.223 loads for a Tikka T3 TAC 1:8 TWIST

[Jamie]

75gn A-Max are properly pointy, OAL for my rifle to the tip is 2.425" to put it 0.020" off the lands. The throat in my rifle is not overly long so expect similarly long OAL but make sure you measure it for your rifle.

Thanks for the advice. What powder do you use and how many grains?

Cheers

Jamie

[MrCetrizine]

I use 23.5gn of Vihtavouri N140 behind 75gn A-Max, 24gn if I plan to push them further than 400m

[tackb]

I use 23.5gn of Vihtavouri N140 behind 75gn A-Max, 24gn if I plan to push them further than 400m

Really ? Half a grain makes that much difference?

[MrCetrizine]

Not really a huge difference but in my rifle, 23.5 just dips below supersonic at 800m but 24 stays above. At 24.2, I start to see my primers flattening unless I back off the lands which opens my groups.

 

Oddly, I can push 75g Hornady Match up to 25gn with no signs of over pressure but I can't get a reliable stock of them near me.

[tackb]

Not really a huge difference but in my rifle, 23.5 just dips below supersonic at 800m but 24 stays above. At 24.2, I start to see my primers flattening unless I back off the lands which opens my groups.

Oddly, I can push 75g Hornady Match up to 25gn with no signs of over pressure but I can't get a reliable stock of them near me.

Have you chrono'd them ?

[MrCetrizine]

I did using a friend's chrono and then he drew up a chart for me which showed the drop below supersonic. I can't remember the exact numbers but it was pretty close both sides of supersonic at 800m between 23.5 and 24.

[tackb]

I did using a friend's chrono and then he drew up a chart for me which showed the drop below supersonic. I can't remember the exact numbers but it was pretty close both sides of supersonic at 800m between 23.5 and 24.

 

does the on target data match up with the chrono results?

[MrCetrizine]

I'm not sure really, I'm quite new to shooting and have pretty much just been taking other people's word for things.

[tackb]

oh right , well if it's working for you keep on doing it ? personally I would stick to the 24g load if it works ? having different loads for different ranges just adds another complication and I've always been of the opinion that the simpler you can make it the more you can concentrate on actually shooting well?

[bradders]

oh right , well if it's working for you keep on doing it ? personally I would stick to the 24g load if it works ? having different loads for different ranges just adds another complication and I've always been of the opinion that the simpler you can make it the more you can concentrate on actually shooting well?

Yep,

Why complicate things?

Set the powder measure once and leave it at that

[Jamie]

Thanks for the advice folks, much appreciated!

[dannywayoflife]

I like tr140 over the 75 Amax in my tikka t3 1in8 varmint. I've gone up as high as 25.6 grains with no over pressure problems.

[Jamie]

I like tr140 over the 75 Amax in my tikka t3 1in8 varmint. I've gone up as high as 25.6 grains with no over pressure problems.

Never heard of that type of powder. Who makes that??

[dannywayoflife]

It's made in Switzerland I believe. It's imported by Nigel cole Hawkins or commonside firearms. It's very similar though a fair bit cheaper than N140. I think it's slightly slower than the VV n140. But it's dam good stuff!

[MrCetrizine]

Does it burn clean as I was told it leaves carbon all up your barrel.

[gbal]

believe it or not I rattled three rounds off once with my 223 (75amax load) as fast as I could sensibly at 900yds for a bit of fun at the end of the detail and they clustered into about 2.5 inches according to the butt marker !

 

could I do it again/consistently , I very much doubt it !

 

does the 223 punch above it's weight , certainly !

Well,what does 'punch above its weight' actually mean-to be competitive at 1000y (with 6.5 142g@2950fps0,the 223 needs 90g @ 3270fps-now,is that going to happen?

