It's nice to have the most accurate rifle/cartridge combo on the line - and the skill to use it ..... it is VERY nice to ride in the "chair" at the end of the day. But it is also very satisfying to simply shoot for yourself with a rifle and equipment that gives you personal pleasure ... when you get there ... the 6.5x55 Swede is a little like "comfort food" imho ..... hard to explain but for all it's years it "works" in a very satisfying fashion.
Best 6.5mm Target Chambering?
- Thread starter CyaN1de
- Start date
Richard. I agree the 260 maybe slightly better and so would the 6.5 x 55 only I am looking for the best all around compromise and believe I have found it. Remember that the 6.5 x 47 was only developed to beat the 6mmBR. I maybe wrong and only time will tell. However, if you are looking for the 1000 yard ranges instead of the 6.5 calibers of various kinds, may I suggest you look at the 284 throated for 180 bergers. This is the caliber that seems to be gathering a following for the longer ranges. Why not keep the 6mmBR's you have for the short ranges and build something like a 284. I think this might be my build after the next 65. x 47. Steve
Trust me Steve....you would have to kill me to get me to give up my BR's 
I am not looking for a replacement for my 6's but something to compliment them at the longer ranges.
Mick reminded me of this when we were discussing my plans "Beware the man that has only one gun, because he probably knows how to use it"
I do agree with that saying, however, what fun is it to have only one gun?
I thought about the 7mm cartridges but I really would prefer the recoil of a lighter round....I'm frail you know LOL
I am not looking for a replacement for my 6's but something to compliment them at the longer ranges.
Mick reminded me of this when we were discussing my plans "Beware the man that has only one gun, because he probably knows how to use it"
I do agree with that saying, however, what fun is it to have only one gun?
I thought about the 7mm cartridges but I really would prefer the recoil of a lighter round....I'm frail you know LOL
rnbra-shooter
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- New Brunswick
Hi Peter, a good answer to have.
Powders with the same chemistry will have the same flame temperatures. So if your entire line of powders (e.g. all N1xx rifle powders) is single-base, and the chemistry of your deterrent coatings in your different powders are the same, then your flame temperatures will necessarily be the same. The only difference between your various powders will be their burn rates, which you engineer via the powder kernel size and shape, and the deterrent profiles.
There's likely a bit of a misunderstanding there, I suspect due to a bit of confusion in the Finnish->English translation of technical terms.
The "more heat" remark is technically correct, but perhaps somewhat misleading in many cases. There is more heat in the same sense that a kettle full of boiling water has more heat than a teacup full of boiling water, even though they both have the same temperature.
The amount that a rifle barrel erodes depends on how hot the surface of the steel becomes (plus a few other factors too, such as the chemistry of the gases, but we can safely ignore those at the moment). Higher powder flame temperatures will increase the amount of heating delivered to the origin of the rifling, and therefore increase the erosion rate. Also, a larger powder charge will cause more gas to flow over the origin of the rifling, which will increase the amount of heat delivered to the origin of the rifling.
If you have an opportunity, perhaps you could ask for more information on this. As far as I know, this is not true - powder charges that develop maximum pressure, do so at extremely similar peak pressure distances (which is typically somewhere between 1.0" and 1.5" of bullet travel).
rnbra-shooter
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- New Brunswick
Richard, I apologize for re-quoting your entire posting, but it is quite some number of pages back, and your post is so to-the-point that everything in it is relevant.
Let me try to convince you that you should relent on your requirement for "good barrel life", and simply suck it up and build a 6.5-.284.
If you want a competitive F/Open rifle, you will be shooting against a field full of 6.5-.284s, some of which will be unbelievably accurate, and fired by absolutely first-rate shooters. You might also be a first-rate shooter, as good as the very best shooter on the line, and firing a rifle fully as accurate as the very best one on the line, but, if your rifle is just a little bit "second best" as far as wind drift performance goes, you are working with a handicap that will slowly grind against you. And "slowly grinding against you" is how Vegas makes money over the long haul, inexorably and unstoppably. Fortunately in the case of F/Open rifle shooting, you get to decide if you play on the wrong side of House Odds, or if you get to play Even Odds.
So you really need to decide whether you want a fully-competitive long range F/Open rifle that is fully competitive, or whether you want "only" a nice high performance 6.5mm long range rifle (which will still outperform a .308 target rifle by miles). Both are good rifles to have and to shoot - but be clear when you make your decision, what it is you are choosing to do.
If you want a fully-competitive F/Open rifle, there are really only two choices that I know of. Either the 6.5-.284 firing 139-142gr bullets like everbody else is shooting, or the .284-class 7mm rifles firing 175-180gr bullets, like a number of people seem to be going towards.
