499 fps at 1200 yards, with a muzzle velocity of 2850.

A 139gr Scenar with a BC of .578 is traveling 1425 fps at 1200 yards with a muzzle velocity of 2650.

The 139 does not catch the 123 until after 1200 yards...

Keep guessing though...

These would probably be your best option for a CM:

Every body has to draw their own line. While some of the loads in those workups are warm, only a few actually go over published data from Hodgdon, Sierra, and Alliant.

On your actual question, I've only actually shot elk with the 127gr LRX (@375yds) and 140gr Accubond (@140yds). Of those two I'd take the 140gr for what seemed like better wound channel (of course it was a closer shot), but the 142gr ABLR would probably be even better.

Nosler Partition if you can find any. They will mushroom at about any speed. 124 grain Hammer Hunter will open to 1700 fps. Which should be around 500 yards or so.

Good list. The numbers for the Hornady's (2000 fps) are the most surprising; I kind of doubt they are that hard - especially SST. I had some good loads with that Game Changer too, but am out and there wasn't much first hand hunting feedback when I tried them.

I am probably over thinking all this but was bored. Even started at 2650 the 127 LRX will not drop below 2k until ~400 yds which is plenty for me. A lot of guys wouldn't blink stretching things further. Basically a 150 fps loss equates to about 75 yds or the average difference between an '06 and 308.

Thanks again Gtscotty. The discrepancy between some load sources is pronounced. The Barnes data seems to be much more conservative compared to the Alliant data. Nosler is also much more 'optimistic' about velocities.

Lee, a lot of talk about those Hammers too. May try to pick some up. I have also had good results with Maker bullets.

I’d be looking at 130 game changers

Most h4350 data is very conservative. Between a ruger murican predator ,tikka ctr & savage axis2 we've been loading h4350 41-43g with 123scenar,129interlock & 130 gc. The tikka takes more pressure evertime. They all group moa easily. I've worked up win 6.5 staball loads for the ruger that I've tested in field with great results also. No chrono yet but these rounds are all 27-2800 according to data.

The 140's c&c (coreloct,) work well in my 700TI barreled .260. 20"? 22"?

In fact, the 140 is the only bullet weight that I've found that it likes, so far. If the shortages ever ease up, I'll try some more additional hand loading for it, so far at a minimum. Right now, I'm just using factory loads.

The factory Barnes TSX in 120 gave me the worst groups of any I've tried. Accuracy of the load, terminal performance, knowing the distance and trajectories thereof is far more important than velocities or bullet weights. Within reason.

Had no problem killing an elk at @150, nor last year's cow caribou at 294, with the 260.

Nor with 150-180 grain loads in a 17" barreled '06 over the years, out to 400 yards, sheep and caribou.

At distance, just mortar slower loads in.....

"Good list. The numbers for the Hornady's (2000 fps) are the most surprising; I kind of doubt they are that hard - especially SST."

Agreed. I've used both factory loads on caribou in '06 150 grain loads out to over 400. SST's tend to leave "larger than average" wounds compared to Corelocts out to about 300, then "normal" wound channels to the 443 yards I've done with them.

The GMX are a bit more conservative than the SSTs, especially at short range.

For 0-400 yards, if the 127 LRX is shooting well I’d go forth and fill up an ark without a second thought.

A couple of things:

Litz published BC values for the 123 and 139 Scenars that are equivalent to G1 numbers of 0.532 and 0.572, respectively.

It’s meaningless to talk about distance where two different bullets have equivalent speed without specifying air density.

Finally, who cares when the 139 overtakes the 123 in velocity? What difference does it make? If you’re talking about minimum expansion velocity thresholds, that’s one thing. As far as trajectory goes, you’re ranging and dialling with either one beyond a couple hundred yards, so the minor trajectory difference is inconsequential. A more meaningful comparison would be where each falls below minimum expansion velocity, and how much each drifts in the wind, as hedging bets in the wind tends to be far more important than speed/flat trajectory out past a few hundred yards (where this discussion matters in the first place).

Whoa there Jordan!

Can't a couple dummies argue ballistics on the internet anymore without some bully using logic, reason and shame?

LOL

Carry on.

129g ABLR, soft for expansion even at long range. I have an old 260 that shoots them well. It's only a 9 twist so it doesn't like the 142g butyour gun might like the 142 and if it does I'd take the extra bc and SD.

Bb