 

Not that any cartridge is going to give less than 3 " regularly at 900 yards. There have been a very few such 5 shot groups at 1000,from the thousands fired (with cartridges more suited than 223) ...as they say,sometimes the wind blows them in ,especially if its 3 shots.....and,as implied,replication will be elusive! Fast twist and heavy high BC bullets have much improved the 223s potential- but not that much!

 

Gbal

[dannywayoflife]

Does it burn clean as I was told it leaves carbon all up your barrel.

It seems pretty clean to me. But then it don't matter to me as I use c2r which just gets everything off easy peasy!

[oaken]

Interesting thread this.

I generally get treated as mildly eccentric for using a .223 at 1000yds.

My rifle is an ancient Sako Vixen with a 27" 1:8. This setup is capable of 1,150fps at the target with 80gr VLDs over 23.7gr of Varget.

Takes a 30min rail and a bit more wind reading input but pushing the limits rather appeals to me especially when giving more "suitable" calibres a close run. You do have to warn the markers to look for tiny holes though!

Have never managed to get the 80smks to group well in my rifle whereas the 80vld are very good and surprisingly oal tolerant. I jump mine 25thou. Was getting some erratic velocities with them close and into the lands.

May try some 73gr Bergerz at some point, to get a bit more speed without destroying my brass.

[MrCetrizine]

Shooting at the very limit with .223 really appeals to me. I'm quite new to shooting and I think it will teach me a lot for when/if I fill the 308 slot on my FAC.

 

I recently won a club competition against 308s in high wind and the "wrong tool" comments soon stopped.

[bradders]

Well,what does 'punch above its weight' actually mean-to be competitive at 1000y (with 6.5 142g@2950fps0,the 223 needs 90g @ 3270fps-now,is that going to happen?

 

Not that any cartridge is going to give less than 3 " regularly at 900 yards. There have been a very few such 5 shot groups at 1000,from the thousands fired (with cartridges more suited than 223) ...as they say,sometimes the wind blows them in ,especially if its 3 shots.....and,as implied,replication will be elusive! Fast twist and heavy high BC bullets have much improved the 223s potential- but not that much!

 

Gbal

A 90 is too much bullet for a .223, and in all the tests carried out in the name of shooting science, they have never bettered an 80 at any distance

[gbal]

Shooting at the very limit with .223 really appeals to me. I'm quite new to shooting and I think it will teach me a lot for when/if I fill the 308 slot on my FAC.

I recently won a club competition against 308s in high wind and the "wrong tool" comments soon stopped.

Well done,but you will find that the 308 is no great shakes at 1000 when you are up against better cartridges in open competition,though considerably ahead of the 223.The 223 will indeed teach that ultimately you need something that reduces the wind reading errors that everyone makes,some more than others.Even in competitions that allow 223 and 308,most use 308;and in competitions where there is no such arbitrary limitation,hardly anyone uses it,if they want to do well.

I have 308s,but it is not a cartridge for serious competition,much less is 223.Fun maybe,maybe even some occasional success in modest competition-but not beyond that,at 1000y.

Ballistics matter,and they show.To compete with a 6.5@2950 fps,as I have said before,308 needs 220g@2650 fps,and 223 needs 90g @3270- pretty tall orders!!

 

Gbal

[gbal]

A 90 is too much bullet for a .223, and in all the tests carried out in the name of shooting science, they have never bettered an 80 at any distance

Mark,I don't disagree-I just can't be bothered to do the maths (hi Les!) on this-if you move down to 80g -for the good reasons you have given-then you need to up the MV to compensate... 3400+ Seems errr ....unrealistic to me !!

223 is just not a 1000y cartridge if one is really serious about competing with the 6.5s @2950-let alone any hotted up ones!

It has other merits,but little is to be gained by flogging a pretty tired horse,up a long ,steep hill,with minimal chance of winning!

Military snipers,among almost all other serious 1000y shooters,seem to agree,and the ballistics (shooting science,if you will) confirm experience.II've just spent a very enjoyable afternoon ,despite a 10-12 mph wind,with a 223 reliably downing 5/600y falling men targets,but not 900/1000 y ones.

