Critique my 6.5 CM handloading process-UPDATE 9/30

[strat81]

After getting out of reloading and swearing to never handload for 6.5 CM, here I am.

Some background...

Rifle: Tikka T3x CTR in 6.5 CM, 1:8" twist, mag fed with OEM mags, Silencerco flash hider, Silencerco Omega 300, OEM stock w/ a Sinclair benchrest adapter on it. The rifle shoots great at 100 yards with factory ammo. I can routinely get around 3/4" groups @ 100 with Hornady American Gunner (BTHP), Precision Hunter (ELD-X), and Match (ELD-M).

Optic: Weaver Tactical 6-30x56

Game: Club-level 600-yard benchrest w/ F-class targets. 1/2 MOA X ring. Three strings of 10 shots, max score of 300. Winners are typically shooting 295-15x or better, out of a possible 300-30x. Winners are also shooting purpose built guns, typically single-shot target actions with 1-1.2" bull barrels and sub 6-oz triggers. I usually score around 270. Other guys with sporter rifles are getting into the 280s with their handloads.



The next step for me is handloading. It's a fool's errand to buy a dedicated target gun and stuff it with factory ammo. The Hornady 140gr Match ELD-M I've been shooting has an average of 2,610 fps, ES of 82, and SD of 27.9. That's not conducive to hitting a 1/2 MOA target at 600 yards.

On to the handloading...

I really hate handloading. I'd rather spend the time shooting, hanging out with my wife, playing games with my kids, etc. So, I'm entering this with the understanding that I will not be a 300-30x shooter because I don't have the gun nor am I willing to spend the time at the bench. I am trying to strike a balance between speed and quality.

Press: Hornady Lock-n-Load AP (progressive) and Lee Classic Cast Turret

Components: 1x Hornady brass from my rifle, Lapua 139gr Scenar BTHP, Hodgdon H4350, CCI LR primers. I'll probably switch to CCI BR primers when I run out of regular primers, and will end up with Lapua SP brass one of these days.

Goal: 1/2" @ 100 yards, SD under 12.

Process:
-Clean 1x Hornady brass in ultrasonic cleaner and dry.
-Sort brass by weight.
-Lube cases with alcohol/lanolin mix
-Deprime with a Lee Universal Decapping die in station 1.
-Full-length size with Forster FL sizing die w/ expander ball removed in station 2.
-Expand case mouth with Sinclair mandrel die with neck-turning (.002") mandrel installed in station 3.
-Remove case lube.
-Trim cases with Giraud trimmer.
-Prime on press.
-Weigh & dispense charges with RCBS Chargemaster 1500.
-Charge powder in station 4 with Lee Long Charging Die.
-Seat bullet in station 5 with Forster Bench Rest Seater Die.

My plan is to start with a ladder test with charges at 40.7, 40.9, 41.1, 41.3, and 41.5 and bullets seated to mag length, 10 rounds each. I'll put those over the Magnetospeed and onto paper at 100 with 10 shot groups.

I don't plan on weight-sorting the Scenars. Anecdotal evidence indicates they are very consistent.


Some possible questions and excuses answers:
-Why ultrasonic cleaning? I have one already and don't want to shell out for a rotary and stainless. I reload adjacent to where my kids play and don't want corn cob media dust wafting through the air.
-Why mandrel for expanding? It appears neck runout is kept to a minimum versus bushings and expander balls. With the progressive, it's barely any extra time to do.
-Why didn't you get a Prometheus? I'm poor, or at least not mildly wealthy.
-Why don't you anneal? Time. I'll accept reduced brass life.

 

[Spblademaker]

Were you wearing comfortable shoes?

 

[_Raining]

I would use Lapua brass from the beginning. You can get single shot sleds, no reason to limit yourself to magazine length in an F Class competition. Chargemasters are not great but I have gotten single digit SD's out of mine. IIRC, people have done tests and weight sorting brass does NOT seem to do anything, you are better off sorting by volume not weight. IIRC, there was some article the primal rights guy did where he used some sort of rice in the vibrator and it left a good amount of carbon in the neck and did not emit the toxic dust that you get from corn cob media.

Play With Your Food: Clean Brass With Rice :: Primal Rights, Inc

Cleaning your brass is a necessity. Foreign material in or on our cases can cause all kinds of problems. Damage to expensive reloading dies, damage to rifles, and various other issues can arise if proper care is not taken.

www.primalrights.com

 

[strat81]

Were you wearing comfortable shoes?

I could have naked virgins caressing my Flintstone toes and I'd still hate reloading. Too tedious. And the experimenting and "what if" kills me mentally. What if I cut back by a tenth of a grain and seat out an extra 5 thou? What if switch to a different primer and different brass!?!? ZOMG.

