308 LH boyds prarire hunter stock, sav1 trigger. I shoot 3 to 4 times a year. I would like to optimise my ammo choice and thought about hand loading ? Or should I stay with off the shelf ? Shooting Hornady whitetail 150g. Should I be shooting something heaver with the 1/10 twist ? Looking to tighten my groups at 100+ . thinking after this season on bedding the stock and maybe a Witt break ?
Thanks all
3-4 times a year isn't much, unless you go through 30-40-50 rounds each time. You want to tighten groups, but don't say what your groups are now. Are you looking for MOA or MODeer? You said 100+ yards, which could mean 101 to 1000. You should easily find a factory round that will give you MOA, but it might take some trial and error. What yours will do with factory or hand loads will not necessarily be what the next one will do. If you want precision shooting, then that is another subject.
Reloading makes economic sense in only two circumstances :
1. The firearm you are loading for is chambered for an obsolete cartridge that is either unavailable or prohibitively expensive; or,
2. You are a high-volume shooter and your initial investment in equipment can be recovered in time through small savings over thousands and thousands of rounds.
It makes no economic sense as far as just looking for accuracy goes, but if you are looking for match-winning accuracy at, say, 1000 yards it may be the only way to find it.
Your description of your shooting activity leads me to believe that you'd probably come out ahead by finding a good, accurate factory load and sticking with it.
Reloading makes no economic sense. It is an addicting hobby that will fill all your cabinets with strange looking objects that only you will know their purpose.
I find reloading, and the search for that perfect combination of powder, bullet and seating depth, just as much fun as pulling the trigger.
+1. Reloading is a hobby. After the initial investment in reloading equipment, powders, primers and bullets, it will take reloading thousands of rounds to get the average cost per round below the retail cost of factory match ammo. And that does not include your time and labor.
Wise words gents thank you��. I've always wanted a left handed bolt gun as a kid hunting. Building this gun to fit me and OCD I thought I'd ask. My normal hunting range is 100 yards and in with a couple of 150 yard shots. I love to shoot but the only 100 yard range is over an hour from me.
On bullet weight to twist. Is 1&10 twist considered fast ? Forgot to add that I'm 1-1/2 MOA at 100
There a good degree of satisfaction with hand loading , finding a recipe that 'works'. Knowing that you did it. Quite rewarding even if there is no monetary savings. Been at it for 48 years.
Check out some different factory ammo. I would try Hornady 308 Match ammo loaded with 168 gr AMAX. Should shrink those groups under 1" MOA @100 and give very good terminal performance on deer size game. This winter do a stress-free bedding job on your Boyds stock making sure to free float the barrel and tang assuming it's a Savage action. Check out the evaluation of .308 factory ammo on this web site. http://www.ballisticstudies.com/Know...7.62+NATO.html
Last edited by jpdown; 11-01-2016 at 08:20 PM.
Originally Posted by m12lrs
+1 on this. I've been reloading since I was 18... crap, 28 years now! My wife's running joke is that I go shooting just so I have something to reload.
Reloading is a great way to find the perfect round for your caliber. Provided you have the time to spend at the range and in the reloading room. I shoot 178 gr ELD-X with 43.9 grains of varget from my savage 10-T. Usually at a 100 yard range but finally got to bang steel at 500 yards. Plan was to do 1000 yards but wasn't consistently hitting 500 so we stayed at 500. It's one of the reason I reload. For someone who doesn't shoot much and/or has little kids at home, you may lose quality time with them reloading. It's a great hobby but time consuming. Suggest you get a single stage press and don't spend a lot. Get into it gradually if your willing to give the time and patience reloading requires. There is plenty of quality off the shelf Ammo to. You just need to buy a box of each to find your sweet spot. Good luck on your decision.
Savage 10 FCP-SR 308, 300BO PCS
I jump down the rabbit hole!
you can make some great ammo without having to spend a fortune.
be warned reloading can become as expensive of a hobby as the weapon's it feeds. lol it truely is a hobby that feeds another hobby. I recently took it to the 3rd degree by getting into casting. but all in all it's a very relaxing and enjoyable experience. one of the few things that clears my mind. the casting has become the biggest money pit though. as new guns spawned because a once too expensive to feed gun has become almost as cheap to feed as current 22lr ammo prices. and those big heavy slow moving bullets are a hoot!
however be warned. right now isn't the greatest time to get into the hobby unless your going to be serious about it. meaning buying plenty of powder, primers, and bullets to suite your needs as the panic buying will likely commence Wednesday morning dependent of the outcome of the elections.
