Adjust powder or coal?

[T. O'Heir]

42 grains of 4064 is just a tick over minimum for a 168. Max OAL is 2.810" for .308. 2.800" is good though. Regardless of what rifle.
Anyway, forget the off the lands stuff until you have a load. It's a load tweaking thing that is different for every rifle and is found by trial and error.
.020" might be good or it might be too much or too little.
Once you have started at the Start load and gone up to the max by half grain increases, you can go back to one load less than the most accurate load and go up by tenths. As in 41.5 to 42.0 by .1 grain.
However, with a Savage M10, it being a hunting rifle, it's probable not worth the time and effort. An inch group is friggin' fantastic. Mind you, it most likely will not do that with a hunting bullet. A-Maxes are not suitable for hunting anything but varmints.

[cw308]

towman32
BE ON THE SAFE SIDE. Brass that is thicker ( heavier ) reduce your listed book load by 1 grain. If your charge is 42.0 that is the medium load for IMR 4064 with a 168 grain bullet. With Federal brass being thicker that's 43.0 grains.keep that in mind when loading hot. If your loading for accuracy, medium to low range on your powder. My accuracy load with 4064 is 40.5 in the summer & 41.5 in the colder months 60 - 50 lower then 50 is to cold for my bones.

[Rich Coyle]

As soon as I had a maximum load established I would then look for the preferred over all length by loading five of various length. At this point I would not change anything except primers. I would load five with every primer I have and check which one the rifle preferred.

[towman32]

That's alot to take in. Thanks everyone. To answer cw308, a case that does not fit flush in my case guage will not chamber in my rifle. As to t.oheir, it's not a hunting rifle, look it up and see, no one would want to pack this heavy thing around the woods! Especially with such a thick barrel. So I'm gonna take a stab at this based on what I've gathered

#1 find identical head stamped brass, pick cases that are within 1 grain of each other. Trim to 2.005, chamfer, debur,swage etc.

#2 take oal measurements with my comparator caliper tool from hornady.(I've done this 5 times with same bullet and got several different readings. As much as .005 diference)do I take the average?

#3 using the 168 a max I start my first 6 rounds with 40.5 grns of 4064 and set bullet .005 off the lands?

#4 once I have found the most accurate load using .3 grn adjustments keeping below max load data, I start the procedure like taylorce1 reccomends to tighten further.

How's this sound?

[towman32]

One other thing I wanted to mention, I have several other bullets (nosler, match kings, berger and hornady eldx). I chose the amax to start with just because I have more of them.

[cw308]

towman32
Sounds good to me. A - Max is a good bullet, for me I found they shoot better jumped, seating the bullet deeper with less of a charge. Could start with jumping & work up to a jam. To get to your perfect headspace for your chamber, back off your sizing die, lower your die down with each size until your fired case will chamber with a slight resistance that would be your zero headspace. Take that measurement then lower your die to bump the shoulder .002 .

[taylorce1]

I'll try to answer your steps in order.

1. IMO unless you're into serious competition shooting there is no need to weight sort your brass. Just sort by head stamps.

2. I'd use the average. Do you use Sharpie on the bullet, or are you using a modified case to find the lands? I have more accurate measurements now that I went to a modified case for my measurements.

3. It doesn't matter what bullet you use, just make sure you start over the whole process when you change bullets. Bullets by different manufacturers all have different shapes, and you can cause pressure spikes by simply changing the bullet you are using.

3&4. Load 1 round each from your starting load up to max book in your .3 grain increments. Don't start looking for accuracy yet, save the bullets for later. If you find pressure back your charge down to the previous charge that had no pressure signs.

5. Once you've established a safe operating pressure then run a seating depth test. This is where you'll find your accuracy, and you'll save a lot of time and components by seeking accuracy as the last step in the process.

[cw308]

taylorce1
Weighing & sorting is important for safe and accurate reloads. Every round should be close to exact as possible.

[taylorce1]

Originally Posted by cw308

taylorce1
Weighing & sorting is important for safe and accurate reloads. Every round should be close to exact as possible.

I seriously doubt any ammuniton manufacturer like Hornady, Lapua, Federal, or ect. that make match ammunition weight sort their brass before it goes down the assembly line. My point is depending on what exactly you want to do with the rifle as far as accuracy goes, you can both be accurate and more importantly safe without going to extremes. I know not everyone is going to agree with me, but I don't expect everyone to either.

My process is simple, "accurate, and safe" for my purposes. I'm not saying the OP needs to follow my way, just that I use what works for me. Then there is the fact that I don't have a rifle built nor do I feel that I shoot well enough yet that weight sorting brass is going to offer me any advantages. Plus it just sucks up time reloading that I could spend shooting to get good enough that it might become advantageous.