I would use Lapua brass from the beginning. You can get single shot sleds, no reason to limit yourself to magazine length in an F Class competition. Chargemasters are not great but I have gotten single digit SD's out of mine. IIRC, people have done tests and weight sorting brass does NOT seem to do anything, you are better off sorting by volume not weight. IIRC, there was some article the primal rights guy did where he used some sort of rice in the vibrator and it left a good amount of carbon in the neck and did not emit the toxic dust that you get from corn cob media.

Play With Your Food: Clean Brass With Rice :: Primal Rights, Inc

Cleaning your brass is a necessity. Foreign material in or on our cases can cause all kinds of problems. Damage to expensive reloading dies, damage to rifles, and various other issues can arise if proper care is not taken.

www.primalrights.com

I only have one more match left this year and have a ton of 1x Hornady brass, so I may as well use it. The Lapua brass will come next year with the transition to a benchrest primer. Despite the cost, it seems like best choice for consistency, longevity, and durability.

Good point on case length. I use my mag as a sled during those matches, so I certainly can experiment going longer. It seems like mag length would be a reasonable starting point, but I'm open to suggestions.

Now I can spill rice all over the floor instead of corn cob.

 

[_Raining]

If you don't want to have to deal with finicky seating depth I would go with a 140 gr Berger Hybrid and seat it ~20 thou off the lands.

 

[Lunchbox27]

The only thing I weight sort is my burger patties after I get home from the butcher.

If you can shoot the difference with a 50.2 grain piece of brass and a 50.3 grain piece of brass... show me.

Other than that, you're on your way. 1/2moa with a single digit SD from a Tikka won't be hard.

 

[Precision Underground]

I dropped ultrasonic cleaning. Much testing proved it pointless and sooner or later you will end up powdering some damp cases. It’s just too easy for water to hide in a corner somewhere.

 

[strat81]

If you don't want to have to deal with finicky seating depth I would go with a 140 gr Berger Hybrid and seat it ~20 thou off the lands.

I'll add a box to the next order.

The only thing I weight sort is my burger patties after I get home from the butcher.

If you can shoot the difference with a 50.2 grain piece of brass and a 50.3 grain piece of brass... show me.

Other than that, you're on your way. 1/2moa with a single digit SD from a Tikka won't be hard.

LOL, point taken. I suppose it makes sense not to bother at this level.

I dropped ultrasonic cleaning. Much testing proved it pointless and sooner or later you will end up powdering some damp cases. It’s just too easy for water to hide in a corner somewhere.

Pointless how? It seems to get the carbon and general filth off the cases. Isn't that the point of cleaning? I agree that ultrasonic cleaning won't get them shiny like corn cob, walnut, or SS pins can.

I put the wet cases into a homemade dryer made from an ammo can and an incandescent light bulb to heat them up to dry them off.

 

[Namekagon]

I'm not familiar with how the priming works on your specific press (I have never used a progressive press), but consider a hand priming tool. I have the RCBS hand primer, and for me its faster and easier. Also, the feel of seating the primer is much better, you can tell exactly how tight or loose the pockets are, and exactly when the primer is properly seated. They aren't expensive, and I think you would appreciate it.

 

[260284]

Consider Peterson brass when you get ready to make the switch. I just fired 15 rounds of new brass that I didn't size or trim, just reamed with a VLD reamer, got a SD of 7. With 1x fired Peterson, 41.4 of Rl16, 140 ELDM .020" off the lands, CCI450s, I was getting 3-4 SD out of my CTR.

 

[strat81]

I'm not familiar with how the priming works on your specific press (I have never used a progressive press), but consider a hand priming tool. I have the RCBS hand primer, and for me its faster and easier. Also, the feel of seating the primer is much better, you can tell exactly how tight or loose the pockets are, and exactly when the primer is properly seated. They aren't expensive, and I think you would appreciate it.

That's a possibility. I had to fuss with the LNLAP priming system to get it to work with 9mm and it never did sit them as deep as the Lee Turret did. Priming problems aren't uncommon on the LNLAP. But the fewer times I take the brass off the shellplate, the more time I save.

 

[strat81]

Results from yesterday at 200 yards with some wind:

Out of 8 loads tested, these were the best in terms of group size and SD.

I had some priming troubles, so I'm curious what will happen on the third loading.

 

[Pvt.Donut]

Results from yesterday at 200 yards with some wind:

Out of 8 loads tested, these were the best in terms of group size and SD.

I had some priming troubles, so I'm curious what will happen on the third loading.

