Range Day 040316 Branching Out
Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2016 6:45 pm
Now it's getting interesting.
Despite vowing to get caught up on my 450b load testing, I was once again lured to the "new kid in town".
What spurred that was an unintended visit to the Hodgdon Reloading Data web page. They had some loads for the 30RAR. Their listings implied that you could cram 40gr of Benchmark into a case, with the right bullet selection. In my previous outings, I had not gone that high, even writing Benchmark off as not a good choice in the lighter bullets I had tested so far. Well far be it for me to leave a stone unturned. Also, I had seen a theoretical load for the 110gr Vmax bullets in QuickLoad, using AA1680, that I had an itch to try. Enough other loose ends and a few different bullets outside the Hornady 125gr SST were also waiting for their at bat, was enough to spur me on. That and another singular, predicted nice weather day was in the offing on Sunday. Up here, we yearn for the return of comfortable weather each spring and despite March coming in like a lamb, it went out like a lion. So, I'll take a good day whenever one is available, this time of the year. Snow tomorrow.
When I first laid eyes on the Hornady 125gr SST bullet, my gut feeling was that it was a good match up for the 30RAR. In practice (see sig), what I saw was with the harmonics of the factory barrel, the faster they went the tighter they grouped, but I was running out of gas on the way there. Well, I found what appears to be an accuracy node around 2870fps. Felt good to get back to the BR rest and bag. Not as rusty as I thought, but this platform weighs somewhere near half as much as the 450b setup with its SS lower and recoil mitigation doo-dads. So I didn't know if I could hold it as steady. I'll let the targets speak for themselves.
First the vitals:
Then the accuracy results:
First up, targets for 40gr Benchmark and Hornady 125 SST along with 42gr H335 and Hornady 110gr Vmax
The Vmax's didn't care for H335, but just wait.
Next up some soft pointers. 40gr Benchmark and Hornady 130gr SP along with 125gr Sierra SP
The Sierra 125 SP did pretty good but 40gr Benchmark for some reason did not drive them as fast as the 125 SST. Go figure...
Lastly the fun experiment. 36gr (90% fill) AA1680 under the Hornady 110gr Vmax and the obligatory fouler target to make an even number.
I think the wind was bumping the 110gr Vmax's a little horizontally. At almost 3100fps average, the Vmax's were really hustling. I knew that the AA1680 modeled a little fast for them, but had to try it. Produced enough pressure to moderately flatten the primers, short of cratering. Case Head Growth reflected the "bridge too far" compared to other loads. Interestingly, unlike the other powders I've tried so far, QuickLoad got this one real close. Coming soon is some AA2200 which might be that slower than AA1680 but faster than any other powder I've tried so far. Hoping for the "missing link". I'm reversing my opinion, Don't count Benchmark out yet, as predicted by Hodgdon.
Hoot
Despite vowing to get caught up on my 450b load testing, I was once again lured to the "new kid in town".
What spurred that was an unintended visit to the Hodgdon Reloading Data web page. They had some loads for the 30RAR. Their listings implied that you could cram 40gr of Benchmark into a case, with the right bullet selection. In my previous outings, I had not gone that high, even writing Benchmark off as not a good choice in the lighter bullets I had tested so far. Well far be it for me to leave a stone unturned. Also, I had seen a theoretical load for the 110gr Vmax bullets in QuickLoad, using AA1680, that I had an itch to try. Enough other loose ends and a few different bullets outside the Hornady 125gr SST were also waiting for their at bat, was enough to spur me on. That and another singular, predicted nice weather day was in the offing on Sunday. Up here, we yearn for the return of comfortable weather each spring and despite March coming in like a lamb, it went out like a lion. So, I'll take a good day whenever one is available, this time of the year. Snow tomorrow.
When I first laid eyes on the Hornady 125gr SST bullet, my gut feeling was that it was a good match up for the 30RAR. In practice (see sig), what I saw was with the harmonics of the factory barrel, the faster they went the tighter they grouped, but I was running out of gas on the way there. Well, I found what appears to be an accuracy node around 2870fps. Felt good to get back to the BR rest and bag. Not as rusty as I thought, but this platform weighs somewhere near half as much as the 450b setup with its SS lower and recoil mitigation doo-dads. So I didn't know if I could hold it as steady. I'll let the targets speak for themselves.
First the vitals:
Then the accuracy results:
First up, targets for 40gr Benchmark and Hornady 125 SST along with 42gr H335 and Hornady 110gr Vmax
The Vmax's didn't care for H335, but just wait.
Next up some soft pointers. 40gr Benchmark and Hornady 130gr SP along with 125gr Sierra SP
The Sierra 125 SP did pretty good but 40gr Benchmark for some reason did not drive them as fast as the 125 SST. Go figure...
Lastly the fun experiment. 36gr (90% fill) AA1680 under the Hornady 110gr Vmax and the obligatory fouler target to make an even number.
I think the wind was bumping the 110gr Vmax's a little horizontally. At almost 3100fps average, the Vmax's were really hustling. I knew that the AA1680 modeled a little fast for them, but had to try it. Produced enough pressure to moderately flatten the primers, short of cratering. Case Head Growth reflected the "bridge too far" compared to other loads. Interestingly, unlike the other powders I've tried so far, QuickLoad got this one real close. Coming soon is some AA2200 which might be that slower than AA1680 but faster than any other powder I've tried so far. Hoping for the "missing link". I'm reversing my opinion, Don't count Benchmark out yet, as predicted by Hodgdon.
Hoot