So I guess we'll just agree to disagree.

[cw308]

taylorce1
I understand what your saying . I get my brass from a shooting buddy that doesn't want to reload. His brass is Hornady Match A - Max. 168 gr. 308 cal. I F/L saze only to .0015 case headspace. Every box of 20 I get from him , I size, trim , chamfer inside & out , uniform the primer pockets & flash hole. Then weigh the 20 cases. On every box of 20 I find 1 to 3 cases 3.0+ grains higher in weight, that could explain that one flyer that occurs screwing up your group. I [color=#FF0000]█[/color][color=#FF0000]█[/color][color=#FF0000]█[/color][color=#FF0000]█[/color][color=#FF0000]█[/color] can those cases. When I mess up a group, I have less excuses to blame it on. Also I'm not reloading large quantities , 30 rounds is a range day, I maybe going overboard on my case peeping 30 cases doesn't take that much time & I like reloading as much as shooting, so the time spent is enjoyable to me. If it were 100 maybe it wouldn't.

[Metal god]

CW , I recently started testing case volume with H2o . The fact I've not been doing it for long means I don't have a lot of data on this but my recollection is that 3-ish grain difference in 308 case weight only translates to a few tenths of a grain difference at most in case volume .

I remember comparing Winchester brass to LC . Win was in the high 160's and LC was in the mid 180's so lets say 18gr of weight difference between the two . How ever the case volume difference was only 3gr-ish more like 2.5gr . Keep in mind this is just a general remembrance and although those may not be the exact numbers they are close and reasonably represent my point .

2.5gr is a lot of case volume difference but it took 18gr of case weight to get there . So what I do if I weigh my cases is keep in inside of 5gr . Meaning a +/- of 2gr .

If I remember you are a bench rest guy and "F" class shooter . I can see why you would want to reduce all the variables as small as possible . For me and my type of shooting ( front and rear bag or prone with bi-pod and rear bag ) that +/- 2gr has worked just fine for me . I suspect it would do the same for the OP with where he's at in the grand scheme of things .

[cw308]

Metal god
As always, enjoy reading your posts & test results. I have a lot of 1 time fired brass from guy's I shoot with . Rem. Win. FC, HSM, & ADI. I can come up with 30 cases close to the same weight. I'm going to test 6 different brands, with the same case weight, to see if it makes a difference in group size. I shoot rear bunny ear bag & bi - pod set up. As long as the rifle is horizontal with the target, there's no hop.

[ka9fax]

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Originally Posted by T. O'Heir. Once you have started at the Start load and gon up to the max by half grain increases, you can go back to one load less than the most accurate load and go up by tenths. As in 41.5 to 42.0 by .1 grain.

Wow what a great Thread. Alot of good info that i have been looking for. So here is what i have. RL15, 175SMK, The 40g looks to be best, so would i back down to 39.6, 39.7, 39.8, 39.9, 5 of each and look for improvement? the pic's of my groups are 3 shot each, from now on i will make it 5 each

[taylorce1]

Originally Posted by ka9fax

Wow what a great Thread. Alot of good info that i have been looking for. So here is what i have. RL15, 175SMK, The 40g looks to be best, so would i back down to 39.6, 39.7, 39.8, 39.9, 5 of each and look for improvement? the pic's of my groups are 3 shot each, from now on i will make it 5 each

How far are you loading off the lands? I'd start with your 43 grain load if it shows no pressure signs, and run a seating depth test. More than likely you can dial in the group by simply tweaking the seating depth. Regardless of the powder charge you choose run a seating depth test.

[Metal god]

ka9fax ,

I'll start with saying 5 shot groups should be the minimum , That said looking at your groups and applying the OCW method/theory of groping compared with POA to POI . I see two different possible nodes . 39.5 and 40gr are pretty much in the exact same spot on the target so that could be a nice light easy on brass plinking load . 41 through 42 seem pretty close as well as the same POI if you were to triangulate the groups . I also agree that you could probably tweak the 43gr load to tighten up the group .

That all said , the fact it seems a few of the charges would work would indicate to me that you need more shots per group to weed out some of those charges . Shooting at a greater distance would help define them as well .

