6.5 Staball and 129 ABLR? need help

[coyoteking]

Today I started load development for the 129 ABLR in my 6.5 Creed. I decided to use 6.5 Staball since I have 2 lbs of it sitting on the shelf. The rifle is a Ruger Precision Rifle.

Hodgdon shows the max load at 44.3 gr with a velocity of 2889 FPS. My actual velocity was only 2795 with that charge weight.

This rifle has a fast barrel. It typically runs 50-80 FPS faster than book data shows with other bullet/powders I have tried.

Can anyone else confirm similar results with this load? I’m kind of wondering if the hodgdon max published load is wrong or maybe they erred on the conservative side?

Here are the velocities attained from my ladder test today.

42.9 gr- 2734 FPS
43.1 - 2716
43.3 - 2734
43.5 - 2734
43.7 - 2749
43.9 - 2760
44.1 - 2773
44.3 - 2795
44.5 - 2826

From 42.9- 43.9 there is a long flat plateau before any real increase in speed at around 44.3 grains which I also find a bit strange. This powder seems to ramp up pressure real fast. I didn’t see any signs of over-pressure on the brass or primers.

 

[billdick]

My cousin bought lots of it because of all the hype he was reading. He worked with it a bit in his creedmoors and said it was weird and gave it all to me. I tried it in a fussy 260 that's still fussy.

 

[coyoteking]

My cousin bought lots of it because of all the hype he was reading. He worked with it a bit in his creedmoors and said it was weird and gave it all to me. I tried it in a fussy 260 that's still fussy.

Yeah, I fell for the hype too. Figured I’d make some hunting rounds with it to use it up and conserve my supply of H-4350.

 

[chrismc]

Same^^^ Totally agree on the hype thing. So I switched.
I was loading 129 lrab with R16 and R26 and getting 2850 (R16 node) and 2900 (r26 node). These gave the best accuracy.
The LRAB do like lots of jump in my rifles.
I have since settled on R16 and 130 Gamechangers, simply due to I am out of the Noslers and haven't seen 129lrab for a while. Very very accurate.

This is with prepped Petersen brass, and a 24" Benchmark barrel. No pressure signs at those velocities

 

[bearhunter]

I think you folks are making to much of a fuss over a paltry 50fps.

Consistency is what you're looking for.

If you can find the sweet spot, for consistent velocities, you can usually tweak that spot for accuracy.

There isn't an animal in North America, or the world that's going to notice 50fps.

Stabal is good powder, in that it does give very consistent velocities.

As far as it being magical, in producing hyper velocities, it works well in longer, say 24-26 inch barrels.

 

[mimile]

Max load is not necessarily the most accurate. You have a node at 43.3-43.5. if I were you I would start with 43.4, see how it shoots and then finetune the load by working on seating depth if needed.
Velocity is the girl you date, accuracy is the girl you marry.

 

[Eagleye]

I have a very consistent and accurate Staball load in my 260 Remington.
I am using the 130 Nosler Accubond and 4x.x grains. Very respectable
velocity and very impressive groups. Dave.

 

[billdick]

My 260 is a horrible thing. I've used staball, both 4350's, 8208, varget, 4064, 4320 a mess of different primers and bullets. 2 1/2" - 3" groups then I tried H380 and it went to under an inch, crazy. I never checked the speed of the staball, I just tried several different combos. My cousin is the one that didn't like it and I may find a use for it in something someday.

 

[coyoteking]

Max load is not necessarily the most accurate. You have a node at 43.3-43.5. if I were you I would start with 43.4, see how it shoots and then finetune the load by working on seating depth if needed.
Velocity is the girl you date, accuracy is the girl you marry.

I couldn’t agree more, and I am going to use that charge to develop this load further. It just seems strange that this rifle is running slow with this powder when I get 50-80 FPS faster than published data with 4350, Varget and RL17. I was just curious if others had run into the same issue with the Staball.

