Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters A short essay on the 6.5 Creedmoor

I was not particularly fond of the 6.5 CM last year when a buddy tipped over a mature bull elk at 255 yards with one in the bottom of a drainage and then called me to help pack it out from the OTHER SIDE of the creek bottom to close to the highest cell towers on the mountain. Total bull crap, lol.

Pretty heavily invested in the 7-08, .243 and other 6mms. If I was to start over I would outfit my kids with either 6mm Creedmoors or 6.5 Creedmoors and be done. Too many good factory options for them if they choose not to handload into adulthood. In my opinion the best thing that ever happened to a 6.5 Creedmoor was necking it down to 6mm.

Agree MedRiver!

I look at it another way. Those of us stubborn FUDS that are spending endless dollars with gunsmiths, and gun shops buying all manor of stuff for our basements to try to get antiquated “dead” cartridges and sentimental rifles to shoot even halfway decent groups are the last line of income for the gun press and gun stores. Otherwise it would be pretty short articles and one page adds.

Put on flat brim. Buy Savage or RAR rifle in 6.5 with two boxes of ammo from Walmart. Head to range and outshoot nearly all there on initial set up. Proceed to hunt with remaining half box and fill tags. Re tie man bun.
Golf or Soccer after filling Tag on day one of hunt with 443yd well placed shot.

Still chasing marginal paper groups with rifles that get outshot often by the IN crowd with the new Laser Zapper and eating tag soup along with crow stew. It appears all predictions hoping the quaint MB would fade away like the WSM’s were as inaccurate as the sentimental “dead” cartridges

Well said Judd. I’ve got two Creeds now and I’m the last guy to drink kool-aid. The darn cartridge is great - my fancy 6mm Rem and 257 Rob are definitely getting lonely.

John,
My experiment with M700 feeding involved an ADL chambered for the 7RM. I stuck a 270, a 300Win and a 404 into the magazine. They all popped up into proper alignment. I was dumbfounded. Order didn’t matter. The 404 was a little tight because of its larger diameter but still worked.
Rick

Rick,

Thanks for memory refresher.

I obviously took it a step further by throwing a .30-40 Krag into the mix....

At the other extreme I've owned controlled-feed action rifles that didn't feed worth a damn, including an early Model 70 "Classic" in .300 WSM. There was also a Ruger 77 Mark II in .350 Remington Magnum. The trouble with controlled-feed and short, fat cartridges is since the case-heads are held relatively tightly by the claw extractor their front end has to tilt up too much when it hits the feed ramp, which can cause problems.

Winchester eventually solved the problem with the WSMs, but it took an afternoon of working on the Ruger .350 to get it to feed OK--though it still didn't feed nearly as well as another .350 I had for a while, a Remington 700 Classic--which worked very slickly.

John

Did the same, feeds like it should and shoots like I wanted.

About 2000 or so I put together a Rem 700 short action for ATC highpower competition. Used .308 as parent case shortened .080 and necked to 6.5. This allowed use of 142 SMK's at 300yd rapid fire without so much jump and still had enough capacity to get them to 600yd pretty good. I stole the idea from another competitor at Camp Butner NC. He built his on a Tikka action with magazines. I just clip slotted the 700. We just shortened 6.5-08 Redding comp dies the .080. I used a 6.5-08 Panther reamer held short. I think that chamber print was done by Jim Carmichael.

Not long after we got them running well Dennis DeMille attends a regional in NC, he notices these guns and not long after Hornady does the 6.5 Creedmoor. The .080 short 6.5 case has almost identical capacity as Hornady's 6.5 Creedmoor.

I also think the less steep shoulder angle eased case feeding. Highpower don't need bench rest accuracy but reliable feeding is important.

Not saying he took our idea but the coincidence is there and we wouldn't have cared anyways.

Thanks MD for bringing back some good memories.

This was a ugly working rifle and always was a work in progress, found this fuzzy pic.

Thanks for the info!

I have been shooting 6.5mm rifles for the best part of 20 years; 19 to be exact. When people asked what I was shooting, I would often get a scoff as a response and "what the hell are you shooting one of those metric rounds for, anyhow?" Most people at the time didn't realize the importance of ballistic coefficient for retained energy, maintaining velocity, and wind resistance. How the times have changed!

I started off with a .260 Remington and a wildcat at the time; the 6.5-284. The .260 Remington was a short-action with a 1:9" twist rate while the 6.5-284 was a long-action 1:8" twist. The short action .260 Remington filled its magazine length with the longer bullets in the 140 gr weights. Additionally, downrange accuracy simply wasn't what the 1:8" 6.5-284 would do. I thought to myself, "if only this .260 Remington were a hair shorter!". Then in 2005, Lapua introduced the 6.5x47. I sent a Remington 700 action and a Shilen Select Match 1:8" twist barrel to George Gardner to have a rifle built.

The 6.5x47 Lapua proved to be a great round, though it simply wouldn't keep up with the speed that the .260 Remington produced. This wasn't a problem for me until I began competing in "tactical" rifle matches a few years later. When the 6.5x47 barrel gave up the ghost, a new round, the 6.5 Creedmoor, was picking up steam in the competitive shooting shooting arena. I looked long and hard at this cartridge and thought to myself, "they are trying to mimic the 6.5x47 Lapua but leaving out the good part!" What was the good part? First, the small rifle primer that allowed for brass to last just a bit longer before giving up the ghost. Secondly, the quality of Hornady brass just wasn't up to par with Lapua. Moving forward, I chose to just go back to the .260 Remington. I could get quality brass and an AW-cut action allowed for 2.995" COL and I could choose my barrel twist rate. At this COL, I managed 2820 fps with the .260 Remington and could stabilize Berger and Sierra 140 gr match bullets. The .260 Remington was doing all I could ask of it at this point and the 6.5 Creedmoor never really crossed my mind.

