6.5 grendel

[kilotanker22]

Bought a 6.5 Grendel from a friend of mine. Palmetto upper, 15" m lock handguard, 18" barrel with a rifle length gas system. Has a pretty nice trigger in it, although I don't know what trigger it is. The lower was built by my friend.

Anyway, what I am looking for is advice from guys who have shot 95-100 grain bullets through a Grendel. Traditionally, does the Grendel prefer the lighter stuff? Or more so in the 120-130 range?

My philosophy of use is a home defense rifle I guess. That is why I purchased some 95 grain Vmax to load for it.

Who here shoots a Grendel? Any words of wisdom with this particular cartridge? Who makes good quality reasonably priced magazines for it?

I am no beginner, but I am brand new to this cartridge. Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

[GeauxTide]

My Grendel shot 5 123 SST into .3". Haven't tried another. CFE223 is my powder, but the 8208XBR is Temp Insensitive.

[stagpanther]

Kilo--I think your intuition of going smaller, lighter with frangible is a good one--but that bullet is going to remain lethal for a long way if you miss your intended target. Grendel probably wouldn't be my first choice for a critical home defense cartridge even though I've had lots of them and it's wildcats, I've had arguments with many shooters since the Grendel list came out, I still think it is a "temperamental" design prone to the occasional stoppage if something is out of whack. These days I'm thinking maybe a quick-handling 9mm carbine with a composite frangible like scinter/inceptor might make for a very good home defense gun. I've driven a 65 gr inceptor to 3000 fps in one of my 9mm carbines. I like lehighs bullets a lot too--but in some 9mm chambers their "Phillips head" design has occasionally hung up on the chamber wall.

[GeauxTide]

One thing I forgot. I started out with Lee dies, but they didn't size the base down enough. Bought RCBS and that took care of that.

[kilotanker22]

I basically use RCBS for dies

[ed308]

Good hunting and target cartridges. I shoot the 123 gr out of mine. Accurate. I use Grendel mags in mine. But I've read where 6.8 mags work. They seem a little tight IMO.

[kilotanker22]

I bought some Hornady black ammunition for it and got it sighted in. Decided to put a red dot on it to keep the weight down. The 3 moa dot is ok. I was able to hit a 16 inch gong at 300 yards every time I shot at it.

That's good enough for me. This rifle is meant for defense/combat purposes so I don't need a whole lot of precision.

Waiting for dies and mags to come in now.

For those 95 grain Vmax bullets. If I can get 2 moa and 2700 fps I will be happy.

Honestly don't know what to expect from this cartridge in a 18 inch barrel

[kilotanker22]

Originally Posted by stagpanther

Kilo--I think your intuition of going smaller, lighter with frangible is a good one--but that bullet is going to remain lethal for a long way if you miss your intended target. Grendel probably wouldn't be my first choice for a critical home defense cartridge even though I've had lots of them and it's wildcats, I've had arguments with many shooters since the Grendel list came out, I still think it is a "temperamental" design prone to the occasional stoppage if something is out of whack. These days I'm thinking maybe a quick-handling 9mm carbine with a composite frangible like scinter/inceptor might make for a very good home defense gun. I've driven a 65 gr inceptor to 3000 fps in one of my 9mm carbines. I like lehighs bullets a lot too--but in some 9mm chambers their "Phillips head" design has occasionally hung up on the chamber wall.

I know that light and fast bullet will remain lethal for a long way if I miss my target. Thankfully the Army taught me well and I don't miss often. All jokes aside though, I have other guns I would grab to defend against a home intruder first. Namely my 9mm handgun or my 22 mag hand gun.

The biggest reason I bought this particular rifle is this. The guy selling it was a really close friend (we served together in theater). He was selling to get funds to build an AR pistol. And of course my affinity for the 6.5 mm bore.

I will say that recoil is difficult to control when shooting quickly. About like an AK. So I may put a brake on it. I am thinking about the Ultradyne Apollo, and the C-4 front and rear sight

[2damnold4this]

I have a PSA 20" upper in 6.5 Grendel and it seems to like Hornady ELDs and SSTs. I use mine for target shooting and hunting but not for home defense as I don't think it's quite as reliable as some of my 5.56 options.

[kilotanker22]

I put around 100 rounds through mi e yesterday without any malfunction. Although, I did have to modify the magazine before it would feed reliably

[stagpanther]

Of all the cartridge I fire--the Grendel is overwhelmingly represented by the huge pile of different magazines I've accumulated over the years. Some of the magazines come close to costing as much as a Grendel barrel. It is a great performing cartridge, no doubt, but I now tend to shoot 6.8 spc and it's wildcats more often. The 6.8 really is one of the best all-arounders for an AR15 IMO--outside of the 5.56.

[AgedWarrior]

Originally Posted by kilotanker22

Bought a 6.5 Grendel from a friend of mine. Palmetto upper, 15" m lock handguard, 18" barrel with a rifle length gas system. Has a pretty nice trigger in it, although I don't know what trigger it is. The lower was built by my friend.

Anyway, what I am looking for is advice from guys who have shot 95-100 grain bullets through a Grendel. Traditionally, does the Grendel prefer the lighter stuff? Or more so in the 120-130 range?

My philosophy of use is a home defense rifle I guess. That is why I purchased some 95 grain Vmax to load for it.

Who here shoots a Grendel? Any words of wisdom with this particular cartridge? Who makes good quality reasonably priced magazines for it?

I am no beginner, but I am brand new to this cartridge. Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

Grendel is a great cartridge in my opinion. I have found E-Lander mags work best in my AR, which is an 80% build and also has an 18” barrel. You might also try Speer 90 grain TNT bullets for lighter bullets and a better price. They shoot as good or better in all three of my Grendel rifles. Nothing wrong with V-max though. I had some feeding issues with Sierra 85 HP’s in my AR but they are pretty awesome in the CZ 527 with a 24” barrel. All in all, I found the Grendel really shines with 120 & 123 grain bullets, but will perform well with lighter bullets too. My experience with 90 to 100 grain bullets is they perform much better at moderate loads; pushing towards max seemed to deteriorate accuracy a bit in all my rifles with several powders. I like CFE223 and TAC the best, but many others perform well.

[stagpanther]

8208xbr usually produced good results for me.

[doofus47]

I have a Palmetto 18" Grendel upper. It shoots Hornady 123 gr SST better than I do. I load for 110 grain Lehigh controlled chaos bullets. I'm still looking for my best load. If you want to dig into a lot of reloading options, the Grendel forums are a great place to start.
http://www.65grendel.com/forum/

[kilotanker22]

The 95 grain Vmax worked out pretty well so far. Power pro Varmint also works pretty well.