Catch-22

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All part boxes i no longer need that I’m looking to move on. 6.5mm 139g Lapua Scenars OTM (71 count). Box is a bit split in one corner. 6.5mm 120g Sierra Matchking HPBT (87 count). 6.5mm 123g Sierra Matchking HPBT (36 count). ALL SOLD!

Actually, looking back at some the uncleaned brass it was only the lower loads that were sooty. The higher loads were cleaner burning, just a smidge of carbon on the necks. My take is that the beyond 92.0gn of RS80 it was fairly clean. The RAMSHOT mag was definitely not as clean. That’s good news to me as it’s a real PITA to load with ball powder, the extruded is so much better.

Thanks Pops. Sounds like a great setup yourself. That is a very healthy speed to be slinging those big long pills. 👌

Barrel is a 27” Bartlein 5r, 1-9.3” twist, to a contour of my own spec; 1.35” at the chamber, straight for 5”, straight taper to 1.2” at muzzle. Chunky as hell but does an awesome job of soaking up the recoil. Although this is a switch barrel gun, it’s just too much fun in .338NM guise, so I think it’ll mostly stay as it is for a while 😁👍

Best group of the day (yup that’s 5x in there!), 93.0gn RS80; Optimum OCW I think with low vertical, ES & SD. I think the group opened up a bit due to me...I know I should have done better here. 94.0gn RS80; Also nice node with low vertical & SD, 94.5gn RS80; I know I could push the 300gn Scenars a bit faster, probably another 2gns and breaking 2800fps, but I’m happy with the results. It’s very pleasant to shoot and the bullets will enter the transonic range at around 1500m which is fine.

If anyone’s interested, here are the results following a recent OCW at 100m with two powders; RAMSHOT Magnum and RS80. Load spec for all bullets; New .338 Norma Magnum brass 300gn Lapua Scenar coated with HbN (bore also HbN swabbed) Fed 215GM magnum primers Boat tail seated right at neck-shoulder junction, which is around 0.01” off the lands and leaves around 0.05” space in a standard AICS .338 magazine. Full magazine feeds perfectly - smooth as butter! Summary is that RS80 definitely produced better groups AND more consistent ES & SD. RAMSHOT magnum produced some ok-ish groups but poor ES & SD. Both powders a bit sooty, RAMSHOT mag being the worst of the two. None of the loads showed any signs of pressure; primers and case extraction all fine. All loads pleasant to shoot, the Area419 brake doing an amazing job. I could shoot this thing all day 😋 Interestingly this .338 barrel is shooting almost exactly 1MIL low and 1.2MIL to the Left compared to my 6.5x47 barrel. But switching between the two barrels shows no discernible change in POI. I also credit the Era-Tac QD mounts too ...no shift in POI taking the scope on and off. EDIT: forgot to say this was a virgin barrel, so all OCW was in fact barrel break in...no cleaning between. Dry patching afterwards was sooty and took about 5 patches before running clear-ish. 1st up the RAMSHOT mag. After some wild shots top left to get me on paper, the groups came. I struggled to keep the Magneto speed fixed and capturing good results as the muzzle blast was significant, but I’ve written down what I got. Next up up was the RS80. I think a great node is around 94.0gn, as either side has low vertical, ES & SD.

Thing is the OP is using a DTA...he not looking for a dedicated ELR on a solid action. But I do agree, one can single load. But not sure if the OP wants to single load. As he’s using a repeater, one can assume that he’ll still want the benefits of using the mag?!? Still think it’s a valid consideration to bear in mind....if using the mag is indeed still his intention. I’ve seen a few people get a .338lm only to realise the long bullets they want to use don’t fit...so have to resort to single loading, something they didn’t want/plan to do.

Unfamiliar with the length of DTA mags, but before you go .338LM route, double check how long you’ll be able to load your bullets. You don’t want a short mag length forcing you to seat those long bullets (the 300g are long) deep into the powder column. Seating 300g bullets out of the powder column when using non CIP length mags was one of the key design considerations of the .338NM & .300NM.

@John MH Those Area419 sidewinder brakes are very nice, they definitely do an amazing job on taming my .338NM.

Lovely gun!

Amazing value and what an offer! Very best of luck with the sale.

I have the parent cartridge (.338NM) and tbh, once you get behind the big boom the first time, I can guarantee you’ll want to shoot it more than 200-300 rounds per year. It’s just too much fun 😁

Barrel life will also be significantly less with the .300NM.

Echo 😁

Echo

Echo

Bump

I too use the sporter and it’s brilliant. I cannot fault it for giving me all the key info I need (ES/SD/avg velocity over 5...or is it 10??....shot string). It gives you all you need to layer with your Kestral data and feed into your ballistic silver and data book. Excellent for the money, has the fundamentals you need....without all the extra bells and whistles (unnecessary for my needs). The only negative is the crappy box it comes in. But that is a very minor point and has nothing to do with the function or quality of the magnetospeed itself.

