Home Forums Hunting & Shooting General Big Game 6.5 Creed - moose bullets

Sure. The 6.5 x 55 is way bigger - its 357.5.....

And my daughter has taken a liking to my 6.5 creed. In fact, somehow it's at her house.

I'd also bet a goodly sum I end up with a 7x57 soonish.

I'm the one that built the 7x57 Montana that Stick has.
Awesome rifle and would make a perfect "One" rifle for a guy, but in the end it didn't beat out my 7-08 Montana for what I use light rifles for.

Thanks Kevin. I'm going to end up with a 'medium' 0.284 at some point. I have several Kimber SA but the 160+ gr higher BC bullets don't want to play nice with the 2.82 mag box limits. I've had dummy 7mm-08 and 7x57 rounds sitting on my bench for 2 years or so pondering what to do. The 162 ELDM isn't horrible in the 7-08/2.82 mag box but far from ideal, or even good in my view. The bigger high BC bullets seem to be seated below the ogive but still in the neck - there is more bullet inside the case than outside.

The 6.5x55 was a change in direction in recent months. I've become enamored with the 0.264 projectiles and their lethality. I think of my creed as a 270 lite, the 6.5x55 as its peer if you long seat bullets and run to modern pressures. My family has long experience with the 6.5x55. Most of our younger hunters start with a 243 or 6.5x55. The Swede just plain works.

Admittedly, I'm experimenting with smaller cartridges in lightish weight rifles (7-7.5 lbs) that overlap. I've settled on 7-7.5 lbs with scope/mounts as an ideal weight for me - light enough to drag into the backcountry, short enough not to get caught on every overhanging branch, enough weight and barrel contour to mitigate recoil, and acceptable terminal bullet performance. To me the 0.264 - 0.284 calibers in medium capacity cases allow enough velocity to shoot flat, buck the wind, and effectively execute the task at hand on NA big game. I'm not a fan of brakes or cans thus arrived as medium capacity 0.264 - 0.284 class of cartridges. Also admittedly, they are way more similar than different - but I love playing with new rifles. I will always have some kind of rifle project in the works - I've come to the conclusion that I'm not capable being the '1-2 rifle for everything guy' as much as that bucks my normal practicality on everything else............ I would also say, I've enjoyed Stick's 'post series' on his rifle diagnosis/mechanics - I've picked up a few things. The guy certainly knows his way around a rifle and rifle mechanics.

My Montana is used mainly for laurel-choked steep hillsides chasing blackbears or set-up in a thick funnel after whitetails. Shots are closer to archery distances and measured in feet. High BC bullets have no interest to me for that work and I could probably get by with a Partition loaded in backwards.
Other than the Montana, all my rifles are in your 7-7.5 lb weight range.

FWIW...I've shot 14 moose with cartridges ranging from 243 Win to 375 Ruger. Five of them were shot with a 270 Win, most recently a bull in December with a 145 ELDX at 2940fps. I can't imagine the outcome would have been much different with a 6.5 Creed and a 143 ELDX.

I’ve shot quite a few animals with the 6.5 creedmoor over the past 10 years or so including blacktail deer, caribou, mountain goat, aoudad, black bear and cow moose. I’ve pretty much always used a 130g accubond load which has worked great from 80- ~400 yard shots.

The moose was during a winter hunt and the shot was around 250yds, one shot killed the large cow. Longest shot was on a mountain goat which also dropped where it was standing.

If you shoot the gun well, then pick a bullet you are confident with, I like the Accubonds but it seems lots of guys are now using things like 140g ELDM, 143 ELDX, 130 tmk with good success. One of my friends loads 140g partitions in his 6.5 and has had great luck with it.

THIS^^^^^
You get the best of both; a fragile front section to provide destructive expansion, and a long, intact rear section to assure deep penetration...all at almost any reasonable velocity.

And if you place your bullet as you would place your arrow you'll have a dead moose.

I strongly favor chest shots on ungulates because that offers the widest margin for error if the bullet goes, say 3 inches away from where I intended. It's still in the chest, through the lungs and possibly the heart. When the time comes, you likely will be standing on your hind legs with the adrenaline pumping, half out of breath, aiming offhand at a moving animal; you take the shot or don't shoot at all.

Please accept my best wishes for an exciting and fulfilling hunt!

Thank you for the well wishes!

That’s the funny thing about hunting in a lot of PA, especially anywhere mountain laurel grows.

I had a decent string of years where I killed critters at longer distances with my bow than I did with the rifle.