I have some new 6.5 creedmoor brass arriving soon and was wondering if it requires any prep out of the box, or am I good to load it up and start doing load development? Any tips or tricks are appreciated as I'm coming from reloading with my own hornady fired brass, and have never used new brass. I am aware that i need to back down the loads with the alpha brass vs the hornady. I shoot an off the shelf Bergara b14.
New 6.5CM Alpha Brass questions
- Thread starter Ntv69
- Start date
You made me stay up measuring and weighing haha.
Anyways, wow this stuff is incredibly consistent! Not that I have owned THAT many batches of Lapua brass, but this Alpha brass is definitely a step up in tolerances over Lapua.
I analyzed a piece in my AMP induction annealer and metallurgically it seems to be very similar to Lapua brass. Much tougher than Hornady or any other "common" brass.
It all weighs in at 169.5 +/- .4 grains ES .9-better than any Lapua batch I've had to date.
Concentricity is damn near 0
Neck wall thickness all less than .001 variance coming in between .014 to .015".
Case length is exactly at trim length across the board. So you know that their weights are their actual weights without extra variance on the necks due to length.
Only thing I notice is they maybe could use a chamfer and debur. No burrs but a little bit of a sharp edge.
I havnt tried to chamber one but have no doubt they will be just fine.
Very impressed so far. You can tell they are using more modern manufacturing techniques.
Anyways, wow this stuff is incredibly consistent! Not that I have owned THAT many batches of Lapua brass, but this Alpha brass is definitely a step up in tolerances over Lapua.
I analyzed a piece in my AMP induction annealer and metallurgically it seems to be very similar to Lapua brass. Much tougher than Hornady or any other "common" brass.
It all weighs in at 169.5 +/- .4 grains ES .9-better than any Lapua batch I've had to date.
Concentricity is damn near 0
Neck wall thickness all less than .001 variance coming in between .014 to .015".
Case length is exactly at trim length across the board. So you know that their weights are their actual weights without extra variance on the necks due to length.
Only thing I notice is they maybe could use a chamfer and debur. No burrs but a little bit of a sharp edge.
I havnt tried to chamber one but have no doubt they will be just fine.
Very impressed so far. You can tell they are using more modern manufacturing techniques.
Is there a website? A quick search suggests not
Is 6.5CM Alpha brass pricey? I`m in the market for some decent brass and am curious. Lapua sounds like too much heartache for me with the smaller than normal flash holes (so you can't use a regular decapping pin - one guy told me he had to sand his pin down to make it work)
Peterson is another option.
Brass fired pretty good for me yesterday. Got right about .5" groups for the most part with 3 different charges. A couple .3's. A couple approaching an inch. Could have been me on some. I was shooting for 2 hours at that point and things get a little sloppy after 2 or 3 hours for me. Neck tension is pretty tight on the 1st loading similar to new Lapua brass.
This gun was driving tacks with fire formed Hornady brass out to 600. Tiny bug holes at 100 with 41.5 grains of H4350, CCI BR2, and Hornady 140 ELDM with an average of 2700. ES around 13-15 and SD of 4-5.
However I did have an Alpha brass issue with more primer catering than I have ever had. And one primer got a hole punched in it at 41.3 grains.
I notice on Hornady brass the primers are pretty damn close to flush with the case head. On the Alpha brass the primers sit a little more deeply-more close to normal probobly. No ejection marks, no heavy bolt etc. Primers maybe a little bit flatter on Alpha than my Hornady brass loads but not excessive.
Is this access pressure causing that 1 primer to punch through? And heavier catering? I'm suprised that a change in brass from Hornady to Alpha would be that significant for pressure.
Like I said Hornady brass got me 2700 fps with 41.5 H4350. Pretty much a perfect shooting load. No need to waste time improving upon.
3 test charges yesterday with Alpha were..
41.1 @ 2713 fps
41.3 @ 2718 fps
41.5 @ 2734 fps
Obviously I will reduce my charges more and try again. But curious to hear some feedback. Thanks.