 

Gbal

[oaken]

No one here is claiming that a 223 will outperform a 6.5 or a .308 for that matter.

Just saying that the humble 223 is capable of more than most will consider.

Some of us are not particularly driven by winning comps preferring to explore the capabilities of what we have or can afford.

[gbal]

No one here is claiming that a 223 will outperform a 6.5 or a .308 for that matter.

Just saying that the humble 223 is capable of more than most will consider.

Some of us are not particularly driven by winning comps preferring to explore the capabilities of what we have or can afford.

I absolutely agree-I think that"s about where I am these days too-but it's only fair to be clear what the limits of this 223/800+ performance actually is,in reality.The 'maths' just show that it is not going to compete! It might hit the target somewhere,but not with much consistency.As long a newbies etc are aware of this,fine.It's simply not ethical on sentient targets,but if someone is happy with a hit rate of maybe one in five,on a benign day-and think thats economical-fine.I do it too,but don't hit football size gongs anything like every shot.

Optimism is no real substitute for realism,when a cartridge's envelope is at it's limits.750,ok....but 1000?( esp if you put some limit on equipment -'what we have,or can afford'. 222 at 750 anyone...!? :-)

 

Gbal

[Laurie]

Not for the first time, I've got to disagree with GBal and Bradders on this issue.

 

First, .223 Rem is perfectly compatible with 90gn bullets provided the chamber is designed to handle them, likewise rifling twist rate (1-7" to 1-7.25" needed, not the commonly stated 1-6.5" which is too fast). That makes the rifle rather specialised as it'll only sensibly handle 80s and 90s thanks to the large amount of freebore. However, that's no different from many cartridges - for instance .284 Win as used in competition rifles or many custom sporters is loaded way longer than its nominal SAAMI length and should never be used in a standard SAAMI chamber. With a resulting COAL of ~ 2.7 inches compared to the 223's standard 2.25-2.26", it is of course totally unsuited to magazine rifles built around the standard 223R / 5.56mm cartridges lengths and in particular is useless for the AR15 platform and similar designs. (It can however be used in standard 'short-action' bolt-action rifles in 'tactical' form that accept the .223 Rem AI magazine.)

 

Secondly, so .223 Rem won't match 6.5-284 ballistically? Well, there's a surprise! But neither will lots of great cartridges that are used in competition. For that matter, .338 Lapua will pee all over 6.5-284 in external ballistics .... and if you want to play stupid, let's advocate 20mm Oerlikon as it'll outperform any rifle cartridge I can think of! The reason for developing .223 Rem with heavies and 'super-heavies' is to make it competitive in restricted cartridge disciplines, that is the ICFRA regulated 'fullbore' prone rifle disciplines - Target Rifle, Palma Rifle, and F/TR which are restricted to .223 Rem and .308 Win.

 

In fact ICFRA rules limit .308 Win to bullets of 'less than 156gn weight', and .223 Rem to bullets of 'less than 81gn weight', but most national administrations allow any bullet weight for F/TR. There is a move to allow an extra 10gn latitude for .223 Rem in TR / Palma to make it more competitive in 'Target Rifle' with .308 Win allied to 155gn / 155.5gn bullets as most 80gn loads are not competitive at 1,000 yards.

 

Where 81gn + bullets are allowed (F/TR most countries, Canada in TR too), the 223/90 combination has shown itself to be the equal of a heavily loaded .308/155 combination. This particularly applies to TR in Canada which has many successful 223 users, Bob Pitcairn using it with great results in international events both as an individual and national team competitor.

 

Potential MVs? JLK and Berger 90gn VLDs can be driven easily to 2,850 fps plus in a 28-inch or longer barrel with a suitable chamber. When I used the Berger VLD in GB F/TR, my long-range match load produced 2,907 fps with an ES in the low teens and single-figure SD. It would shoot 0.25-0.35-MOA 100 yard groups and got me several national league stage medals, a 4th F/TR league round at Blair Atholl, 7th place in the GB F-Class Assoc league F/TR championship, and 17th F/TR in the F-Class European Championship all in 2011 when 185-210gn bullets were being widely used in .308 Win F/TR loads.

