Precision Rifle reloading discussions

[JCL]

@JCL has a Giraud annealer, I think. I know he does it for his 5.56 bolt trainer.
https://www.giraudtool.com/giraud-ca...-annealer.html

I don't spend the time on it for 5.56 blammo but the Lapua brass I use for my trainer gets annealed every 1 or 2 firings. I've probably got at least ten loadings on it by now.

[Trigger]

So after looking at the price and availability of bullets and components, me and a shooting buddy have decided to try out 22BR for PRS and NRL type shooting. I picked up some Lapua 6BR brass just as the UKR invasion kicked off, since I was worried about supply and inflation going forward. Bullets were a big driving factor. Hornady 88 ELDMs seemed to be the only long range bullet available, and I could buy in bulk for .24 cents a bullet, where the 6mm bullets are hard to find, and .40 cents each or more. Plus it only burns 29gr of powder compared to 40gr for some of the 6mm options.

Shooting buddy contacted PVA and we ordered 5 barrels. Three for me to fit Kelbly actions and two for his Defiance. The PVA reamer cut a .255” neck with .130” throat length, which is ideal for the bullet and case combination. I read a bunch on other forums and started out at 28.5gr Varget, doing barrel break in and cleaning. At the 100 round point I started to look at 28.5 to 29.0gr, seated .020” off the lands, using the fire formed brass. 28.8, 28.9 and 29.0 grouped pretty well, and showed low ES/SD. I loaded up 50 rounds of 29.0 to verify velocity and groups.

This target was the best result:







I shot 20 rounds across the chrono, and those showed an ES of 25 with an SD of 7. More interesting was they were the first 20 rounds on the clean barrel in two groups of 10. The first 10 had a higher ES than the second 10. The second 10 were ES 18, SD 5.9

I think I’ve found a good load for this year.

[SecondsCount]

Looking good!

[Odin Bravo One]

I can’t load more accurately than I can shoot, and my time is valuable enough that I won’t bother trying to chase smaller decimal digits when it is purely academic anyway.

MOA is still MOA (Minute of Asshole), and “good enough for government work” is usually good enough for 99.9% of shooters and circumstances. Since threading the needle at 1800+ is no longer in my job description, there isn’t a lot of return on the time investment trying to make my hand loads more accurate than Hornady or Black Hills, and the down range performance of those loads is also respectable. Most OTM’s don’t perform on target all that great, even well inside the “effective” range of caliber and cartridge.

[Trigger]

I agree that reloading, especially precision rifle reloading can be a time suck. But I’ve been refining my process on a Dillion Super1050, and I get good results with much less time than a single stage. The case feeder is huge for speeding up the process.

If I want to take fired cases and size/mandrel/prime for immediate loading, I can run 100 cases in 5 minutes using stations 1-3 on the 1050, then spin through the other stations and into the bin. If I want to deprime first, then clean, then size/mandrel/prime, it does not take that long to run 100 cases through the 1050 twice.

Once the cases are primed, I can choose how I add powder. The slow precise way is by individually weighing out 100 charges using an AutoTrickler into cases on the loading block. Then I top the case with a loose bullet, and stick directly into the seating station of the press. I’ve gone faster by using a Harrels powder measure held in my hands to quickly charge the cases in the loading block. Works well for fire-forming. Using the Dillon powder measure and loading all in one press cycle is fastest, but it takes a while to get the press and powder measure tuned to throw the correct powder weight. I do this for 223 practice ammo, but I weigh out powder for PRS loads like 6BR or 6Creed.

When loading in bulk, I can turn out a lot of good reloads on a 1050. And much cheaper than I can buy factory loads for currently. For me, this is very evident today because 6mm ammo and 6mm match bullets are unobtanium due to demand. But I can get .223 88gr ELDMs, and load 22BR for less than 50 cents a round (not including brass). YMMV.