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Any .308 pet loads?

16607 Views 22 Replies 11 Participants Last post by  unclenick, 
HardBall
I'm looking for some .308 load suggestions for 150gr hunting type spitzers and also 168gr match bullets.

I've seen 39.5gr IMR-3031 with a 168gr MatchKing mentioned, I assume with at 2.80" COL.

Any other suggestions?
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unclenick
Rocky Raab said:
I used known accuracy loads in .308 Win and in the .223, changing only the primer. I ranked primers in order of the velocity produced, averaged from 20 shots. (It was so long ago, I have no record of the loads used or the velocities, only the resultant rankings. Here they are from hottest at the top down to coolest: . . .

Small Rifle

F205
R7½
WSRM
F200
WSR
CCIBR4/CCI400 (tie)
R 6½. . .
Click to expand...
It's fascinating to me how these kinds of things can differ. Charles Petty had an article in Handloader 248 (Aug-Sep, 2007) in which he did the same experiment. He ran a 52 grain Hornady Amax bullet over 24 grains of Reloader 10X in new Winchester brass in a .223 bolt gun (Cooper Pheonix). His result had the Federal 205 and 205M at the bottom of the velocity list and Remington 7½ at the top of the heap. Others inbetween.

I put Petty's results in Excel to sort by the 25 shot average velocity from hottest to coolest, and got:

Code: 
Primer    25 shots Avg    ES        SD
Rem 7½      3305 fps    50 fps    21 fps
Rem 6½      3298 fps    38 fps    16 fps
CCI 400     3294 fps    82 fps    20 fps
CCI BR4     3263 fps   117 fps    23 fps
WSR         3210 fps    76 fps    30 fps
Fed 210M    3176 fps    24 fps     7 fps
Fed 210     3146 fps    42 fps    14 fps
I like this article on primers by a former CCI employee. He points out that primers get changed without notice or fanfare by their makers. It's yet another reason you back your loads off when a component lot number changes.
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HardBall
I remember Charles Petty's article on primers in Handloader. ...I have also seen primers listed in order of "hotness" in various other books/magazines and my recollection of them generally matched Rocky's findings. Mr. Petty's article came as a surprise to me but since he was testing small rifle primers I thought maybe my memory was of large rifle primers.

Very interesting article by the CCI employee and something to ponder when choosing primers. I've tried primers from all the domestic companies, though not all at the same time, or in the same decade. All I've been able to say, for sure, is that standard Winchester primers are generally going to be hotter than CCI-200 and CCI-250 primers are about the same as the standard Winchester primers. I haven't used Remington or Federal enough, because I can't find them as often, to permanently place them in my own "hotness" chart and, if what the CCI employee says is true, I may never be able to.
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unclenick
And it's only going to get worse if everyone eventually has to switch over to DDNP from lead styphnate, because they'll all change all over again.
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