Reloading Copper
- Thread starter KLS
- Start date
The load data for homogeneous copper bullets is different than cup n core or bonded, partition bullets. Go direct to the manufacturer for load data. Make sure your barrel is clean and copper free before testing. The Barnes website gives lots of advice but only shooting with your rifles will tell the tale.
I have quite a bit of experience reloading Hornady CX and Barnes LRX for 7mm PRC.... I reloaded to max COAL to work in the mag for hunting. These bullets are long and if you want good velocities you will find that you need to do compressed loads sometimes.
Same here, most of my Barnes loads are at least .080 off the lands and some are as much as .125!
Cat
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A short-cut that often works is to seat 50 thou off the lands, then load a pressure series of one cartridge per grain and shoot through those until you find what seems to be your working maximum. Load 5 or 6 of those and see how they group; you might already be done. Hunting ammo is mostly about getting around the velocity that you expect, and shooting good enough. You could play with seating depths from there is you want, make big changes of 30 thou or so and see if something jumps out at you.
Barnes used to suggest something very similar if not exactly the same. Then there’s the millions of hunters hope that their factory ammo has somewhere around the expected velocity and shoots good enough. There actually is such a thing as good enough.
Barnes used to suggest something very similar if not exactly the same. Then there’s the millions of hunters hope that their factory ammo has somewhere around the expected velocity and shoots good enough. There actually is such a thing as good enough.
..........and I have never had one that did!
I have had a couple of rifles that didn't do really well with monometal bullets, but the majority shoot them quite accurately. I start with a .050" jump to the lands, and I ended up with from .040" to .070" with my rifles. I stay with lighter monometal bullets, as they perform best on game, with higher impact velocities. Monometals also require a faster rate of twist, so again, stay towards the lighter to medium bullet weights, for most rifles.
