.260 Rem Vs. 6.5 x 47L?

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lyle1

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Hypothetically.....:p, If a person was to build a practical/tactical/fun/F-class
REPEATER rifle, which cartridge would be best? Would one "feed" better in a magazine than the other? Is the cartridge overall length going to be a problem for one or the other, or both with the 130/140g Berger/Lapua bullets with the 2.800oal clip length? I think the the .260 will give a little more velocity/case capacity, but is the 6.5x47 inherently more accurate? What about the "doughnut" problem necking up .243 Lapua brass? Is this really a problem? I see on the "benchrest" forums that at 600yard competitions the 6.5 Lapua is showing up a fair amount, but the .260 does not?
Any opinions and real life experiences would be appreciated......:)
 
It would be difficult to take advantage of any extra case capacity in the .260 Rem while limiting COL to 2.800. The long 140's would take up a lot of case space.
 
Yep, that is the draw-back to any precision repeater; the length of the most suitable bullets often exceeds mag length, however the simple fix is to use a long action.

The 260 is an excellent cartridge capable of handling the heavy 6.5's and doing so with extreme accuracy. Brass, well there are many MANY options including excellent Nosler and Norma 260 brass, plus you have the option of 243 or 308 Lapua brass. I have also had good luck with Winchester 308 and it is both cheap and plentiful.

However.... any repeater rifle will have to have certain concession that can affect accuracy. You must load with more neck tension than may be considered optimal, you generally need greater neck clearance, and fire formed brass may not feed as easily.

Both the 6BR and the 6.5 will feed from a magazine; center-feed styles work better.

If I were to build a repeater 6.5 I'd go with a 6.5X55, but for a short action I would do a 6-22-250 in a heartbeat. It is accurate, handles 115 Bergers (equal to the 130 in 6.5), and Lapua makes brass for it.
 
The HRN 6.5 Creedmore is supposed to be the answer to this question.

Seems to be working well in the US as brass demands far outstrip supply.

All three, Lapua, Rem and HRN, are excellent cases. All have their plus and minuses. None offers a tangible advantage over the other in a mag fed rifle.

The advancement in tactical rifles is greatly influenced by the limitations of the mag.

Big reason I shoot the Savage center feed det mag. With an internal length almost 3" long, I can load whatever I want, where ever it works best.

Jerry
 
The Creedmore would be my choice of a short action 6.5 if brass were easier to come by. More case capacity than the Lapua, feeds from a mag with the longer bullets and but still has the advantages of the longer neck and steeper shoulder.
 
I am planning a build myself and am leaning toward the 260 rem. The fact that I can find 260 brass locally alot easier than finding 6.5x47 is one big reason I am thinking about going 260. I am all about the KISS rule..... Keep It Simple Stupid. I am going to stick with things that are easily accessible.... Makes sense to me.
 
Most of the problems have been answered by those more knowledgeable than me.

Yes, you will get donuts necking up. I just did 10 .243 Lapua cases in 2 steps, to 7mm, but at .264 I already had donuts. I had previously used Nosler .260 brass in a .260AI I had and was satisfied with it, but man it's pricey - like $85-90 per 50.

.260 in a short action and assuming you want to be able to reach the lands, unless your throat is very short and therefore having to put bullet far into the case, you will not be able to mag feed long rounds. **EDIT TO SAY** this was in a Remington factory mag for my .260AI, sounds like Savage might work.

As suggested above, I went 6.5x55 for essentially the same or slightly more performance. In a Savage long action, I can set the bullets as 3.150 OAL and still feed them from the factory mag. It hasn't yet been an issue for me, but I understand one drawback of 6.5x55 is more frequent length trimming. Rifle is too new to say yet, I'm fine at 4 firings.

Can't answer a single question about 6.5x47. You're obviously giving up a little case capacity but some of the reading I did suggests you can still get 140's into the 2900fps range, which is very easy with 6.5x55.
 
Also consider the availability and costs of dies. Mainstream cases like the 260Rem have lots to choose from and dirt cheap.

Low production chamberings like the Lapua and Hrn have limited options and that raises costs ALOT.

Necking up 243 brass to make 260Rem brass has been and will be a bad idea if you want to avoid donuts. Regardless of the brand of brass, there will always be a portion of the 243 shoulder that is pushed into the neck area of the 260rem. With work, this can be removed and annealing would be a good idea.

