223 Twist Rate v.s. Bullet Weight

thatmikeguy

thatmikeguy

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I just bought a savage model 12 chambered in .223 with a 1 in 9" twist and i want to know which weight of bullet would work best. Has anyone experimented with this? Do you have any advise? I was told that it still shoots 40 grainers just fine but i prefer heavier bullets. Does 1 in 9" really shoot well with light and heavy bullets? i don't want to buy one of everything just to find out.
 
55gr Noslers lots of Varget 3400+ fps very accurate, 75gr Like maynard said, work the best at long distances. Bergers vld if you use hornady I and other club members found the 75gr HPBT Match shoot better than A max bullets
 
I've got a Model 12 VLP on the way with the same twist and 1000 50gr V-Max bullets sitting in the basement. I hope it's a good match.
 
50gr might be a tiny bit light.....i watched a guy sighting in his gun shooting .223 40gr out of a 1 in 9 twist remmy, and the bullet was keyholing at 50 yrds. As soon as he went to 75gr it was a frikkin tack driver.

Whereas 50gr would work fine in my 1 in 12...send me the bullets for free and I'll dispose of them for you, hehehe...
 
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Rick65Cat said:
50gr might be a tiny bit light.....i watched a guy sighting in his gun shooting .223 40gr out of a 1 in 9 twist remmy, and the bullet was keyholing at 50 yrds. As soon as he went to 75gr it was a frikkin tack driver.

Whereas 50gr would work fine in my 1 in 12...send me the bullets for free and I'll dispose of them for you, hehehe...
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I was shooting 52's with great accuracy in a T3 that had a 1 in 8 twist, so I'm hoping the 50's will work with 1 in 9. I appreciate your offer to help though.;)
 
1shot said:
By way of comparison, my 1:9 .223 Tikka will not shoot anything heavier than 50 grains.
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I'd say something odd is going on there. Are you reloading? And, if so, using known or tested loads? (My 1 in 8 twist Tikka .223 shoots everything I've fed it thus far, from 45 gr up to 75 gr).
 
1shot said:
By way of comparison, my 1:9 .223 Tikka will not shoot anything heavier than 50 grains.
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I've got the tikka tactical in .223, and I must say that there is definetly something wrong there. I would take it somewhere to have twist rate examined to make sure you got the twist right. There should be no problem shooting 50gr and higher with what you have, infact 50gr seems too light in my opinion for that rifle.
 
Guys with 1:8 twists, how does your gun shoot the light bullets?

I would love to throw a 1:8 heavy Shillen on my Stevens, but I would still like to be able to shoot 40gr VMAX's over 12gr of Bluedot for those days in the gopher patch.

Mike
 
I'm surprised at the conflicting opinions here. I heard the same from the guys at the store. one says it'll shoot 40gr through to 75gr and the next says something else. The berger web site recommended 70gr to 77gr so i imagine 50gr to be a little light. i wan't to use heavy bullets so i should be okay.
 
thatmikeguy said:
I'm surprised at the conflicting opinions here. I heard the same from the guys at the store. one says it'll shoot 40gr through to 75gr and the next says something else. The berger web site recommended 70gr to 77gr so i imagine 50gr to be a little light. i wan't to use heavy bullets so i should be okay.
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Its not really a matter of conflicting opinion, just a bit of physics. Simply put:

The faster twists (1:8, 1:9, etc) cannot really over-stabilize the lighter (shorter) bullets (assuming they're well constructed and don't come apart at high velocities), and they have the ability to stabilize the heavier (longer) ones.

The slower twists (1:12, etc), meanwhile, can stabilize the lighter (shorter) bullets, but just don't have the ability to stabilize the heavier (longer) ones.
 
KDX said:
I've got a Model 12 VLP on the way with the same twist and 1000 50gr V-Max bullets sitting in the basement. I hope it's a good match.
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I saw one guy in another forum say he was getting 10 shot groups the size of a dime at 100 yards with this combo. I plan to try them in my brand new VLP .223 as well...after 100 round break in with FMJ ammo.
 
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