oh if you do decide to pull the trigger i'd reccomend finding a temp insensative powder since you plan to hunt. varget is a great versatle powder if you can find it. in my AO the new IMR 4166 and IMR 8208xbr are easier to find and would also work well if thats what you can find.
as to answer your bullet weight question a 1:10 barrel will spin up most bullets with no problems. I have run from 110 v-max's to 208 a-max's with no issue in my 1:10. If your only hunting deer sized game and your shots are 150yds or less you could get away with running a bullet like a 125 nosler b-tip or accubond as well as the hornady 125sst and have a lower recoiling flatter shooting load. generally you work your way up in weight for 2 things. more penetration (larger game) and higher BC (better in the wind and longer supersonic flight)
"temp insensitive" powders aren't that in any application. They are such only under the designed-for conditions. Varget, was designed for ball ammo in the 308; lighter or heavier and it's no better than any other choice.
Factory ammo isn't unchanging either. They constantly swap propellants, so don't expect the Dave results from year to year.
For as little as you shoot, factory ammo is the obvious choice. Unless there is an ammo your rifle truly doesn't like, it likely isn't the limiting factor in accuracy.
I'm a firm believer in the theory that if it bleeds, I can kill it.
^^^^I believe darkker is over stating his position. Some powders are very temperature sensitive in certain applications, others are less so. But that's only based upon my own personal experiences with many different powders, bullets and cartridges. 25-06 with RL-19 comes to mind... a particular load shot consistent .5 moa in 10 degree weather and went to pot in 50 degree weather. The same rifle had much better consistency across the same temp ranges with Hodgdon 4831SC. There are always good academic explanations for these kinds of experiences, (perhaps my rl-19 load was operating on the edge of a "node") but time and again I find some powders are truly more temp sensitive than others. Are there solutions to the "problem"? Probably. Maybe certainly. Does that mean some powders are NOT be more or less sensitive to temp variances? No, it does not. JMHO.
My point was that there is always a voice of "buy X, because it's temp insensitive, therefore great in any application"; that simply isn't the case.
As you point out, in any application there are better or worse choices. And beyond that, and especially for as little shooting as the OP does, any powders sensitivity to a given application gets far too overblown.
A prime example is varget. Many many folks use it to very good effect in the 223. But if you look at some of the testing in that application, by temperature stability with 50-55gr bullets; it performs rather abysmally compared to the old H335 ball powder.
Another example of, shall we call it "marketing liberties". If you "take the extreme tour" Hodgdon tells you that THEY created a line of magic propellants(they also claim that the tin &bismuth in CFE was created for the US Military, also false).THEY haven't created anything, they buy surplus and contract toll milling of existing powders. While unlike other studies they tell you essentially nothing about the testing, in the 22-250 the extreme beats the next non-competitor by 6fps. A lousy 6 fps over a 125° spread is what the rest of the world calls not statistically different; and certainly isn't noticed by 99.99% of the shooting world.
So certainly, use what works well for you. But don't listen to marketing hogwash and think it is all encompassing and magic; that doesn't exist. It may well be a very fine powder for your application. But designed to be insensitive for application A, doesn't mean it is so in application B.
I'm a firm believer in the theory that if it bleeds, I can kill it.
Living in the desert where 30+ degree temperature swings from morning to mid day are normal and very large temp differences from summer in the desert and winter just a few hours north. I have over the years learned to consolidate to one load per rifle. so I can learn it well. the more data I can gather with that given load the more consistant I can be. and I don't want to have a summer load and winter load. with powders like RE17 in .308 I was getting great velocities but accuracy was all over the place from season to season as was velocity which really messes up your dope especially with distance involved which is very common in my AO. so I sacrificed velocity going to varget and I try and do my load development during the summer and I load to the top of the node. and I verify in the winter and the swings are far better than it was with RE17. that load will also stay sub MOA with it being on the money(1/2-3/4moa) during the more comfortable shooting temps in the fall/spring.
I'm getting the same results with IMR 8208 xbr in .223 with 77's vs TAC I used to run. I have a co-worker who runs the same load year round in his 300WM but subs a 215m primer for his elk hunts vs a 210m as where and when he hunts elk he has run into hang fires on occasion. but the 205m gives him lower sd/es when its warmer.
as with anything your mileage may vary.
