Anybody loading 220gr prohunters in 308 ??

[tammons]

Just curious.

I am using 3 loads. 110 amaxes for plinking, 130 gr Barnes TTSX and 220 gr prohunters. I might try 110 gr Barnes tsx bullets in a reduced recoil load sometime.

130 gr TTSX bullets are for open field hog hunting.
220 gr prohunters for the brush.

[kenbo776]

220 Gr bullets in a .308? The highest I have ever seen recommended for .308 is 180 grain. There is not enough room in a .308 case to hold enough powder to drive that heavy of bullet very fast. You might try using a 220 grain if you are shooting a 300 Win mag, but don't think it would preform very well in .308. My savage loves the heavier bullets since it has 1in 10 rifling but I get the best accuracy with bullets around 165- 170 gr.

[tammons]

My barrel seems to handle them okay. Grouping about 1.5" which is good enough.

I dont really care about speed that much as its a brush round intended out to 100 yards.

With my load for 130 gr TTSX zeroed at 200 yards, the 220 gr prohunter is very close to zero at 100 yds.

I have yet to chrono it, but it should be at about 2300.

[Eric in NC]

Don't have any data for you but you are right on with the velocity being fine. You can't get close to what a 30-06 will do with them but you can certainly beat what a 30-40 Krag will do with the 220 grainers.

And the 30-40 will certainly put anything in the US (short of big bears) feet up with the 220 grain round nose at 2,000 fps.

[BobT]

I don't know about the 220 grainers but some of the long range guys are keeping the 208 Amax super sonic out to 1400 yards with the .308. I believe they are using Reloader 17. I have not tried that bullet or powder yet in my .308 but I do plan to.

Bob

[tammons]

Really not trying to max it out. Just need a lumbering brush hunting load that balances with my other loads.

Right now I have 3 balanced loads on paper that work with the Leupold LR reticle scope I have mounted
but I still need to test the loads and make sure they work together. I will still have to tweak them a bit.

Unfortunately someone stole my chrono so...

IE the 220 prohunter is zeroed at 100 yards. Its a round nose bullet and shoots good enough for hunting out of my rifle. Although I will probably never use this load over 100 yards, that gives me roughly

dot1 - 175
dot2 - 235
top of bar - 300

2" low at 150

Also 130 gr barnes same scope setting running at close to max
Zero is 200 yards with the same scope setting

dot1 - 300
dot2 - 395
top of bar - 475

2.6" low at 250

Also a 110 gr Vmax and 110 gr TSX reduced load
Roughly zeroed at 175 yards with the same scope setting.
Don't care about hold over LR reticle for that one so much.

That will shoot from 0 to 200 no higher than 1.2", and low 1.2" at 200
Sort of a hold on 0-200 yd round for target, coyotes, hog head shots etc.

dot1 - 280
dot2 - 350 - Not much energy past 350
top of bar - 425

[sinman]

it doesn't matter how fast you can throw a brick, your still throwing a brick and bricks hurt. That 220 should be fine for anything, you won't get a lot of reach with it but it will be fine.

[tammons]

Yep, I am only looking for 2200, 2300, something like that.

Should hit em like a ton of bricks.

One area where I hunt hogs is close to a swamp and very thick pines, and a lot of briars, thickets etc.
and not a good area for a fast moving light bullet.

I have been using mostly a 338-284 and 250 gr gamekings in that area and that load was probably too fast.
I just wanted to try and set up a heavy bullet 308 for a little less recoil, and a little better versatility, longer shots if I want to load up some high BC bulelts etc.

That said, my best hog gymnastics came from a 375 ruger I used for a while.

[sinman]

how about 220gr bullet in a model 99 in 300 savage or 308, that would be a hog killer.

[tammons]

Actually I would like to have a model 99 one of these days.
Lever action open sites.