 

[bearhunter]

My 260 is a horrible thing. I've used staball, both 4350's, 8208, varget, 4064, 4320 a mess of different primers and bullets. 2 1/2" - 3" groups then I tried H380 and it went to under an inch, crazy. I never checked the speed of the staball, I just tried several different combos. My cousin is the one that didn't like it and I may find a use for it in something someday.

I have a Remington 700 Long Action rifle, that was put together with parts from several other 700 bits, that were left over from builds and back in the day when firearms turned in for destruction, could be stripped of parts and the only thing that had to be destroyed was the ''receiver''

I was lucky enough to have an aftermarket adjustable trigger in hand, Trigger Tech.

The twist rate in this barrel 1-9 and the heaviest bullet it will stabilize well is 140 grain flat base, spire points. Hornady #2630 and it has to be pushed fast, close to max pressures to do it. Length is 24 inches and standard sporter weight.

Remington finally fixed it and went with a 1-8 twist. My barrel is one of the earlier barrels.

Now, I use 129 grain bullets (mostly Hornady #2620) of just about every shape/manufacturer and they all shoot very well with a couple of different powders.

I went with the 700LA, because it was in the bin of 700 stuff on the shelf and in truth wanted to be able to load the bullets out as far as possible to utilize powder space.

The powders my 260 Rem likes are Win 760/H414SL10/IMR4350/Staball/H4831ssc and IMR7828ssc, from fastest to slowest.

I settled on a faster powder than Staball, because it gives excellent accuracy and very consistent velocities. It's not available any longer, H414sl10. Depending on which lot of IMR4350 you have, it's either the same burn rate or slightly slower, but it's a ball type powder that I believe was a special order powder by a large corporation and may have been one of their first attempts at temperature stabilization.

All of these powders give similar velocities, when used with CCI250 Magnum primers.

All of them give very good results accuracy wise, with bullets from 95 grain to the flat base 140 grain.

With Staball, I used charges right up to 47.0 grains and my velocities were right around 2850fps. Accuracy was around moa.

Primers were flattening but still had a rounded edge and there wasn't any expansion of the web that was abnormal. I'm estimating around 60-65K psi (not CUP), which may be hard on cases but the action is definitely strong enough for it.

All of the other powders gave similar velocities and similar accuracy.

I could have tweaked things more but I'm not overly interested in match accuracy moa is fine for the shooting I do on medium sized game, out to 300 yds, usually under a hundred.

The thing about longer 6.5 bullets, is they don't really settle down until they're out past 75 yards.

I always shudder when folks report they sight in at 50 yards and complain about their groups.

 

[mimile]

I couldn’t agree more, and I am going to use that charge to develop this load further. It just seems strange that this rifle is running slow with this powder when I get 50-80 FPS faster than published data with 4350, Varget and RL17. I was just curious if others had run into the same issue with the Staball.

I had the same experience when I was loading for my 6.5x55 with Staball 6.5. I was never able to get the speeds I saw on Hodgdon's website and the milder load with the 125 grain was the most accurate.
But with the 30-06 and 165 grains, Staball 6.5 gave 180 fps more than all other powders.

 

[RonR]

Can anyone else confirm similar results with this load? I’m kind of wondering if the hodgdon max published load is wrong or maybe they erred on the conservative side?

From 42.9- 43.9 there is a long flat plateau before any real increase in speed at around 44.3 grains which I also find a bit strange. This powder seems to ramp up pressure real fast. I didn’t see any signs of over-pressure on the brass or primers.

OP, I am working on a load albeit for a different cartridge and thought I would share - if it's of any interest - my experiences so far with this powder. To date, I as well have results that mirror the thought of a long flat plateau before pressure builds up, and when it does, it is drastic and groups well with what appears to be a small range of forgiveness of plus/minus .1 gr variance in test charge weights.

Consistency is what you're looking for.

Stabal is good powder, in that it does give very consistent velocities.