With respect to barrel life, I don't fully believe the wide gulf in reported barrel life between a 6.5-.284 and the other slightly-smaller cased 6.5s. If a 6.5-.284 really is wearing out after 800-1200 rounds, there's no way that a .260 Rem can achieve over 2000 rounds of barrel life when burning only five grains less powder and coming within 75fps of the 6.5-.284. Either the 6.5-.284's life is understated, or the .260's is overstated. (Barrel life is a really hard thing to nail down objectively).
Remember too that a barrel isn't a permanent part of a rifle, it is an expendable, consumable part, and not a terribly expensive part either. For a long-life cartridge like a .308, barrel wear is going to cost you 10-15c per shot. For a high-performance cartridge like a 6.5-.284, it is going to cost 30-40c per shot. The high performance of the 6.5-.284 (just over half the wind drift of a .308) clearly comes at a price, but it isn't _that_ unreasonable a price to consider paying, when you consider the relative cost of barrel wear versus ammo costs. (It's even worse when you consider your other per-shot cost, but that's not usually a fun exercise to do!)
*All* of your other requirements are extremely important, especially "inherently accurate" and "easy to load for (not finicky)". Make sure that you get these, otherwise you will be unhappy. Voice of experience here, I wasted over four years trying to shoot F/Open with unconventional 6.5mm rifles, a 6.5-06 for a couple of years and then a 6.5-08 for a couple more. While they were accurate enough for Target Rifle shooting, they were clearly uncompetitive for F/Open back in the '98-'02 timeframe, and they definitely held me back (the 'bad news' is that good F/Open rifles are substantially better now, so the standard of competition are even higher!). Trust me when I say that you really, really don't want to be shooting a 3/4MOA rifle with mediocre velocity spreads, it just isn't fun...
If this 6.5 rifle will not be your only rifle (it sounds like you already have a first rate 6BR), then that's even better. Even if a 6.5-.284 really only does last you 1,000 rounds, you can fire your 6BR at the short and mid ranges most of the time, perhaps using your 6.5 for unusually tricky conditions. And shoot your 6.5 most of the time at the longer ranges, but you can still shoot your 6BR at the longs with probably no loss of competitiveness on the easy days (which actually do happen! ;-).
If we accept that the 6.5X284 and the 260.* are both capable of dropping identical bullets into identical groups (with a match-quality barrel) in perfect conditions, then what it boils down to is the effect of 1-200 fps muzzle velocity at a distance of 1000 meters and the shooter's ability to adjust for them.
That makes a bit of a difference, but as the old axiom goes, "beware of the man with only one rifle, for he knows how to use it". I feel the shooter makes more difference than the technical differences between a 260 and a 6.5X284. The reason TR team coaching works so well is they all use the same cartridges and the wind coach knows what each gun will do. They work with an exceedingly predictable set of ballistics. The rest is up to the shooter. (308 is certainly not a crowd favorite for 1200M shooting!)
I certainly agree with the assertion that barrels are indeed a disposable commodity, but the 6.5X284 is not capable of surviving a full season of shooting in BC. Between the Alberta and BC matches alone, a season is good for 1500+ rounds of ammo. You can dispute the barrel life numbers but they are well established, in fact from my own first hand experience with a nice-shooting Gaillard barrel, it was done at 800.
With ICFRA mention nothing about the exclusion of Magnums, I think I would probably use a 300 WM or RUM if I wanted to buck the wind, but I am a whimp.
I'll stick with light n' greasy.
That makes a bit of a difference, but as the old axiom goes, "beware of the man with only one rifle, for he knows how to use it". I feel the shooter makes more difference than the technical differences between a 260 and a 6.5X284. The reason TR team coaching works so well is they all use the same cartridges and the wind coach knows what each gun will do. They work with an exceedingly predictable set of ballistics. The rest is up to the shooter. (308 is certainly not a crowd favorite for 1200M shooting!)
I certainly agree with the assertion that barrels are indeed a disposable commodity, but the 6.5X284 is not capable of surviving a full season of shooting in BC. Between the Alberta and BC matches alone, a season is good for 1500+ rounds of ammo. You can dispute the barrel life numbers but they are well established, in fact from my own first hand experience with a nice-shooting Gaillard barrel, it was done at 800.
With ICFRA mention nothing about the exclusion of Magnums, I think I would probably use a 300 WM or RUM if I wanted to buck the wind, but I am a whimp.
I'll stick with light n' greasy.
Dan, I have to rely on the test enginneer from Lapua, as do VihtaVuori reloaders and professional end-users around the world. He dealt continually with real-life development of projects such as the MRSR for Canada, as well as dozens of others. Theory is fine, but I'll accept info from the man who has actually done this testing.
