need a crash course on .260 rem

i went to a tiny local show today and bought over 1000 6.5 bullets, 300+ pieces of virgin brass and dies. but don't even have a barrel, let alone a rifle, i was planning on doing a 6br as my next build, but well... i got the biggest part of a 260 covered, but not sure what weight guys are shooting and what twist and on and on.... bullets vary from 85 to 142gr w/ most in the 140 or 142 class, smk's, berger, lapua, hornady, etc. what do i want as a universal twist that gets the job done, barrel length etc. or ???

I'm far from an expert...but for the heavier bullets..I've seen a 1:8 twist used. I've got a 1:8.5" twist on my .260 Improved. I based this twist rate on the article: "Terry's Tactical Two-Sixty AI" http://www.6mmbr.com/gunweek046.html

I'm sure others with a ton of experience will be able to give better insight and advice.

Good Luck...Sounds like an exciting project in the works!

Wayne

I shoot 139 Lapua's. 140Gr. A-Max. and 140Nos CC's and occassionally the 129SST Horn with my 1:8twist 260AI. Shoots them all great.

i got all those bullets except the hornady's, the redding comp dies came w/out bushings, so i got to figure out what i need for the virgin rem brass if i pursue this. i do have a neck turner and even had the foresight to by a 6.5 arbor even though i did not own a 6.5 rifle.

A 1 in 8 twist is good for the heavier 140/142 grain pills. Go with a "no turn neck" chamber in the barrel you order. I'm shooting a 260 with the 1 in 8 and use the Sierra 140gr Match pills and Hornady A-Max's. My barrel prefers the A-Max giving me consistent 1/2" at 100 yards seated to .006" off the lands. HTH

Powders ?

My 260 AI really likes H4831sc...RE19....N560

Anybody here have experience reloading this round? I've got a new 260 barrel thanks to Jim Briggs and I'm getting ready to start breaking it in. Looking to use R17/R22/R25 behind some 130 and 140gr bergers and have a big supply of fed 215 primers from loading my weatherby. I'm a bit short on load development time with chuck season right around the corner and a new barrel to break in. I'm hoping to get the savage out to the fields this year... (Not that a weatherby mag isn't fun to varmint with!) Thanks in advance!

Great 260 barrel to look into is a 28" Walther 260 1-8" I know quite a few guys that have or had fantastic luck with them, They usually have them in stock and you can have it in less then two weeks, Think they are 300.00. I got mine from Sinman awhile back and loved it! Shot 120 Amaxs great and 140AMAXS Fantastic. I was getting 2900fps with RL-19 in mine.

My .260 has a 26" Schilen Select match barrel with a 1:8 twist. I shoot the 140 Berger VLD's with H4350 and Win 748. I have been happy so far. For brass I use Win 7mm-08 brass resized for the .260.

hcpyro

Rl-22 and RL-25 are to slow for the 260 case. Rl-22 you can't stuff enough in the case to even worry about. Rl-25 is even slower.

Rl-17, H-4350, N-160,n-560 ,varget are all good choices.

I have been working up loads with my 32" 260 with the 123gr sierra's and am trying Ramshot hunter, N-160, n-560,Rl-17.

560 and 17 top speeds were in the 3300fps , Hunter and 160 topped out at 3100fps but i do have room to move up in powder charge with them.

I did some testing yesterday with N-560 and shows some promise around 3220fps. Gotta tweak seating depth but i may do some more testing with Rl-17 and N-160.

Peetz, thanks for the info. Let me know how you make out. I loaded up some rl17 behind some 130 bergers last night and I'm hoping to make it out to the range this weekend. I have to break in the barrel, so I have some factory remington 140's to take care of that. I have a 26" mcgowan and I'm hoping to get the 130's around 3000 fps and have good accuracy. This is my new toy, I'm trying to get my holdovers and wind correction close to my 300 wby handloads for a bit of cross training on a gun that won't eat barrels nearly as fast! Looks like it shouldn't be much of a problem getting a 260 to fly relatively close to a 300 mag. I can't wait to see what this gun can do, 12 vlp action and the mcgowan pre-fit, near base... hope it shoots as good as it looks!

-HcP

I recently got a 260 Rem barrel, I have been using 140 gr SMK's and have had pretty good luck with them. I just bought a box of Berger 140 gr. Target VLD's. I have been using a whole host of different powders, H4350 seems to work pretty good. Alliants website shows that RL19 should work good. And according to Zak Smiths 6.5mm shootout article RL17 is a perfect match for the 260 Rem. And I would consider him a bit more of an expert than myself in this field. I just picked up a pound of RL19 that I plan on shooting with my Bergers. Another reason I chose to go with RL19 is that according to Alliants website RL19 will work in every single other rifle I currently own. I wanted to try some Ramshot Hunter powder but have been unable to find any so far. I used Ramshot TAC ad Big Game in some of my other rifles and have been nothing but impressed with the cleanness and consistent burn rates from Ramshot powder. So I expect the Hunter would follow the same lines. Some of the other powders that Peetz mentioned looked like they would work well in the 260 but I have not tried any of them.

One thought about the Berger bullets is that in 6.5 they make a Target VLD bullet that is for target shooting only, and they make one that is a VLD Hunting bullet. As far as I can tell they are shaped exactly the same and their site calls for the exact same BC between the two. One of the local game wardens shoot the Berger VLD Hunting bullet and he is extremely happy with the bullet performance in a hunting application across all velocity ranges.

I plan on using that for both target shooting and hunting, that way I don't have to readjust my dope for hunting.

Headed out to the range tomorrow afternoon to do a little ladder testing with the rl 17 and some 130vld's... Hoping the weather cooperates with the chrono and I can get this load development thing taken care of before the woodchucks get lonely!

hcpyro..........How did it go? Is she a bug hole maker? :o Are you happy? Pictures man, pictures!! Of the rifle to of course! ;D

Clark, I got hosed. Drove all the way down to the range to find out that it would be a 2.5 hour wait to get a table on the line. I left a little dejected, have to try again on friday, assuming the weather is friendly for the chrono!

== Got out to the range and my round count is now up to 78, my chrono is really helping the reloading on this one. Approaching 2925fps with the 130's and the sd is under 10 and I think will go even lower with a little more fine tuning. The rl-17 really seems to like the higher pressure loads, and seems to have 100% of the powder burned before it leaves the 26" barrel, it's a quiet shooter. Guy next to me at the range thought I had a heavy barreled 17 hmr... : ) I can't really tell since I got used to the muzzle blast of the magnums! Shot a nice 5 shot group with one flier, the rest were easily covered by a dime. If she keeps grouping like that I think she'll be a keeper!

-HcP