When I started designing and making my 6.5 Mystic years back (and 260 improved over the last 2 years), I saw this problem and started using 308 Win brass. It has worked superbly with a number of positive benefits.

If working with the 260Rem, either factory shaped brass or neck down 7-08 or 308. Regardless of the brand, going from big to small will be a much more successful method.

If the goal is to build a Creedmore, I bet the 22/250 brass can be easily reworked to this chambering. Annealing will be a good idea as the brass will have moved around alot. Might be a bit short, but then you will not have to trim for a long while.

Hrn Creedmore brass continues to be a pain to get with long waits the norm.

When building a custom rifle, specing the reamer to suit your bullet and OAL should be part of the process. So the issue of mag length vs throat length should NOT be an issue.

There is always a relationship between case capacity and performance. Small cases can act like big cases when pressures are elevated.

A Lapua must run at higher pressures then a Hrn which also runs elevated pressures to meet a 260Rem run at standard pressures.

If all cases are held to the same pressures and effective barrel lengths, the largest case will push the same bullet faster.

I am not a big fan of super high pressures having seen more trouble then its worth. I use a case large enough to do what I want at standard magnum pressures. All reloading components are stressed for this pressure levels and powders burn extremely well too.

If the goal is a mag fed rifle, then the length of the mag is the limiting factor in the performance of the rifle. Find the largest mag that will suit your action and work back to the case that will get it done and fit.

Jerry
 
In a rifle with a short magazine, I would be inclined to go with the standard 260. The donut, in this instance, is kind of a mythical problem. The brass is not any thicker, there is just a vestigal "wrinkle" where the corner used to be. If a person necks up his 243 brass by firing a blank load, the wrinkle seems to be gone. Annealing does help to eliminate the wrinkle.
The "dreaded donut" as described by the BR crowd is the result of thicker brass moving up into the base of the neck on neck turned brass. In this case, the brass may actually be thick enough to interfere with bullet seating or chambering a loaded round. It certainly affects accuracy. When working with brass which is not neck turned, the corner at the juncture of the neck and shoulder can produce greater tension on the bullet at the point if the case is sized right to the base of the neck. This may or may not show up on the target. Regards, Bill.
 
One of the few times I will offer a 'correction'. The forming using 243 will push alot of the shoulder into where the 260Rem neck will be. Because of how much brass is moved, it is a fair bit thicker so you create that internal donut as a byproduct of forming.

Been there, only use 308W brass now.

Jerry
 
300 Metre world champion this year uses 6.5X47 Lapua to shoot 600/600, as do increasing numbers. They feed well from magazines well, as mentioned before and shoot very well. Most consider Lapua brass the best.

Regards,

Peter
 
peterdobson said:
.....l. Most consider Lapua brass the best.

Regards,

Peter
Click to expand...


And those that don't shouldn't be listened-to :)

If lapua don't make it, I don't use it.


I have used lots of Lapua 243 brass for making 260 brass and the doughnut problem is a non-issue. I use very light neck tension on my 260; the neck is re-sized and then I run a 6.5 expander mandrel into the case to give roughly 1 thou neck tension. I trim my necks to uniform, and I can also state emphatically having trimmed hundreds of them, that there is NOT an excess of shoulder material in the base of the neck. Remember that when using 243 brass, you are opening the brass only .25mm on each side. (9 thou) When you use 308 brass, you are compressing by .66mm (25 thou) on each side, and that is material you ideally should trim off.
 
Jerry,
I want you to sit back, close your eyes, and visualize the reformation which takes place when you expand 243 to make 260. As you expand the neck, you don't push any shoulder material into the neck. Instead, you stretch neck material out to a larger size and the small amount of the existing shoulder which becomes part of the 260 neck is actually expanded outward. It doesn't expand outward perfectly just because the angle of the neck/shoulder juncture is structurally more rigid than the brass in the neck just due to it's shape.
On a piece of random Federal .243 brass I measured the neck thickness at .0131" at the mouth and .0136 at, roughly, the midpoint of the neck. The face of the thimble of my tubing mike wouldn't allow me to measure the base of the neck. I was able to measure the shoulder at a point immediately behind the neck 9about 1/16 inch behind the juncture of neck and shoulder) by cutting away the neck. The brass at this point measures . 0132. At a point about 2/3 down the angle of the shoulder the brass thickness is .0126.
A piece of this same brass which has been expanded to 260 measures .0118 at the mouth, .0125 halfway down and .0129 in the shoulder. As you can see, when you expand that little bit of shoulder to make a .260 case, the brass does not get thicker. New brass is actually thicker at the base of the neck than it is at the base of the shoulder, which makes prefect sense when you think about it. If you were to take a piece of .243 brass and blow it out straight, the brass thickness would taper from the mouth to the base; there would be no doughnut.
As I said before, any doughnut which may exist is simply a wrinkle in the brass which will, with use, disappear. It is not a thickening of the brass from pushing shoulder-dwelling brass into the neck. Regards, Bill.
 
