Factory match ammo consistency

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Roddy

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I have a bunch of factory match ammo I have to use up to get brass. I have never used a lot of factory match ammo and have noticed large variations from lot to lot. Luckily I have about 200 rounds each of two different lots but I was surprised at how much velocity and POI varied.

I know in the past lot numbers were important but I thought with modern manufacturing techniques it wouldn't matter as much. The ammo Hornady ELD-M and ELD-X. The ELD-X actually out shoots the ELD match by quite a bit actually.

Just curious if anyone else has noticed this and if they have any workarounds like weighing powder charges.

It's kind of funny but I learned a lot about precision rifles, like how match ammo is made, from the 1995 computer game Police Quest SWAT. Crappy game but before the internet was as big as it is now it had a lot of information.

screenshot.police-quest-swat.640x460.1995-12-31.5.png


I had considered just buying factory ammo for a while instead of reloading but if I have to get new data all the time it's a lot of work.
 
Now you know why we reload...

Save the brass, or better, just get some new brass and start loading.

There are definitely some brands that offer very good out of the box performance and more "match" factory ammo is coming (Think Berger/Lapua merger)... very pricey per bang. The generic big box factory stuff is mass produced and can vary so you takes your chances.

Jerry
 
I am going to reload when I get enough 6.5 brass I had just heard such good things about it that I thought it would be more consistent.

On the plus side Hornady brass is pretty good, hardly stretches at all innmy chamber, and now I have a lot of plinking ammo.

Really just thought factory ammo was better than that.
 
The 308 FGMM and Black hills is very good indeed. The 6.5 CM in the prime is good enough to place top 10 in PRS matches and i know the 6.5 match in Winchester with the SMK bullets are sub .250 on 5 rounds when we test. Lots out there that are good but it is indeed much cheaper to reload unless you are a sponsored shooter.
 
Right...stuff is very very good
I know the blackhills on a few of our 308 have posted 5 shot groups in the sub .100'S on a consistent basis..very good ammo indeed. Wish there was a dealer in Canada for it
 
I would have thought it would be possible for a few rounds to be tested before making a new batch of ammo to make sure it is the same as previous lots. A lot of other products are made to exacting standards for fairly cheap, like electronics.

Just to clarify this ammo is easily getting 0.5" groups at 100 meters but the point of impact at distance varied quite a bit from lot to lot.
 
hometownhero said:
Even in the reloading world everything has a lot number. Not every lot is the same as the last one.
Click to expand...

Correct.

Buy powder in 1 pound cans and then change cans = new lot.
Buy bullets in box of 100 and round 101 = new lot.
Bought primers in boxes of 1000... well round 1001 = new lot.
 
BadAsMo said:
Correct.

Buy powder in 1 pound cans and then change cans = new lot.
Buy bullets in box of 100 and round 101 = new lot.
Bought primers in boxes of 1000... well round 1001 = new lot.
Click to expand...

I draw the line at powder. I'm sure bullets and primers can be inconsistent from lot to lot but if I had to get new data every 100 rounds I would never get the chance to shoot! Plus with my handloading and shooting skills it may not even matter.

I can see where a really good chronograph like a Magnetospeed would be handy. My optical chronograph is a pain to set up and I don't think it's wlvery accurate. The Magnetospeed looks way easier to use and you can use it in a variety of positions.
 
furtaker said:
Right...stuff is very very good
I know the blackhills on a few of our 308 have posted 5 shot groups in the sub .100'S on a consistent basis..very good ammo indeed. Wish there was a dealer in Canada for it
Click to expand...

You'd think with how popular and consistent Black Hills ammo is it would see its way up to Canada.
 
Roddy said:
I draw the line at powder. I'm sure bullets and primers can be inconsistent from lot to lot but if I had to get new data every 100 rounds I would never get the chance to shoot! Plus with my handloading and shooting skills it may not even matter.

I can see where a really good chronograph like a Magnetospeed would be handy. My optical chronograph is a pain to set up and I don't think it's wlvery accurate. The Magnetospeed looks way easier to use and you can use it in a variety of positions.
Click to expand...


That's the beauty of the LabRadar. It's accurate to 0.1% (claimed) easy set up so every round fired from the bench is recorded. Change one item like a primer shoot a few rounds , if velocity is off then tune with the powder charge ( this goes for any component change or lot#) even goes as far as loading for temperature.
The Quickload program is great for doing the math.

Also, notice that the RCMP use the magneto speed to check velocity on the ammo they get to have accurate dope charts. It's very good for what they use it for but may not be the best for the handloader.
 
Roddy said:
I draw the line at powder. I'm sure bullets and primers can be inconsistent from lot to lot but if I had to get new data every 100 rounds I would never get the chance to shoot! Plus with my handloading and shooting skills it may not even matter.

I can see where a really good chronograph like a Magnetospeed would be handy. My optical chronograph is a pain to set up and I don't think it's wlvery accurate. The Magnetospeed looks way easier to use and you can use it in a variety of positions.
Click to expand...

That is why reloads buy more then one pound or box of bullets/primers at a time. Order 1000 bullets, 8# of powder and 1k primers. You are good for 1000 rounds. Or you can take that further and buy larger quantities. I have had a different box of bullets shoot noticeably better then others.
 
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