Last edited by squirrel_slayer; 11-08-2016 at 10:02 PM. Reason: wrong primer info
+1................
Life is tuff.....its even tuffer when your stupid
{John Wayne}
I agree, absolutely
Try the following factory ammo...
Federal Premium 165gr Sierra Gameking (best 308win factory deer ammo I've ever shot)
Want to try something a little less expensive then the above mentioned ammo ?? Try Federal Fusion line of ammo. 150, 165 & 180gr. One of those will shoot bugholes in your rifle.
DON'T DO IT !!!!!. Reloading is a great hobby, but getting into reloading is the single most expensive thing you can do in the sport of shooting. If you only shoot 4 times a year, reloading is insane. If you're get involved in mid/long range match shooting, you MUST reload, but you'll also be going to the range a couple of times a week for testing/practice. Match shooting and reloading is addictive, time consuming, and expensive. But hunters don't have to be nutty to find sufficient precision to satisfy their needs.
In other words, if you're a hunter, especially if you're shooting at a few hundred yards, reloading doesn't make any sense at all. There are many factory loads that will give you sub MOA performance at 100 yards in most any kind of descent bolt rifle. If you do a couple of inexpensive and easy DIY mods, like bedding, getting a good scope, etc., you can expect to deliver a good percentage of 5 shot groups around 1/2 MOA at 100yards shooting from a bench with good factory ammo. That's MORE than enough precision to kill God's little furry creatures. It's cheap and easy too. Hand loading is expensive and, all things considered, is not easy at all.
The big thing I enjoy about reloading is buying the components, testing, making notes, searching for the best combo. It's great, it let's me shoot wildcats, older cartridges, cutting edge stuff and is a family tradition. That being said, I am terrible about finding the perfect fit, rifle bullet and powder, and rather than mass produce, do it all over again with another bullet. For me, it's a constant challenge to get small groups with a good rifle and move on to the next. I know what works but I'm also always trying the latest bullet, newest powder. So I don't know how cost effective that is, but it involves more than just a few trips to the range a year...
SHM
I enjoy the experimentation of reloading. Switching from one bullet to another, just to see if it works better in your system, and give my systems variety. If I cannot get this particular bullet, then I have something else to go to. Reloading does make sense if your shooting a wide variety of calibers. If, like me, I shoot a 45, 44 magnum, 44 special, 308 winchester, 260, 7mm remington magnum, and a 223, and I also shoot just about every weekend. It may be only 10 to 15 rounds a shooting session, but it is fun.
For your application, I would continue to buy ammo off the shelf. You're not shooting enough to justify the cost to reload. I find reloading doesn't save me any money. It just allows me to shoot more. You will go to gun shows, buy brass, for the sole application of necking the brass up or down for experimentation, and buy different bullets and powders to see if they shoot any better. I wouldn't risk going down this path.
They who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.
For my hunting rifles I work up a load and stick with it.
Now my range rifles I am constantly trying new combinations of.powder, bullet and seating.depth. for me that constant search for.the perfect combination is as much fun as shooting. That said.I have.thousands.of.dollars.in reloading equipment. Not to mention powder, primers and bullets. Nothing about it will save you money. It is an addicting hobby that I enjoy immensely.
1.5 Inch MOA is plenty good at 100 yds. That was what my 7mm did when I hunted, couple of shots out to 250 no problem.
You can try 168 or 175s or heavier, but 150s should be good. I have seen as low as 125 shoot very good.
Longest shot I took was at 500 yds I would have been fine if I had trusted the load and aimed at the animal and not above it (broke the skin just above its back bone you could see the bare bone - one we chased it down and a whole story there).
So with that and 4 times a year, don't bother reloading. I got into it for hunting and pistol, it never paid off for hunting.
Actually one year loading truck up to go hunting, and no ammo, I could have sworn I had 20 rounds. Big panic, to load up, head out, or dig the stuff up to make ammo? waste the day.
I went to the store, bought 2 boxes of Federal Premium (on sale) and off to the range for a few sighters. ****ed if it wasn't as good as my best hand load.
Never reloaded for hunting again.
It maybe broke even for pistol, but I now find there is a lot more to good ammo making than what the books tell you.
So its a lot more money for a good setup and things like trimmers that work right, scales (digital the only way to go)
Frankly reloading does nothing for me. I like to shoot and its an ends to the means as I shoot quite a bit. Mine are better than their but it take a fair amount of work.
I am always short of time and reloading up to the last minute.
I will get ahead but........
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