Sorry, won't ask for elaboation or test results, but may ask specific questions on occassion.
Regards,
Peter
Sorry, won't ask for elaboation or test results, but may ask specific questions on occassion.
Regards,
Peter
800 rounds is amazingly quick, what level of drop off in accuraccy are we talking about to create a marker?
Just curious as I have rescued service rifle barrels with many thousands of ball through them and still found them capable of holding moa with half decent handloads, (I do understand the difference between service .30 ammo and hotter 6.5-284 loads but I am curious. Does this wear exhibit mainly as throat erosion?
Just curious as I have rescued service rifle barrels with many thousands of ball through them and still found them capable of holding moa with half decent handloads, (I do understand the difference between service .30 ammo and hotter 6.5-284 loads but I am curious. Does this wear exhibit mainly as throat erosion?
Depending on what service rifles you're talking about, they have the advantage of shooting cartridges with very low overbore indexes combined with chrome lined barrels. 6.5X284 is a throat burner. It is the combination of wear and converting steel to plasma under the heat and pressure of a concentrated jet of a low-yield explosion.
F-Class uses a .5MOA v-bull. When the rifle can't maintain sub .5MOA, it is done in my books.
rnbra-shooter
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- New Brunswick
Hi Peter, as you know I have a great deal of respect for the technical competence of those guys, as well as the absolutely first-rate quality of their products. I am sure that he knows his stuff. And I am also sure that if he, you and I sat down to have a beer and talk about shooting stuff, that we'd all have a really great chat. Hey, that's a great idea you just came up with... why not arrange it? ;-)
I was just pointing out two things, firstly that the his comment about "more heat" was phrased in a way likely to be misunderstood by most people, even though he is absolutely correct (i.e. the distinction between "heat" and "temperature").
And secondly, his comment "slower powders will burn also outside the case, so they will also cause more heat erosion on barrel throat and first part of rifling than faster ones." is also completely true, but again it might suggest things to people that aren't true, and lead them astray. For example, medium-burning powders (Varget, N140) also burn outside the case. And, a full-pressure load of a slower powder in a given cartridge case will produce more throat erosion than a full-pressure load of a quicker powder in that same cartridge case. But, how much of that increased erosion is due to the increased charge mass of the slower powder, versus how much is due to a difference in the time-temperature-pressure-distance profile?
To illustrate where an incomplete understanding of his statement might lead a shooter astray, consider the case of a .308 case loaded with 45 grains of N140 versus 45 grains of N160, firing a 155 grain bullet in both cases. Which one will produce more throat erosion?
The first charge is basically a full-pressure load, the second charge is a fairly low pressure sub-optimal load that a shooter would not use in practice, since N160 is pretty badly matched to a .308W/155. But while it is true that the N160's burn profile will result in a larger portion of the powder being burned outside the case than the N140 charge, and also the N160 charge will reach its peak pressure farther down the barrel than the N140's charge, it is also the case that the full-pressure, more-burned-in-the-case N140 load will be more erosive than the N160 load (and I'm confident that the Lapua propellant engineer will agree with me on this).
Anyhow, I think that that idea about us having a beer with that propellant engineer is a great one....
Cheers,
Dan, it is realy great to have you comneton these board, as: 1. you are a competent shooter(congratulations on Connaught!}
2. Having a Masters in engineering,compined with much practical experience gives you the upper hand.
Personally, I can't enjoin every scrap or enlist the heavy-weights from Lapua on every technical detail, as they are busy. I do like to dispell some of the misleading info posted here by so-called experts and those seen as such. Of course you are not a diseminator of poor info and I always look forward to your postings.
Beer with the engineers can be arranged. We had a great time at the Sniper Concentration a few years ago. Watched Finland v Canada in the hockey final with our best snipers. When Finland scored, Erkki would say"cry if it makes you feel better". Luckily we won - drank beer, broke a few chairs -usual stuff.
Regards,
Peter
2. Having a Masters in engineering,compined with much practical experience gives you the upper hand.
Personally, I can't enjoin every scrap or enlist the heavy-weights from Lapua on every technical detail, as they are busy. I do like to dispell some of the misleading info posted here by so-called experts and those seen as such. Of course you are not a diseminator of poor info and I always look forward to your postings.
Beer with the engineers can be arranged. We had a great time at the Sniper Concentration a few years ago. Watched Finland v Canada in the hockey final with our best snipers. When Finland scored, Erkki would say"cry if it makes you feel better". Luckily we won - drank beer, broke a few chairs -usual stuff.
Regards,
Peter