Bill, what you have described is bang on IF you are simply expanding the neck on the 243case from 6mm to 6.5 mm. This is exactly the process I would go with HOWEVER, the gents are Rem decided to start with the Rem 7-08 case and neck down. Avoiding any complaints from Win or other near identical wildcat designs (we can debate the copying side till the cows come home as there were several designers that never got credit or maybe that should be compensated)

243Winch.png


The 243 is 1.8043" from the base of the case to the base of the neck

260REM.png


The 260Rem is 1.7755" for this same dimension so to form a 243 into a SAAMI 260Rem, the neck has to be expanded AND pushed back.

Make any sense, nope but there it is. Why the donut is a given when 243 brass is used.

Jerry
 
Jerry,
I don't suppose you have a CAD program but, if you did, you would be able to see that as the lines forming a given angle converge, they will be further from a starting point as they get closer together. The juncture of the neck and shoulder, at a given diameter is a certain length from the base. Change the neck diameter, the distance to the juncture changes. The measurement to the datum line remains the same, the distance to the outside corner of the shoulder remains the same, but the distance to the neck/shoulder juncture varies according to neck diameter. Now, when forming brass for a cartridge like the 260, it doesn't matter what you start with. If the finished neck diameter is "X" and the shoulder angle is " 20 degrees=Y" then the distance from the base to the neck shoulder juncture is "Z"; every time. Expand the neck diameter to "X+ .0209", the distance from the base to the neck shoulder juncture is "Z-.0288" every time. There is no pushing back involved. The shoulder is untouched. It matters not whether one starts with 243 or 308. The angle of the shoulder and it's starting point are perpetuated. No pushing back. This is why the formation of a donut when expanding 243 brass to 260 is a mythical occurence. Like a bogeyman used to frighten children at night, it doesn't really exist. Regards, Bill
 
Leeper said:
It matters not whether one starts with 243 or 308. The angle of the shoulder and it's starting point are perpetuated. No pushing back. This is why the formation of a donut when expanding 243 brass to 260 is a mythical occurence. Like a bogeyman used to frighten children at night, it doesn't really exist. Regards, Bill
Click to expand...

I completely and totally agree.
 
Leeper said:
Jerry,
The shoulder is untouched. It matters not whether one starts with 243 or 308. The angle of the shoulder and it's starting point are perpetuated. No pushing back. This is why the formation of a donut when expanding 243 brass to 260 is a mythical occurence. Like a bogeyman used to frighten children at night, it doesn't really exist. Regards, Bill
Click to expand...

If you look at the diagram of the 243 case, you can see where the shoulder of the 243 case, when the neck is expanded, forms the base of the neck of the 260Rem case. (pushing back neck was not an ideal description).

Is that brass thick enough to cause trouble? Sometimes it does.

Best way is to cut some cases in half and look at how thick the material is in your cases at the shoulder area.

If these donuts do not exist, then there are a bunch of customers who have bought inside neck reamers for nothing.

YMMV.

Jerry
 
Quite often they have. They are reaming away brass which exists as a result of bending , not thickening. They are actually ending up with a groove once the brass straightens out, which it will do. I'll go into this a in a bit more depth tomorrow. Regards, Bill
 
Leeper said:
Quite often they have. They are reaming away brass which exists as a result of bending , not thickening. They are actually ending up with a groove once the brass straightens out, which it will do. I'll go into this a in a bit more depth tomorrow. Regards, Bill
Click to expand...
I neck up instead of down whenever I can, when altering cases, it just makes sense to me.
Cat
 
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