Ha - it's all fun & games. Booooom 💥

Thanks chaps! Ive read a lot that when using HbN, it's necessary to go a full grain, sometimes even more, to match non HbN velocity & pressure. i actually think there's a higher node for both N140 and RS62. For me, whilst the N140 load looks very stable, 2739fps is just too slow. I can see both the groups and ES/SD numbers shrink and grow. I think that if I go a charge or two higher, I'll break into another nice higher node. Worth a shot at least 😋 And I expect to maybe get up to 39.1gn, possibly even 39.4gn with N140. I'm also definitely keen to squeeze more RS62 into the case because it was both a lovely powder to work with and see shoot on paper. I'm gonna see if I can fit 42.5gns...maybe even upto 43.0gns in there (obviously working up in 0.3gns a time, looking for pressure. That might get me to around 2900fps. Ill give it a whirl then try at distance (600m and 1000m) then report back at somepoint. But next up will be RS80 and Ramshot Mag in the big .338 NM boomer barrel. 💪💥

Photos in order of shooting:

I managed to get out and conduct some initial load Dev with this new 6.5x47 26" Bartlein 5r barrel (MTU contour). Barrel was swabbed with a HbN slurry a couple of hours before shooting. All bullets also coated with HbN. I definitely noticed the velocity lower than a previous 24" barrel I had, so the HbN is certainly acting as a lubricant. All shot at 100m inside a tunnel to minimise wind influence. All groups are 5x groups. Velocity, ES & SD captured using a Magnetospeed with bare muzzle (no brake or moddy). All shot off a bench with bipod and rear bean bag. All loads used new Lapua brass, sized with Whidden F/L die, expander mandrel (giving approx 0.02" neck tension), KVB223m Murom SR Magnum primers and 123g Scenar loaded to around 0.015" off the lands. Everything loaded using my Autotrickler/Autothrow on an A&D FX120i, holding to 0.02gn accuracy. All loads shot in same session, with no 'run in' or cleaning inbetween. 1st up - Viht N140 (I had good results with this previously). 1. 37.0gn // mv: 2776 // ES: 24 // SD: 10 2. 37.3gn // mv: 2793 // ES: 4 // SD: 1 3. 37.6gn // mv: 2809 // ES: 14 // SD: 6 4. 37.9gn // mv: 2834 // ES: 20 // SD: 8 5. 38.2gn // mv: 2851 // ES: 30 // SD: 10 6. 38.5gn // mv: 2867 // ES: 10 // SD: 3 7. 38.8gn // mv: 2904 // ES: 16 // SD: 6 2nd up - RS52 (wanted to give it ago) 1. 36.3gn // mv: 2772 // ES: 24 // SD: 10 2. 36.6gn // mv: 2806 // ES: 30 // SD: 12 3. 36.9gn // mv: 2807 // ES: 20 // SD: 9 4. 37.2gn // mv: 2823 // ES: 28 // SD: 12 5. 37.5gn // mv: 2841 // ES: 59 // SD: 24 6. 37.8gn // mv: 2865 // ES: 28 // SD: 12 7. 38.1gn // mv: 2885 // ES: 26 // SD: 10 3rd up - RS62 (also wanted to give it ago) 1. 40.3gn // mv: 2671 // ES: 28 // SD: 12 2. 40.6gn // mv: 2706 // ES: 23 // SD: 9 3. 40.9gn // mv: 2725 // ES: 22 // SD: 8 4. 41.2gn // mv: 2744 // ES: 21 // SD: 8 5. 41.5gn // mv: 2770 // ES: 18 // SD: 8 6. 41.8gn // mv: 2789 // ES: 12 // SD: 4 Things I found: - no pressure found at all with any loads. The hot load in my previous barrel was 38.4gn N140, giving 2930fps. With this HbN coated bore, I managed to go to 38.8gn N140, mv of 2904fps with zero pressure. So velocity is down (due to HbN coating) so definitely need to up my charges next time. - N140 gave both good velocity and groups as experienced in previous barrel proving to me that it is a very good powder for this cartridge - N140 and RS62 gave some good ES & SD consistency, especially as powder charges & velocities increased - RS52 was definitely a disappointment, both ES/SD and also group size - I noticed some fractional delayed ignition only with RS52. A few times I pulled the trigger, heard a feint 'pop' followed very quickly by 'bang'. Primers all from the same batch, no issues with firing pin, no issues experienced with any other load or powder. I can only put it down to the powder itself - I actually didn't like the recoil impulse with RS52, noticeably sharper and less predicable. N140 and RS62 much better in this regard. - RS52 was difficult to meter through the Autotrickler/throw scales, much more so than N140 or RS62. - definitely need to improve my shooting position & stability, which has shown itself in vertical stringing and the odd flyer in a few of the groups. Purely my fault, definitely need to tweak some of the configuration, namely a bit too much cant in the buttstock. - cleaning afterwards was 3 dry patches through the bore. The first patch was a little sooty but no where near as bad as when shooting a bore without HbN. The next two patches were almost clean coming out. Looking through the crown showed no signs of coppering, just some HbN residue in the grooves. - Pete Walker did a Stirling job with chambering. Sadly I didn't take a pic of the crown but it had a beautiful, even 5 spoke 'star' showing the even cut made. Lovely job! Next job will be to test some higher charges, though I'm gonna have trouble fitting more RS62 into the case. I think it's better suited to a heavier bullet to generate better velocity, but worth a go as it's a v. good powder! If I can get reach 2900fps with RS62 then great, otherwise it is likely that I'll stick with N140 as the velocity is there, its a very consistent powder and groups are good.

Hi George. Sorry - collection only. I don't have a large enough box, but if I did it would likely cost at least a tenner itself. Cheers

12x pigeon shells (hollow and stackable as per photos) 5x full size pigeon decoys (hollow with hole underneath for sticks or poles) 1x netting bag with rucksack straps for carrying everything SOLD Collection from Newport only please.