Results here are positive. W760 was the bomb for this cartridge, and if it's any bit cleaner or more consistent with groups, hype or not, it is showing very well at the moment so it's garnering my respect.

Very respectable velocity and very impressive groups. Dave.

EE, that's where it looks to be headed. No chrony results yet to confirm but looking at paper at the moment, both respectable velocity and accuracy looks to be aligning.

All of these powders give similar velocities, when used with CCI250 Magnum primers.

Primers were flattening but still had a rounded edge and there wasn't any expansion of the web that was abnormal.

Agreed with the primer selection. I tried various combinations of Stabal with different weights of bullets with different primers, and 250's were the most positive. Here, the sweet spot so far shows the start of primer flattening before the firing pin indent develops any ridges that can be detected with my thumbnail. (I am not well versed regarding suspected values in pressure value of PSI or CUP.)

Regards
Ronr

 

[bearhunter]

I had the same experience when I was loading for my 6.5x55 with Staball 6.5. I was never able to get the speeds I saw on Hodgdon's website and the milder load with the 125 grain was the most accurate.
But with the 30-06 and 165 grains, Staball 6.5 gave 180 fps more than all other powders.

That's because you likely loaded it for the higher pressures of modern 30-06 loads.

The Hogdon site loads defer to the lower pressurs applicable to the myriad of older surplus 6.5x55 M38/94/96/Krag actions.

I found Staball to be most consistent at pressures 60K psi and over.

 

[mad max78]

I bought a pound of it to try with the 160 woodleighs in my swede. Also in my 338-06 shooting the 250gr accubonds.

 

[mimile]

Mad Max, If Staball does not work for you, you can try 45 grains of H4831. It gave me 0.5 moa with two shots in the same hole. Max load for Hodgdon is 48 grains....

 

[IvoB]

The powder usually gets blamed for everything but not:
1) Inconsistent neck tension any rough spots (burrs) at the mouth of the case will cause added friction to the bullet.
2) Primer seating depths
3) Inconsistent powder measuring device (digital or beam scale)
4) The marksmanship of the shooter

all these play a pivotal role in obtaining be best consistent anything

 

[coyoteking]

OP, I am working on a load albeit for a different cartridge and thought I would share - if it's of any interest - my experiences so far with this powder. To date, I as well have results that mirror the thought of a long flat plateau before pressure builds up, and when it does, it is drastic and groups well with what appears to be a small range of forgiveness of plus/minus .1 gr variance in test charge weights.



Results here are positive. W760 was the bomb for this cartridge, and if it's any bit cleaner or more consistent with groups, hype or not, it is showing very well at the moment so it's garnering my respect.



EE, that's where it looks to be headed. No chrony results yet to confirm but looking at paper at the moment, both respectable velocity and accuracy looks to be aligning.




Agreed with the primer selection. I tried various combinations of Stabal with different weights of bullets with different primers, and 250's were the most positive. Here, the sweet spot so far shows the start of primer flattening before the firing pin indent develops any ridges that can be detected with my thumbnail. (I am not well versed regarding suspected values in pressure value of PSI or CUP.)

Regards
Ronr

Thanks Ronr. Im not the most experienced reloader but this powder does behave a lot differently from the other powders in my stable.

I’ve settled on 43.4 gr for my load. I Shot 3, 5 shot groups today and all 3 groups were right at 3/4 moa with an ES of 22 FPS for all 15 shots. Afterwards I rang steel out to 800 yards. Good to go for deer season!

 

[hawk-i]

I've only tried 6.5 Staball in my Kimber 280AI Montana so far, 58 grs is giving me 3095 fps with TSX 150's. Accuracy is great with cold bore 1st round hits on a 4" target @ 500 yards. (200 yard zero and 7.25 MOA up)

Haven't tried it in my 6.5 Creedmoors yet because they are all very accurate with 41.4-42.1grs of H4350 and 143ELD-X's 41.4 in the Savage 12, 41.5 in the RPR and 42.1 in the Kimber Montana.