Powder choice help

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DarkSith

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Hi,
I am in my 2nd year of reloading, and I am reloading hornady's GMX 165g bullets. They are a guilded metal bullet, and they are much longer than any other 30-06 bullet that I have reloaded so far. When I seat the bullet it touches the powder b/c it is so much longer than the bullets I have been practicing with and I am not even close to the max load. I have heard that it is ok to crunch the bullet a little bit into the powder, but not too much that I start to change alot of the surface area of the grains which would change the burn rate...makes sense. So my question is, I obviously need a denser powder that will require less grains to get the same velocity. Which powder would you vetrans recommend. I am currently using IMR 4350, loading 52 grains in a .30 cal for my 30-06 using the hornady GMX 165g bullet.

PS - How do you decide what powder to use from the get go? I am using IMR 4350 b/c thats what came with my stuff when I inherited my reloading gear.
 
I choose a powder that is temperature stable, first. This usually means a Hodgdon Extreme powder. I usually start with the one that is listed (on the Hodgdon site) as giving the highest velocity for the bullet weight in question.
 
You should be able to get more than 52gn of IMR 4350 into the 30-06 with a 165 grain bullet.

Do you need to be seating the bullet as deep as you are? Seat it out more if possible.

57gn of IMR 4350 is a load that works well in many 30-06's. It's a good choice of powder for that cartridge which is likely why it was being used by the previous owner.

Don't be concerned about compressing the powder.

60gn is the max listed on the Hodgdon site for a 165 gn bullet.
52 gn is very light.
 
the GMX bullet is almost twice as long as a regular 165 grain bullet, and the hornady tech told me that the max listed was 58 grains for that bullet, but I probably wouldn't get that high before I saw pressure signs and realistically the max would be closer to 56 grains. I am seating the bullet so my COL is at its max for my rifle. I can't quite fit the spec COL in my gun, the bullet starts to enter the barrel at listed length when I attempt to chamber that round, so I have shortened the COL accordingly until I can chamber a round with no resistance when locking the bolt closed.

I am assuming that that is the right move, as I was told online that if my bullet was already into my barrel that that would be a dangerous situation and pressure would be different that in the books.

Don't quote me on the 52g as I just moved and don't have my reloading book handy. But I know that I am no where near the max powder charge for the bullet. If its not 52 then its 54, but Im pretty sure its 52 and I am already crunching powder when seating.
 
DarkSith said:
the GMX bullet is almost twice as long as a regular 165 grain bullet
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Can you measure the length of the bullet for us?

IMO if you have to seat a bullet that far into the case, its pretty much useless, no matter what powder you have...
 
1.420 inches according to my calipers

It really is a very nice bullet. Carries far and straight, hits with a huge amount of power, and opens up big holes without fragmenting.
 
DarkSith said:
Carries far and straight, hits with a huge amount of power, and opens up big holes without fragmenting.
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So what's the problem then? ;)

I would try something in the range of RL15, Varget, 4320, or 4064

That is a long bullet. A .308 168 TSX is 1.322".
 
blargon said:
So what's the problem then? ;)

I would try something in the range of RL15, Varget, 4320, or 4064

That is a long bullet. A .308 168 TSX is 1.322"
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no problem, other than I can't get enough grains of IMR 4350 into the shell, so Im looking for a denser alternative that gives me the same velocity or better, with less volume of powder.
 
4350 is an excellent powder for the 30-06, with bullets of 165 grains and heavier.
As has been pointed out, 52 grains is a very light load. I will guess the velocity is closer to 30-30 speeds, than it is to 300 Savage velocity.
Nothing wrong with compressing 4350. But, I will say also, why do you seat them so deep? I would seat them with two things in mind. Seat them deep enough in the neck to firmly hold the bullet, and deep enough in the neck that they will work through the magazine.
I would completely forget about any measurement the book shows, and I would not measure them with calipers.
 
DarkSith said:
why is that?
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IMO, non-lead bullets thrive on speed, and seating one this deep is robbing your velocity, as you're seeing. Going to a smaller amount of faster burning powder will get you close, but not likely to meet or beat what 4350 or similar will do with a tsx or accubond...

Have you ran your loads over a chrony?
 
H4831 said:
4350 is an excellent powder for the 30-06, with bullets of 165 grains and heavier.
As has been pointed out, 52 grains is a very light load. I will guess the velocity is closer to 30-30 speeds, than it is to 300 Savage velocity.
Nothing wrong with compressing 4350. But, I will say also, why do you seat them so deep? I would seat them with two things in mind. Seat them deep enough in the neck to firmly hold the bullet, and deep enough in the neck that they will work through the magazine.
I would completely forget about any measurement the book shows, and I would not measure them with calipers.
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I am seating the bullet so deep b/c it is so long, and if I seat it any shallower it enters the barrel when I chamber a round. It will fit in my magazine, but the actual bullet gets pushed into the barrel slightly when I chamber a round. I was told this is unsafe and will add huge amounts of pressure.

