Thread: Stupid Question. bare with me please

Originally Posted by Pommy

Standard twist rate for 6.5 Creedmoor is 1:8 so the 147 will be fine.

The Lyman M die is not necessary to get consistent neck tension. A standard set of reloading dies is fine.

10 thou back from being jammed into the rifling is a good way to get a pressure spike.

Needs a lot of rounds to give a good enough sample size to say with any certainty that a particular charge is giving a better ES than another. 3 rounds is not nearly enough. It probably won't make any meaningful difference. Same goes for grouping.

Adjusting seating depth is also not likely to make any noticeable difference with that bullet in a Creedmoor chamber.

Recommending that they START with what you think is a MAXIMUM load... of what is also an expensive and hard to get powder???

This is the problem with a forum.

I have been loading and developing loads for years for both competition and long range with pretty good success. I have used QL for at least 15 years. That's how I do it and never had a problem. My goal is to build the highest preforming ammo I can. I would have thought that was why we all reload.

QL is extremely good at identifying the most efficient powder for a particular cartridge and projectile. I look for a powder that fills the case to 100% burns 100% with a high efficiency. In that case RL17 was the winner. There are several other powders that come close so if cheap is what you a looking for by all means use it. That said a 6.5 Creedmore is no super long-range cartridge so maybe having your ES under 10 is not a big deal.

I'm not sure why you are all hung up on firing 5 shot groups when developing a load. It makes no sense to me at all. If you know how to read a group 3 is plenty. In my own gun I never bother with much more and nor have any other top shooters I know. That said a factory rifle more often than not will open up after 3 shots. If you are stalking with it who cares what happens after 3 shots. If you run full custom guns like me I have no doubt your experience is the same as mine, they will put 10 through the same hole. For the record I do test my finial load with a 10 shot more than anything to see when the barrel start fouling a bit.

44 was not max pressure but near to. On every single load I have developed over the years the ES settles a bit above max pressure assuming you are using the correct powder.

I get that if you have no experience with QL it seems a very foreign way to go about load development but once you understand what you are doing its an extremely reliable tool. It will predict velocities to with in 20fps or much better.

It is clear to me that you have not understood the method I was suggesting and so that is ultimately my fault as I really did need to write a book to join the dots. I am not going to bother responding to all of it as much of it has already been proven over and over not to be true.

I know my effort here is futile and I will ultimately get shouted down and that is unfortunate. This is really a hunters forum and sticking to basic loads is ultimately the best advice. It certainly keeps things safe at the expense of stifling discussion.

I will respectfully leave it at that.