how light can you load a 30.06?

Mr. Friendly

Mr. Friendly

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by light load I mean bullet weight. lightest I've seen is 150g, but I'm wondering if you can go lighter?

speaking of this I am actually wondering if all 30.06 are 1 in 10 twist? if so, doesn't that actually lend itself to shooting some lighter bullet loads?

thanks for forgiving my noobishness... :redface:
 
Lightest .308 caliber bullet I've seen is 110gr, other than the "Accelerator" sabot ammo.

Rifle twist is not a hard science, IMHO. Some rifles will shoot 130gr bullets just as well as 200gr bullets. I know my .300 WSM does.:)

Never tried 110 or 220grain bullets in it, though.:)

If you are looking for a low recoil "reduced" load, use Hodgdons H4895 60% rule. Yes, there are other ways to get reduced loads, but the 60% rule is easy and takes much of the guesswork out of it.
 
Gatehouse said:
Lightest .308 caliber bullet I've seen is 110gr, other than the "Accelerator" sabot ammo.

Rifle twist is not a hard science, IMHO. Some rifles will shoot 130gr bullets just as well as 200gr bullets. I know my .300 WSM does.:)

Never tried 110 or 220grain bullets in it, though.:)

If you are looking for a low recoil "reduced" load, use Hodgdons H4895 60% rule. Yes, there are other ways to get reduced loads, but the 60% rule is easy and takes much of the guesswork out of it.
Click to expand...

That is 60% of MAX load.DAN>>>:)
 
That's for jacketed bullets. With cast, you can delve into bullets much lighter (e.g. 90 grs) and velocities well below 1000 fps.
 
Mr. Friendly said:
by light load I mean bullet weight. lightest I've seen is 150g, but I'm wondering if you can go lighter?

speaking of this I am actually wondering if all 30.06 are 1 in 10 twist? if so, doesn't that actually lend itself to shooting some lighter bullet loads?

thanks for forgiving my noobishness... :redface:
Click to expand...

Won't know until you try it.

My .308 1:11 twist shoots everything from 110gr to 180 gr. Haven't tried 200gr yet.

.30 cals are usually 1:10, 11, or 12 twist.
 
Some guys report good accuracy with both 100 gr loaded to 2000 fps and 110 gr bullets loaded fast. This hasn't been my experience, but then again I haven't given the very light bullets an honest try. I tried Remington Accelerators when they came out and found the results dismal. It has been my experience based on my 1:7 Gaillard .222 and my 1:8 Krieger .308 that a fast twist barrel will shoot light bullets well. Any given twist will stabalize a broad range of bullet lengths, but when you get towards the outside edges of that range you may have to tweak the velocity (slow down light bullets or speed up heavy ones) to get good results. We have two .30/06 rifles, one with a 1:10 twist and the other with a 1:12. The 1:10 shoots everything well, but the 1:12 tends to tip 240 gr Woodleighs, not keyholes, but certainly not nice round holes either. My light loads are 195 gr cast, and you can find bullet weights from 125 to 240 grs within my inventory, but I don't spend a great deal of time shooting light bullets. I can tell you though that over the years I have found that the the 125 gr Sierra and the 130 gr Speer are very accurate, shooting less than MOA in a number of .30/06 rifles with 1:10 barrels.
 
the established twist for 06 is 1/10 = it's rare to find anything else but in a custom barrel- which is good all the way up to your 220 grain loads- it's not the light end of the spectrum you have to worry about, but the heavy end- ie running out of twist before you run out of bullet weight- that's why you can use 190 in a 308, but going to the 200 in a 1/12 runs you out of the spectrunm- btw, the theoretical for a 180 is 1/13.2 so you're ok, but going to the 190 match really pushes it unless you have 1/11 or 1/10 barrel- most manufacturers just go with what the army established way back when and the 06 back in 1903 was a 220 grain pill, so they used a 1/10 twist- there's a chart somewhere - anyway, the army boys had a couple of wars to contend with so they didn't start monkeying around till after ww2- as it was the loading was somewhat different in ww1 and 2 than the original pre ww1 load- so they left the barrels the same and "improved" the ammo- when the 7.62 x51 ( 308 win) was in development , then they also experimented with the twist rate and came up with 1/12 as they were using 147 grain pills at the time- my remmy and my savage 99 have a twist of 1/10 and a 1/12 twist, respectively- all the m14s are 1/12 - then they threw the whole book out the window when the ar came along and used a rate of 1/14 originally, andwent through various twists when the 1/14 wasn't doing the job- now we're at 1/7
 
Ive shot 110 gr Vmax in a few different 30-06 and all of them grouped it well. RL15 powder @ 3350-3400 fps speed.
 
I have a part box of 110 gr Speer spitzers that I have loaded to 3500 fps in a 30-06. They came with a bunch of components I got in a deal years ago. Amazing how accurate they are with such a short shank!

Speer110gr.jpg


Suppose they would be a good varmint bullet, but I have only shot paper with them.

Ted
 
I've shot 00 buck pellets in a 30-06. They must weigh under 100 grains (not sure).

Size and prime the case, dump in about 4 grains of Bullseye, tap an 00 buck pellet in to the case mouth with a mallet, this will form the pellet in to a round nosed cylindrical bullet of the correct diameter.

Go play.
 
Hornady 308 110 GR SP over 53.0 IMR 3031 gives about 3250 fps in my 22-inch 30-06 A-bolt and it groups 5 shots under 1MOA.
 
"...if all 30.06 are 1 in 10 twist...." Yep. It's a hold over from U.S. military rifles.
110 grain bullets are made for the .30 Carbine. They'll do, but look into a 125 or 130 grain bullet for a .30-06. Nearly all of them are varmint bullets though. Sierra makes a 125 grain SP Pro-hunter and a 135 grain Matchking and SP Pro-hunter. Hornady makes a 125 grain SP. Speer makes a 130 grain HP and FNSP(made for the .30-30).
 
sunray said:
....110 grain bullets are made for the .30 Carbine. ......
Click to expand...

Not all of them. The 110 gr Speer spitzer is too long for the 30 US Carbine, even seated all the way in to the beginning of the ogive. As well, it is designed for high velocities. It does not expand at those achieved in the Carbine and behaves like a FMJ.

Their 110 half jacket works perfectly however. :)

Ted
 
Wildcat Bullets out of Wetaskiwin AB used to make some 68 (as in Sixty Eight, not 168!!) grain .308 dia bullets with a polymer core in the back to get a decent bearing surface. Not sure what ever came of the project. I got a box that I was going to try in a .300 Win Mag, but I never got around to it and then traded the rifle off.
 
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