OK, don't quote me on the grain of the load, I guess I will have to dig out my reloading data book to see what I was loading at. I picked up this bullet late last year and only had 50 rounds to play with to get a decent load dialed in before my hunting trips, so I didn't have time to work the load up as much as I would have liked, but when I was seating the bullets I started to hear the powder being compressed, so I didn't go any further since I am so new to reloading and I just want to make sure I am learning to do things properly without learning the hard way.

No chrony yet, but hopefully one day I will meet someone with 1!

So you guys are saying don't worry about compressing the powder, go for it as long as you are staying in a safe range of powder according to my reloading manuals, and get that bullet moving as fast as possible while staying within the reloading data from hornady.
 
DarkSith said:
So you guys are saying don't worry about compressing the powder, go for it as long as you are staying in a safe range of powder according to my reloading manuals, and get that bullet moving as fast as possible while staying within the reloading data from hornady.
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I have no concern about compressing powder, as I have some loads that do that as well. My point was if you are seating it deep enough that you can only get enough powder to reach ~2600fps, then there is no point in using that bullet. I would bet that 52gr of 4350 is only getting you 2600-2650...

A chrony will answer these questions. You can get a Shooting Chrony for $120...
 
blargon said:
I have no concern about compressing powder, as I have some loads that do that as well. My point was if you are seating it deep enough that you can only get enough powder to reach ~2600fps, then there is no point in using that bullet. I would bet that 52gr of 4350 is only getting you 2600-2650...

A chrony will answer these questions. You can get a Shooting Chrony for $120...
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ah, I gotcha. Why does my rifle have a different seating depth? Is this bullet mainly for another caliber of rifle rather than a 30-06 then or is my gun just funny.
So if I can get more powder into the shell to up my velocity then I will be ok? Seating depth will limit my ability to put max amounts of powder into the shell, which will in turn limit my max velocity. Other than seating depth limiting my shells powder capacity, how else does that affect max velocity if at all?

what would be a good bullet that would give my 30-06 the ability to reach out to 500yards? Any ideas?

Im just trying to learn as much as possible, if Im frustrating you I am sorry. I wish I had a friend/family member that could teach me, this would be so much easier :)
 
DarkSith said:
... the actual bullet gets pushed into the barrel slightly when I chamber a round. I was told this is unsafe and will add huge amounts of pressure.
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This is a claim that is often made. I've never experienced a noticable increase in pressure by seating the bullet out to touch the lands in the 30-06. Plenty of people talk about this but how many have seen it? I think it gets repeated because it seems to make sense. Things don't always work the way we think they ought to in reloading though.

You'll be fine touching the lands if you work your way up from the point you're at now.

DarkSith said:
So you guys are saying don't worry about compressing the powder, go for it as long as you are staying in a safe range of powder according to my reloading manuals, and get that bullet moving as fast as possible while staying within the reloading data from hornady.
Click to expand...

Yup!

You can compress powder A LOT without any ill effects. You can compress powder so much that the bullet will slowly be pushed back out of the case. When you get that far, you've compressed it enough...

Have you considered a different bullet?
 
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DarkSith said:
what would be a good bullet that would give my 30-06 the ability to reach out to 500yards? Any ideas?
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The 165 Nosler Ballistic Tip is an excellent bullet in the 30-06. My number one choice.

I use Reloder 22 with it in mine. It fills the case right to the mouth and then some. I need to vibrate the case to get it all in, and then it gets compressed by seating the bullet.

Just over 3000 fps, which is about what you might hope to get with a 150 grain bullet. It's very accurate too, of course, or I wouldn't bother. Velocity takes a back seat to accuracy in my approach to reloading.

That load is in the Nosler manual BTW.
 
TwoTone said:
Have you considered a different bullet?
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No, but that is b/c I am so new to this. I only started hunting again 2 years ago, (before that I only hunted with my dad on occasion as a teenager) and reloading last year. I just read up a bit more on the GMX bullet, and I read something that I missed before. They state that the bullet won't expand like it should when it impacts less than 2700fps? But then they claim that it is an excellent bullet from speeds of 2000fps to 3400+fps. Kind of confusing. Anyway, I still have 100 bullets in my inventory, and I will get a chrony and see what I can do with it. It did work surprisingly well on my 2 deer kills last year though, but they were both inside 100y. I will from time to time have to take a shot at a moose that is out there, 300+y, and that is what I am attempting to get out of my rounds with my 30-06. I will/do re-zero my scope for whatever hunt I am about to embark on, so having many different rounds for different purposes is my goal.
 
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