 

Also in 2011, I was a member of a 4-shooter scratch Scotland team put together by Paul Crosbie (who has just won the 2013 F/TR league championship incidentally) in a coached team shoot against US F/TR team members who came across to Scotland after beating Ireland in the revived Creedmoor Match on the then new Tullamore ranges. That was 2+15 each at 900, 1,000, and 1,100 yards coached by Hamish Hunter. Under his expert wind reading I got the 2nd highest aggregate score just behind Paul who was shooting .308 Win with 210s at a substantial MV over Viht N550. During the same long weekend, I won a 1,000 yard individual F/TR match in the preceding SRA Scottish Long Range meeting, the US national team shooters also entered alongside domestic competitors. In a 1,200 yard 'fun shoot' beforehand (actually 1,224 yards at Blair), the 223 kept every one of 10 consecutive shots within the 1,000 yard F-Class target 'four' ring, equivalent to less than 1.5-MOA all in a tight elevation pattern bar one three-quarter MOA low shot!

 

Here's how the two 90gn VLDs at 2,900 fps compare to .308 Win with 155s at 3,100 fps

 

90gn 0.224 VLD, G7 BC 0.281 (~0.295 if 'pointed') at 2,900 fps and 1,000 yards

 

out of the box - 1,454 fps at 1K, 7.2-MOA (75 inches) drift in a 10 mph crosswind

Pointed - 1,512 fps at 1K, 6.7-MOA (70 inches) drift in a 10 mph crosswind

 

 

155.5gn Berger BT Fullbore, G7 BC 0.237 (~0.245 if pointed)

 

out of the box - 1,371 fps at 1K, 8.2-MOA (86 inches) drift in a 10 mph crosswind

Pointed - 1,416 fps at 1K, 7.8-MOA (82 inches) drift in a 10 mph crosswind

 

 

The upsides using .223 Rem in these applications? Very easy to shoot in a heavy rifle due to negligible recoil. No need for 'big-foot' F/TR bi-pods due to much reduced recoil and torque. Reduced powder and bullet costs compared to .308 Win.

 

Downsides? very hard work to get the accuracy allied to MV and small spreads. Needs powder charge weight spreads under plus or minus 0.5gn. Everything has to be perfect requiring fully prepped brass, very consistent neck tension .... etc, etc. Some people cannot get it to work at all. Barrel must suit the bullet perfectly. Very limited bullet range - JLK and Berger VLD. 90gn Sierra MK is unsuitable for this application and the 90gn Berger LR BT produces more pressure so cannot be loaded to the same MVs. Berger has stopped production of this bullet anyway.

 

.308 Win is far less work. Moreover, if you must have the ultimate F/TR external ballistics, you can now load bullets weighing up to 230gn in the cartridge although the 200gn Berger Hybrid is increasingly seen as the ballistically optimal choice for the cartridge by US F/TR shooters.

 

Just to finish this off, have people heard of bullet design 'scaling'? That is, take an optimal design in one calibre and scale it up or down to other calibres? This is a standard reference tool for professional ballisticians. In rifle bullets, the first optimised match models in widespread production and use were the 139-142gn 0.264" models for 6.5mm calibre cartridges and their existence played a large part in 6.5-284 Norma becoming the cartridge to use in long-range prone rifle disciplines some 10 to 15 years ago.

 

Here are Bryan Litz's calculated optimal weights for scaled bullets starting with the 6.5mm 142gn Sierra MatchKing, US shooters' favourite long-range bullet in the 6.5-284 and similar:

 

.224" ~90gn

.243" - 112gn

.264" - 142gn (base design)

.284" - 177gn

.308" - 228gn