That is, until it did. I was in a transitional point in my life where I was no longer competing and needed a more "hunting-weight" rifle. I had quickly grown accustomed to the light recoil and impressive external ballistics only the 6.5mm cartridges could afford. I was living on the road and out of a truck more and more and no longer had access to my reloading bench. I also didn't want to spend custom rifle money on a lowly hunting rifle. That meant that 6.5x47 was off the table because rifles and ammunition were unobtainium and the .260 Remington wasn't much better. By this time that Johnny-come-lately copycat cartridge had really gone mainstream. I could get a rifle off the shelf and ammunition off the shelf for less than a buck a round. I ended up picking up a Tikka rifle chambered in 6.5 Creedmoor for a song and kitted it out.

I was pleasantly surprised at how mild-mannered the cartridge was. It wasn't picky about what ammunition it was fed, with hunting bullets from Hornady shooting nearly as well as their affordable match ammunition. It was as if you couldn't go wrong. Later I had discovered that the chamber dimensions lent themselves to good accuracy which combined with modern manufacturing with new tooling provided a "level-up" to the rack-grade rifle and ammunition consumer. I liked the little 6.5 Creedmoor rifle so much that I purchased a second rifle from another maker only to find it shot just as good as my Tikka! As life settled down and I was able to spend time at a loading bench again, I learned that the Hornady brass performed better than the Hornady brass of old. It was much more consistent and lasted a long time. As a bonus, nearly every trip to the range I would find piles of Hornady 6.5 Creedmoor brass left on the ground for me to find. I've accumulated thousands of pieces just because it is there. Today many makers make good quality brass for the hand loader, including Lapua with both large and small rifle primer pockets.

While I have moved on from my short stint with the 6.5 Creedmoor in search of bigger and better things, the 6.5 Creedmoor has merits both the fanboys and the haters rarely seem to highlight. I will certainly keep the rifle and components that I have for the little fairy-dust round just in case I need them. Most certainly, I will introduce my children to hunting with the 6.5 Creedmoor and it will likely do everything they will need it to do for their rest of their lives providing they don't get bitten by the rifle bug as I have.

In my experience, which is owning two of each, and helping others set up a dozen or so of their rifles, the 6.5 Creedmoor is perhaps a little more precise. It could be attributed to flinch and concussion. It is hard to say, but I would attribute this to 140 gr 6.5mm bullets liking to run in that 2600-2750 fps node. That isn't to say the PRC isn't accurate, but in my rifles accuracy in the 2900 fps range isn't as good, but when I push 140s up to 3050 and 130s up to 3100 fps, they tend to settle back down a little.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who has a surplus of rifles, and don't shoot at "long range".
I don't shoot competitively anymore, just hunt - and not at long range. I like to try to get closer.
At ranges from 400 yards (or so) I don't feel the need for anything my 243 or 30-06 can't handle.
IF I ran across an elk with my 243, I'm willing to pass up a bad opportunity - and wait for a better shot opportunity.
With my '06, I feel I'm covered.
No need for me to get into a 6.5 anything.
Not putting those who use them down, I just feel no need.

I guess I am in the 6.5 Creedmoor does nothing that a 6.5X55 or 6.5X57 won't do group. Nothing wrong with the Creed, but having had several 6.5's a Tika T3X 6.5 Creedmoor did nothing that my current Steyr's in 6.5X55 and 6.5X57 don't do. I handload so I'm in that group. I have recommended the 6.5 Creedmoor to several young folks starting out. Accurate rifles that don't have to break the bank and good ammo easy to find. Had a Remington 700 in .260, it does not do what a 6.5X55 can do.

The advantage over your Steyr's in 6.5X55 and 6.5X57 is that you can find arms and ammo in 6.5 CM that are readily available and affordable.

And the chamber/throat dimensions are more uniform rifle to rifle.

Am thinking of starting a "Go Fund Me" site, where anybody who's never fired a 6.5 Creedmoor yet finds it doesn't do anything differently than a 6.5x55, .260 or whatever can send me the aforementioned $20. I'll throw a party here in Montana next summer, and we can all relax and laugh a little while we discuss this in person.

Oh, and there's also an excellent local range only 4 miles from our house, where we can all go and shoot our rifles at ranges out to 1000 yards--including at full-sized, "life"-painted steel silhouettes of animals from pronghorns to moose. Eileen and I are life members, and can take guests for $5 apiece, which would be easily paid from the funds.

John,
I will chip in $100 in support of that event, provided I can attend!
Fun, food, shooting, and rifle BS. Perhaps there could be several wacky competitions!
Rick

I’d meet ya for the trip Rick.

I’d drive from GA for that event! I have never fired a Creedmore but have not commented on its performance. I am considering picking one up though…

If you got twenty bucks from everyone who expressed an irrational opinion about the Creedmoor you could afford to buy a cargo container full of cases of Midleton Very Rare for the party.