Load Advice

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Island_Craig

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Hello... Trying my first crack at reloading and I have a question with regards to finding a load.

Rifle: Remington 700p LTR, 20" factory 1:12

Components: H4985, fed 210, HRM 168grn HPBT

The book says the load is 38-43 grn... My question is, do I have to start at the min load and work up in say .5 increments? Or can I start at 40 and go from there?

I've got 100m to work with and was planning three round groups for testing.

Does is all sound proper?
 
You can but what if the most accurate load for your gun is 39grs .You will usually find a couple of accurate loads going thru the range If your just going to shoot paper at 100 yards why not use the one with the least amount of powder and kick If you plan to go out to 600 yds then youll be looking at a load near the high end of the range
Remember to check brass after each shot for any pressure signs you may hit that before you reach max load
.5 at first then .2 close too one that groups well

Hornady manual 35grs to 43.3 h4895
 
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litledab is correct that there may be accuracy below 40 gr. that you will miss. I am always after hunting loads, so I want hunting accuracy with the maximum velocity I can safely achieve. So I tend to start my testing in the mid range and work up. You should have no issues, but always observe carefully for pressure signs as was already suggested.
 
Island_Craig said:
Hello... Trying my first crack at reloading and I have a question with regards to finding a load.

Rifle: Remington 700p LTR, 20" factory 1:12

Components: H4985, fed 210, HRM 168grn HPBT

The book says the load is 38-43 grn... My question is, do I have to start at the min load and work up in say .5 increments? Or can I start at 40 and go from there?

I've got 100m to work with and was planning three round groups for testing.

Does is all sound proper?
Click to expand...

I would ask what are you looking for out of your rifle & ammo ??? Minute of deer or minute of angle?
If it's minute of angle with a LTR or any other rifle. I would suggest starting your load development at your min & working up slowly , find your most accurate load then play with seating depth to get all you can get out of your equipment. I say this because you are reloading Hornady 168gr HPBT which are target bullet's & not suitable for hunting application's . So why skip 3 to 5 gr's in load development it ???. You might be miss something...Also this is your first time reloading , so how do you know your rifle will handle 5gr's above min suggested load ?? Do your rifle & most importantly yourself or the guy standing next to you a favour. Start at min & work up..Watching very closely for pressure sign's..................

Cheer's
 
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Well - You fail to mention the caliber, and the type of brass. Assuming its 308, if you inadvertently use military brass you're loads will be hotter due to diminished case volume. Considering you're a rookie, start at minimum. don't arbitrarily run up to max load - you don't know what to look for.
Finally, you should realize that your rifle will preferentially "tune" to a particular bullet weight. Rather than spending a lot of time/money doing incremental tests, play around with a few bullet weights. A good load will show promise right out of the gate.
 
Thanks for all the replies I'll try and fill in the blanks as best as possible.

It is a 308 with Federal cases that I've fired.

I have two ranges here, the primary one I use is 100m and I also have access to a DND with as far as I can go. I will only be shooting paper for the foreseeable future. I may dabble in hunting later but won't deal with it now.

I'll start at the minimum and see if I can't find the couple nodes. Hopefully high and low as I'll eventually want a load to send a ways longer than 100m.

Will return will results. Thanks!
 
Start with the Minimum, and your idea of a quick survey of 3 shots in 0.5 increments is OK. But you must be prepared to stop shooting and to bring some ammo home if get pressure signs, like a slight resistance to opening the bolt.

Why start at minimum?

1. The results in their rifle are only an indication of what might happen in your rifle. Consecutive rifles off the line are quite different, with velocity difference in the order of 100fps. Totally different rifles (their well shot, throat eroded Remington vs. your brand new Winchester, with totally different chamber dimensions) could be very, very different.

2. Different brass, different primers and different powder lot numbers. Powder lot numbers can vary quite a bit.


My caution is reinforced by my experience. A Start load (in 6.5x55) that had a very severe over pressure incident in a rifle.

And, as others have said, you might miss the sweet spot. I recall a 22 Hornet that I could not get to group with many powders and bullets. I tried a slow shotgun powder and got a great result. There were a few left over from the test, so I pulled them and checked the powder charge. I had accidently thrown charges 5 grains lighter than I intended (easy to do with a beam scale).

I then tried some other powders, starting much lighter than the Start load and found the rifle shot well. It just liked a milder charge. Turned out it had a tight barrel.
 