This gun was driving tacks with fire formed Hornady brass out to 600. Tiny bug holes at 100 with 41.5 grains of H4350, CCI BR2, and Hornady 140 ELDM with an average of 2700. ES around 13-15 and SD of 4-5.
However I did have an Alpha brass issue with more primer catering than I have ever had. And one primer got a hole punched in it at 41.3 grains.
I notice on Hornady brass the primers are pretty damn close to flush with the case head. On the Alpha brass the primers sit a little more deeply-more close to normal probobly. No ejection marks, no heavy bolt etc. Primers maybe a little bit flatter on Alpha than my Hornady brass loads but not excessive.
Is this access pressure causing that 1 primer to punch through? And heavier catering? I'm suprised that a change in brass from Hornady to Alpha would be that significant for pressure.
Like I said Hornady brass got me 2700 fps with 41.5 H4350. Pretty much a perfect shooting load. No need to waste time improving upon.
3 test charges yesterday with Alpha were..
41.1 @ 2713 fps
41.3 @ 2718 fps
41.5 @ 2734 fps
Obviously I will reduce my charges more and try again. But curious to hear some feedback. Thanks.
I have found the Lapua and Alpha brass to have less case capacity than Hornady and they required less powder for similar velocities. I didn't find the Hornady to be as consistent, both in measurements and velocities and the primer pockets were very loose after 3 firings.
I found my Alpha 6mm SRP brass to have tight primer pockets after 1st and second firings. I have not had any real signs of pressure with it so I cannot comment on flattened primers, and this is with exceeding previous max loads with other brass, even compressed loads. Maybe its also because I am using CCI magnum primers. I've been using H3831sc for my 6mm in a Defiance action and Bartlein barrel but it is a SAAMI spec chamber.
Right now I'm running 110 grain Sierra MKs at 3007 fps in my 6mm Creedmoor with an ES of 13-15 and SDs around 4-5.
What primers are you using?
What gun is it in?
SRP or LRP?
I found my Alpha 6mm SRP brass to have tight primer pockets after 1st and second firings. I have not had any real signs of pressure with it so I cannot comment on flattened primers, and this is with exceeding previous max loads with other brass, even compressed loads. Maybe its also because I am using CCI magnum primers. I've been using H3831sc for my 6mm in a Defiance action and Bartlein barrel but it is a SAAMI spec chamber.
Right now I'm running 110 grain Sierra MKs at 3007 fps in my 6mm Creedmoor with an ES of 13-15 and SDs around 4-5.
What primers are you using?
What gun is it in?
SRP or LRP?
It is LRP brass with CCI BR2 primers. Gun is Bergara BMP. I will reduce loads and see what happens. Try and get it back to where it was for velocity not that a 15-30 fps increase is that dramatic.
Hornady brass is definitely not even remotely close to Alpha consistency as you say, no arguing that. Things should only get better.
Hornady brass is definitely not even remotely close to Alpha consistency as you say, no arguing that. Things should only get better.
That's amazing for factory.
Best results I have ever had were from Hornady 88 grain ELD in 224 Valkyrie with an IBI AR barrel a few weeks ago. Never really had any factory ammo more consistent than 0.8 moa. The 88 grain was consistently 0.6-0.75 moa and then I took it out to 1080 yards easy and a few hits at 1200.
Previously I have only really ever had good results with handloads.
The odd wonky shot comes out of the Hornady brass on the chrono. But has been more than satisfactory. Shot it out to 600 meters at Connaught last Monday in insane wind and was very impressed with the groups. Vertical was all very close over 38 rounds with the Hornady brass. I will get it dialed in again I'm sure. Just need to find that sweet spot again. Hopefully the primer issue is just from a bit too much pressure. Easy to fix that.
The Hornady factory 140 ELDM shot very well for me. That's why I chose those bullets to reload.
