30-06 Winchester Marksman 175 SMK/RL17 Load Advice

[Cowsearshooter]

I've had some success with IMR4350 but the batch was pretty old and I've run out of it anyhow. Following the hype, I went and got a whole mess of RL-17.

My basic recipe is:
Winchester/Norma case with .3055 neck tension
Tula LRM primer
175 SMK seated 0.010" off the lands
58.5 grain IMR-4350

Can anyone recommend a basic powder charge for RL-17? The barrel is 26" long and seems to be tuned to the high end of the load ladder so to speak.

 

[Tx_Flyboy]

Re: 30-06 Winchester Marksman 175 SMK/RL17 Load Advice

Cowsearshooter,

There is a mess of 30-06 loads in the reloading depot at the top of this forum. RL-17 loads were discussed there as well.

What is the muzzle velocity of your basic load with IMR-4350 & 175SMK?

 

[Cowsearshooter]

Re: 30-06 Winchester Marksman 175 SMK/RL17 Load Advice

Thanks, bit of a Noob here.

I'm getting 2915 +/- 7 FPS with that load. There was a little room left in the pressure curve but the node opened up at 59.0 and kept going.

I'll check out the data dump on the forum and see what I can come up with.

I'm getting a pretty solid 2670 with the A-Max 208s and RL-22. The 175 just works better (and I've got a lot of them).

 

[Tx_Flyboy]

Re: 30-06 Winchester Marksman 175 SMK/RL17 Load Advice

Thanks cowsearshooter.

Btw, what do yo mean the 175s work better than the 208s? Are you saying the accuracy is better with the 175s?

Have you tried your IMR powder with the 208s? if so how did that work out?

Thanks again for your input.

 

[Cowsearshooter]

Re: 30-06 Winchester Marksman 175 SMK/RL17 Load Advice

This rifle seems to like the 175 SMK a lot and the BC of the 208 doesn't make up for the discount in velocity, additional TOF, or make a heck of a lot of real difference in the wind since I can count on the 175s to go to the same spot (well, within .5 MOA anyway) and the 208s were a bit sketchy at 600.

Admittedly, I was shooting in really high temps and there might have been several layers of inconsistency there. Sweat+recoil+hot barrel+wind=183-2X...you know, that old chestnut.

Don't get me wrong, I like big tall BCs and all; but the scores with the 175s are consistently higher for me.