You have some good advice in the feedback you have received. I started reloading about a year ago, with .308 only and was surprised at the results. First off, as has been said, your rifle will like a certain bullet, case, primer, powder charge, C.O.L., NS, or FL sized, etc, so best to try many combinations. I found my rifle did the best with either Varget or IMR4064, with Sierra Match Kings or Hornady Amax in the 150-168 g range. Part of the fun is seeing what your rifle likes best as it seems to be very different from rifle to rifle. The accuracy is so much better than factory loads, at least for me.
 
Got out to the range today. Here are the results. The pencil write ins should read inches, not MOA. Also, I took them with a micrometer edge to edge and subtracted .308 from the measurement, but it seems off. The indicators on the page are not to scale (my print program was messed up) so what should be an inch box, is less...

Remington 700P LTR barrelled action
Bedded into McM A5
Bushnell 10x
Hornsby HPBT 168
H4958
Frd210 and FC cases Full sized







Thanks for your thoughts
 
ok, well. i don't want to discourage you but depending on what you are trying to achieve.
you may want to further detail your approach and continue tsting.
if the accuracy you're looking for is up to 200 to 300 yards or so and your happy with the results your getting than that's great and i would look at fine tuning your 40 to 42 grain loads in smaller increments of 0.2 or 0.3 grains.
run 5 shot groups if possible.

now if you're looking to go out and punch paper at way out there ranges like 1000 meters than i would suggest documenting and triple checking every small detail in your reloading and firing process.
some things to consider are:
assuming the rifle is not new and already gone through a break in procedure.
ambient temperature, ammo temperature, rifle temperature i know it may sound crazy but these things will affect your muzzle velocity and it will be more noticeable at longer ranges.
was the gun barrel temp the same when running your first shot of the 38 grain powder as the last shot of your 41 grains of powder?
use an infra red thermometer if you have one and document as much as you can.
chronograph your shots if you can and document MV variations at different temperatures.
if you decided on the hornady 168 bullet , stock up on it as much as you can.
use the same brass, weigh and measure your brass and more documentation.
do not vary any components and be strict with your reloading. document each step with measurements and if you want to change something, do it one change at a time.
document seating depth of bullet etc etc...
these are just some things that come to mind but if you are wanting to get out to long ranges first step I would suggest is to document and compile as much data for your rifle as you can.
this data will help you down the road when you need to check something or need to compile ballistic charts for your rifle.
hope this information is helpful
 
This is literally the first load development I've ever done. So I'm tracking all the high speed stuff, and I'll get there eventually.

I shot the test as directed. So shot 1 went to target 1, shot 2 went to target 2, using the second load. That way the barrel was in the similar condition for all targets. Aka, I didn't fire 3x35grn then move to the next.

I have these bullets, 155AMAxS I'll be trying and a few types of powder. I just want to make sure I'm on the right path... Before going to load more. I'm also curious to see if it's worth it to load some .1gn increments around the better groups?
 
I wish I had your money.

If you want a round that will go long distance (do you really want to mess around with multiple loads???) you need to do a simple pressure test. After that, drop 3-4 grains below and then run your OCW test. Once a suitable load is found, then adjust seating depth to tighten groups.
 
Shooter ----/ said:
I wish I had your money.

If you want a round that will go long distance (do you really want to mess around with multiple loads???) you need to do a simple pressure test. After that, drop 3-4 grains below and then run your OCW test. Once a suitable load is found, then adjust seating depth to tighten groups.
Click to expand...
infra red thermometer , princes auto $19.99
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chronograph $129.99 cabelas


pen & paper for documenting data dollar store $2


hitting the mark at 1000 yards... priceless.
 
When you get your satisfactory data... And I'm not saying I'm there yet. Do you upload into a program for the DOPE for longer ranges to see if you have enough horsepower with the current load?
 
in a nutshell yes, you can.
one good free online software to look at is JBM ballistics http://www.jbmballistics.com/ballistics/calculators/calculators.shtml

however if you do choose to take the blue pill and go down the rabbit hole of long range precision shooting there are other factors to be aware of that will influence your point of impact other than bullet drop.
things like wind, spin drift angle of fire etc etc.... but that is why it would be good to compile as much data as you can so in the event that you will need to create charts for long range you will already have most of the data compiled.
you will have the numbers and be able to calculate the changes needed.

here are some utube clips by rex that explains it well, again, this is for long ranges.

 
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Once you find a suitable load, download any of the good apps on your smart phone and have fun!

If you used the method I gave you, it's pretty much the best you'll squeeze out of your rifle with the given load components. You can then step to the next powder if more performance is desired.
 
Looks like you have a potential load around 41.0-41.5 grains. Load up some tests 0.2 grains apart and expand your tests to 5 rounds. Many a 3 round test has proven disappointing when expanded to 5 rounds.
 
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