[ka9fax]

Thanks a lot for the help guys. Yes, no excuse for the three shot group's. From here on out, it will be at least five. As far as my distance from the lands, I used the Hornady over all length gauge and checked three times. My reading was 2.830 from base to tip or, 2.256 measuring base to ogive. I am seating at 2.800 so if I'm understanding everything correctly I am giving myself a .030 jump. But these readings are with the Hornady modified case. I guess once I start working closer I should Compare the modified case with one of my fire formed trimmed resized case. I would compare this using my T7 press with a Redding instant indicator, then plus or minus the difference from the 2.256 ogive reading. I guess that should give me a more accurate reading.if this is correct and you think necessary. Thank you again for all the help I don't have shooting buddies so all my knowledge has to come from the firing line and trusted YouTube channels.

[cw308]

ka9fax
I have that Hornady OAL gauge, will get you in the ball park but that's about it. Your fire formed cases, are they neck sized or full sized.? I found the using a Go gauge for my 308 very helpful in getting me my exact chamber headspace. The Go Gauge measures 1.630 when installed in your chamber your bolt will close.l cut pieces off a feeler gage to shim on the back of the gauge, it wouldn' close with a .002 shim, did close on .0015. Now I know my chamber is 1.6315. With an unprimed sized case l make a sample bullet seated to jam & back it down till it just touches the lands. That's my starting point measurement to jump or jam. Wish I used the Go gauge a long time ago , would have saved me money on trying every gauge I read about.

[taylorce1]

Originally Posted by Metal god

That said looking at your groups and applying the OCW method/theory of groping compared with POA to POI . I see two different possible nodes . 39.5 and 40gr are pretty much in the exact same spot on the target so that could be a nice light easy on brass plinking load . 41 through 42 seem pretty close as well as the same POI if you were to triangulate the groups .

I don't like OCW at 100 yards, I was never able to get the results or read the results like I wanted. I found OCW worked much better as a ladder test at 300 yards or greater. I ditched OCW in favor of finding pressure and then adjusting seating depth.

The reason I ditched OCW wasn't because I didn't think it wasn't working. I ditched it because I liked it better for longer range load development and trying to read the nodes was a PITA on the ranges. Trying to get the range to go cold so I could go down and read the results at 300 yards was an exercise in futility.

I found running a seating depth test once I found pressure worked well at 100 yards. I didn't have to wait on the range to go cold to read my results, as I had four separate targets to look at in my spotting scope. I also found that once I found the proper seating depth for the bullet it worked very well at longer ranges as well.

[Metal god]

taylorce1,

I don't really disagree with anything you just said . I only used the OCW method of reading the groups because there were to many rather good ones . I figured the next best way to eliminate groups was to look at POI to POA .

[ka9fax]

This might be a silly question, but I keep thinking about this, so I'm going to ask. In the area where I live I have to drive over a hour to get to the 100 yard range. The maximum there is 200, but I have always just shot at the 100y. I decided to redo my ladder test over with five shot groups like metal God suggested. But I wonder if this time I preform the test at 200 yards that way I would be able to see the spread better. My question is, once I find the tightest group at 200 would that still be the tightest group as you move down in yardage? Or does the OCW do funny things and I would have to repeat the test at whatever yardage I would be shooting at. For instance, A person preforming his ladder test at 500 yards once he figures things out should The group be extremely tight at 100? or are things not that necessarily simple. My goal is to find the tightest group at 100 yards.

[cw308]

ka9fax
Once you reached the charge weight & bullet that is your tightest group at 100 yards , say 1/2" group . Will probably group 3/4" & 1.5 to 2.0 low, shot from a level position with any cant right or left. Longer distances I would zero longer, develope a load with a heavier bullet if twist will allow, to buck the wind. Going the other way that heavier bullet & charge may not group so well at 100 yards

[ka9fax]

Thank you cw308. I fig, there would be more to it...lol. The twist is 1-12. i was told by the barrel maker that it was made after the M40A1 and 168 -175 should work well.

[cw308]

ka9fax
Yes, 1-12 twist is perfect for 168 + 175 grain

[Metal god]

I decided to redo my ladder test over with five shot groups like metal God suggested.

What do you mean by ladder test ? I did not realize that's what I was looking at in those targets . Are you talking the traditional ladder test where you're trying to find a stable zone with in the charges that have a consistent POI area in relation to POA or are you talking a ladder test that just moves up the charge weight ladder from minimum to maximum charge ?

They are two different test that are read differently and are generally shot at different distances . The former needs to be shot at a minimum of 300yds and only uses 1 or 2 shots at each charge and you should use a quality front rest and rear bag . The later is more of a traditional load development that can be done at any distance but is generally done at 100yds .

[towman32]

What's the recommended bullet weight for 1:10 twist? For 100yrds, 300yrds, 600 yrds and 1k? Didn't know if there was any info for that. I shot 1k with 168 amax and 43 grns 4064, my grouping was about 14". I plan on improving that.