favorite .270 loads

Most loads with 130 gr bullets work well, but I was looking for a load with 150 gr. bullets, and with the powders I had, nothing just jumped out and proved up.
Back to Nosler, and the most accurate powder was 52.0 gr. of H4350. BINGO!
I wanted more velocity, and found that I got better accuracy as I went higher and hotter.
Loaded 160 gr. bullets for a friend and settled on 55.5 gr. IMR 4831 but then ran out of bullets so he now gets the 150 load.
 
I've been loading the 130 gr Barnes TSX over a stiff charge of IMR 4831 lately. This load gets a chrony'd 3100 fps out of a 22" barrel with good accuracy.

The TSX is more bullet than needed for deer, but if larger critters might be on the menu, it's quite an effective bullet on game. I've also used 150 Nosler Partitions with good results. I also would consider the 140 gr Nosler AccuBond as a good all round hunting bullet.

I think your bullet choice should depend on what you plan on using it for. The premium bullets aren't required obviously for target shooting or just for deer, but I like to use them on deer anyhow.

There are lots of suitable powders for the 270. Think in the 4350 / 4831 / RL 19 / RL 22 burn rate.
 
I've had good success with 45gr. of IMR4895, WLR primers and 150gr. bullets - Hornady and Nosler. It's not the fastest, about 2700 -2800fps but it is the most accurate load I've found for the 270 over the past 20 years, at least in my rifle. I've used this load with 150gr. Partitions on quite a few deer and a couple of moose with great success. It's my go-to target load also.
 
One buddy runs nothing but 130gr. Partitions with IMR4350
Another has awesome luck with 130 Intelock Honady's on top of H4831.
And a third friend runs 140 Hornady Interlock's on top of H4350.

My wife runs the discontinued 100gr. Barnes X bullets on top of IMR4350.

All these people take multiple heads of game every season, and on average a moose every 3 or 4 years, same load regardless.
 
54 grains of IMR 4350 topped with 130grn Sierra game kings gives me <3/4" groups out of my beater Savage 110. Sorry, no chrony. So far have no complaints on deer from 20-150 yards.
 
140 Accubonds and 58 gr of Norma MRP. wow!! groups under ¾moa right out to 400 meters and 3000 fps in a 24" tube. What more could you ask for? Close second is the 140 Partition and 60 grains of Vihtavuori N165. Regards, Eagleye
 
Scott_N said:
I've been loading the 130 gr Barnes TSX over a stiff charge of IMR 4831 lately. This load gets a chrony'd 3100 fps out of a 22" barrel with good accuracy.

The TSX is more bullet than needed for deer, but if larger critters might be on the menu, it's quite an effective bullet on game. I've also used 150 Nosler Partitions with good results. I also would consider the 140 gr Nosler AccuBond as a good all round hunting bullet.

I think your bullet choice should depend on what you plan on using it for. The premium bullets aren't required obviously for target shooting or just for deer, but I like to use them on deer anyhow.

There are lots of suitable powders for the 270. Think in the 4350 / 4831 / RL 19 / RL 22 burn rate.
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I use a near max (for my rifle) load of H4831 .010 from the lands, and 130gr Speer hot-cor sp with very good accuracy in my Savage/Stevens. I plan to switch to tsx.

I am well aware of the fact that IMR4831 and H4831 aren't interchangeable, but I still have a couple of questions regarding your tsx load. Did you use that powder with other 130's before trying the tsx? I'm interested in an approximate idea of how much you needed to adjust your powder charge and seating depth to get the tsx's to perform well.
 
The .270 was the first rifle that I actually bought for myself. I'll admit to being a big Jack O'Connor reader back then. Anyway in his "Complete Book of the Rifle and Shotgun" he mentioned that a load of 49.5 grains of 4064 and a 130 grain bullet had given him consistant accuracy in most every .270 he tried them in so I went with that. Well, I went with as close to that as my Lee dippers would get me. Man I killed stuff with that load!:D
 
Caribou kid,
There were a lot more than one. The 4064 load was one that he had apparently had lot of luck with in many different rifles. I was hoping for quick success and found it with 4064. It may have been the only powder at the hardware store as well.:D It's hard to believe that Ole Jack has been dead for 29 years. His writing got a lot of guys off to good starts, and even now it's hard to pick out something that he was wrong about.
 
Bruce Hodgdon didn't start selling surplus cannon powder and calling it 4831 until 1950. Dupont revamped their powder line in the thirties with a different coating and called them Improved Military Rifle or IMR. They were around long before that too. The .270 dates to 1925. Jack was stuffing .270 cases long before there was a powder called H4831. It is, however, a very good one.
 
Dogleg, got it thanks. :)

I've been hearing so much of his "classic 270 load" that I got the impression that 60 grains of 4831 with a 130 was the only load he pushed that hard for the 270.

I hope to buy/read his books before long, but at the moment I'm spending all the cash I get on more loading manuals and the myriad of other stuff we feel sucking our wallets dry. ;)
 
Goose25 said:
I have a buddy that is getting into reloading, we would like to know what are your favorite .270 loads?

might narrow it down for us, thanks.
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For more than forty years my all-time go-to load for my 270 rifles has been 60 gr of 4831, 130 gr Nosler partitions and a magnum primer.

Scores of big game have bit the dust with that load, including huge bull moose, caribou and bears.

Ted
 
cariboo_kid said:
I use a near max (for my rifle) load of H4831 .010 from the lands, and 130gr Speer hot-cor sp with very good accuracy in my Savage/Stevens. I plan to switch to tsx.

I am well aware of the fact that IMR4831 and H4831 aren't interchangeable, but I still have a couple of questions regarding your tsx load. Did you use that powder with other 130's before trying the tsx? I'm interested in an approximate idea of how much you needed to adjust your powder charge and seating depth to get the tsx's to perform well.
Click to expand...

cariboo_kid,

Yes, I did use this powder with other bullets including a few other 130s. 56.5grs of IMR 4831 gave 3060 fps with Hornady 130 gr Interlocks. The IMR load guide showed this to be the max. charge and the Lyman manual shows 57.0 gr. as the max in their data for IMR 4831. I worked up to 56.5 with the TSX and it was shooting nice groups, so I just left it at that because the velocity was what I had hoped to get. I think that I could increase the powder charge a little in this particular 270, but thought that 3100 fps out of a 22" barrel must be fairly close to maximum.

I did seat the bullets a little deeper, but I haven't experimented any farther. From trying the TSXs out in a couple of other rifles, my experience has been that the TSXs aren't fussy at all.
 
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