.243 Win what should I try next?

[taylorce1]

Take a look at the thumbnail you might have to enlarge it (powder is I4350 not I3031):


Stevens 200 action
26" McGowen 1:7 twist Heavy Varmint Taper .243 Win
Kevin Rayhill Recoil Lug
Sharp Shooter Supply Competition Trigger

I know I'm going to have to bed the rifle, right now it is sitting in a Savage M12 Varmint synthetic stock. I was hoping to hold off the bedding job until I could get either a new B&C Medalist or McMillan stock for the rifle. But since the new stock is still a ways off, I'm going to have to bed the rifle if I want my groups to tighten up.

I'd like to bring my SD down as well hopefully into the single digits, do you think switching the primers would help with this? I haven't played with seating depth because I have the bullets out as long as I can get them while still feeding reliably from the magazine. Which still puts me a little over .030 off the lands.

I'm thinking of trying some H1000 or RL22 as well but I had 8 lbs of I4350 so I tried it first. I'd have to go buy the H1000 but have about 1.5 lbs of RL22 on the bench. Or should I just stick with I4350?

[Blue Avenger]

RL 19 maybe, but not 22 or 1000

[mbkmkk]

RL 19 maybe, but not 22 or 1000

Why not RL-22 or H1000? Just curious. Too slow?

[Blue Avenger]

yup. You did not say what bullet you are using. one of the IMR or Hodgen 4831s would work also for heavy bullets. If your in the 60 - 70 gr bullet range those would even be a bit slow.

[CJ in WY]

A primer change might help as much as anything. Another thing to try is H4350?
H1000 may work for you too...if you like drop tubes.
Adjusting the seating depth might help the most or even a different bullet? A 7 twist barrel is going to be a lot less forgiving than a 9.5 or even an 8 twist=little things will make a bigger difference!

R22 works great with 105-7 grain bullets in my striker 9.5 twist 15" barrel just like it did when the barrel was a stevens rifle barrel BUT R22 is a very agrivating powder in that the lots vary quit a bit and you have to be very carefull not to let the rounds cook in a hot barrel or leave the rounds in the sun=Much above 90 degrees the preasure goes way up!!

[taylorce1]

107 SMK was what I was shooting on the xcel sheet. I'm going to try some 115 DTAC and Berger's as well in the future. I might put some 120 Matrix bullets down the tube as well. I've only tried 105 A-max and the SMK so far.

[243LPR]

I've had good luck with the 95 gr Berger hunting VLD using H4831SC as far as accuracy goes. Haven't shot anything with them yet though.2 of my 243's are 10 twist,the other is 9.25 twist, so I haven't tried the heavier Bergers yet.Good luck with the 243,it's my favorite cartridge.Does everything I need and doesn't pound the snot out of you.

[stangfish]

You did not mention your case prep process. What can you tell us about that. What kind of dies. FL or Neck? yada yada yada....

[taylorce1]

I started with brand new RP brass, ran the expander ball through all the necks to uniform. Then trimmed all the cases to lenght, chamfered the cases. These loads were once fired and neck sized through an RCBS neck sizer, no other case prep done. I've ordered a flash hole deburr tool and I'm going to dig out my primer pocket uniformer and give that a try.

[Jamie]

IF you are looking for a different powder try the H4831SC as well as Ramshot Hunter. I would also try different seating depths, even if you have to single load them.

[Slenk]

You might try some IMR 4007ssc. If you can find it. It has worked great for me.

[JASmith]

What were the winds when you shot? How steady is your scope? My heartbeat oftentimes moves the crosshairs by about the horizontal spread so that could also be affecting the horizontal spread.

Have you looked at just the vertical dispersion for the groups?

Depending on your expectations and prior experience with this rifle, you may want to try a different powder. I'm just starting a similar exercise with the Hornady 87 gr BTHP and have gotten one five-shot group of .59" moa at 100 yards using H414. Of course others get better groups, but this one is almost certainly the best of my shooting career and my Savage .243 Win. is a Weather Warrior sporting a low-mid price 3-9X scope and a very inexpensive Caldwell rest.

Should you want to continue with the current ingredients, you could take a closer look at groups #3 (vert center = -0.311) and #4 (vert center =-.308). These look like they have the smallest vertical spread, and their centers are very close to the same height.

One could take an excursion of seating depth as the next step. Some rifle and bullet combinations seem to like a longer jump. Use some caution as you increase the depth -- your pressures and velocities will increase as the bullet is seated deeper.

What powder charge to choose? Group #3 seems to be 40.5 gr of H4350 with Group #4 being 40.8 grains. Since the velocity is likely to increase with seating depth, pick the intermediate load of 40.6 for the depth excursion. That should move the barrel time through the best accuracy node for this set up.

Good shooting!

Please let us know how things work out whichever set of advise, or combination you go with!

[slurpin dog]

From research i have done the 7 twist may be a little to fast. Most all shooters who are shooting the 115 bullets are using a 7.5 or 7.8 twist. They also seem to beleive that the 115 is pretty well at the max range of weight that will shoot accurately.Joe Hendricks is shooting h1000 with good success in a 6cm, which is very similar to a 243AI. He shoots the 115 dtac and 115 Berger. He is also getting good results with the 105 hybrid Berger. 28" 7.5 barrel jumping .040. This leads me to believe that h1000 just might work.
Another winning shooter, George Gardener is shooting a 243 he built, with R25 behind 115 dtacs.
There is an article over on www.accurateshooter.com that has some good 243 info. Ron

[kelbro]

You're going to have to really smack those 115s to make them work in a regular 243.

[taylorce1]

Right now the COAL is 2.770, I can push them out a little over 2.8" but the last round in the magazine will not feed. There are some custom bullets from Matrix they have a 107 and a 117 VLD and a 100 grain Cutting Edge match bullet that I might try as well as the 115's from DTAC and Berger. I know the 7 twist is a little fast but I wanted to run the heavies in this rifle as I have a .243 hunting rifle to run anything 85 to 100 grains and a 6x47 to run the varmint bullets offered in 6mm. So since McGowen only offers a choice of a 7 or 8 twist to handle these kind of bullets I opted for the 7.

I need to have this rifle feed from a magazine as I don't want to use it as a single shot. I'll eventually be adding CDI bottom metal and using AICS magazines. I've only put 70 rounds down the barrel so far with break in and load developement, so I'm hoiping the barrel will settle in after a few more rounds. Any way this is the first time I've ever tried anyting like this so it has been a learning experience.