If your goal is 600 benchrest, I'd suggest you do your group testing at 600 yards. Maybe try the Optimal Charge Weight method but a ladder test at 600 should give you a good range of powder that keeps the groups tight. Best of all you can probably do it with under 30 rounds. If you have a chrono check into the Satterlee method. I typically load up like 20 rounds in 0.1 increments and load to the flat spot. Test for charge weight, then test seating depth, factory Tikkas have a bunch of free bore so you can get really long if you're single loading.

For the primers, as others have noted, I think you're wasting time with large primer brass. Cost effective, look into Starline small primer brass, otherwise Peterson and Lapua would get my vote. I've got probably 6-8x firings on my Lapua and it's still going great. Its worth the money.

Alternatively, you could buy a primer pocket uniformer for the Hornady brass and see if that doesn't help. Sounds like they are very tight.

I found the 139 scenars to be super forgiving and my Tikka really liked them. Once you get them dialed in they should be great shooters.

 

[strat81]

If your goal is 600 benchrest, I'd suggest you do your group testing at 600 yards. Maybe try the Optimal Charge Weight method but a ladder test at 600 should give you a good range of powder that keeps the groups tight. Best of all you can probably do it with under 30 rounds. If you have a chrono check into the Satterlee method. I typically load up like 20 rounds in 0.1 increments and load to the flat spot. Test for charge weight, then test seating depth, factory Tikkas have a bunch of free bore so you can get really long if you're single loading.

For the primers, as others have noted, I think you're wasting time with large primer brass. Cost effective, look into Starline small primer brass, otherwise Peterson and Lapua would get my vote. I've got probably 6-8x firings on my Lapua and it's still going great. Its worth the money.

Alternatively, you could buy a primer pocket uniformer for the Hornady brass and see if that doesn't help. Sounds like they are very tight.

I found the 139 scenars to be super forgiving and my Tikka really liked them. Once you get them dialed in they should be great shooters.

Time and convenience precludes more frequent testing at 600, but I understand what you're saying.

Yes, Lapua, Peterson, Starline, or Alpha brass are in my future.

I also plan on trying Berger 140gr Hybrids and Sierra 142gr Matchkings.

I'm pretty ignorant of OCW and Satterlee methods - I'll have to do more reading about them.

Thanks for the feedback!

 

[ChristianSilver]

Single digit SD and low ES are doable, I have found my loads with 140 ELD Match, H4350 and 15 thousand off the lands in my Ruger PR. Both play very well, my OCW test @ 400 yds gave me great results between the 2 load ranges below. Hornady Brass, trim to 1.910, .288 bushing for neck tension using Hornady Match Grade Dies using the Chargemaster 1500 scales. I’m headed out today with 30 rounds, 6 sets of 5 rds each.
41.3 gr @ 15, 20 and 25 thousands and 41.9 gr @ 15, 20 and 25 thousands off lands.
Taking these out to 400 yds as well..
ES and SD from last 2 outings below.

 

[pbatesaz]

With small samples you should expect your true ES to be about 4 times your SD with 5% of your shots falling outside that value.

 

[_Raining]

Here are the major reloading techniques:
Optimal Charge Weight (OCW) - Goal is to find consistent POI at 100 yards.
Audette Ladder Test - Goal is to find consistent POI (Vertical only) at distance (300+).
Satterlee Ladder Test - Goal is to find a flat spot in velocity. I don't like this method because it is statistically irrelevant, YMMV.
Shoot for Groups - Pick the distance you will be competing at and find the smallest group.

Shooting for groups requires a very consistent shooter.

Audette requires consistent environments and the skills to be able to determine that they are consistent. Weird shit like clouds can change your POI, plus you are assuming each shot is at the center of the potential group, which is bad. I have tried this but I am not good enough of a shot to make it work (I repeated the test multiple times and did not get the same results each time). The idea is to find a charge weight where the barrel is whipping up (this is a simplified way of looking at it, the barrel does a bunch of stuff I don't understand). A slower round will leave the barrel at a higher point and thus cancel out some of the disadvantage it has from the reduced velocity, a faster round will leave the barrel sooner and thus be at a lower point which cancels out some of the velocity advantage it has.

OCW - POI can vary if the shooter is inconsistent with cheek weld and recoil management but this requires the least amount of shooter skill, aside from Satterlee.

Satterlee - All you need is a chronograph. People like to say that this only works for people who are very meticulous with their reloads. I say you are just looking at signal in the noise even if you are meticulous. A modified version which uses more than 1 shot per charge weight is nice but I still don't like it. Too many things can cause variation in MV, even things people don't typically mention like linearity in your scale.

 

[Feif64]

I use your method almost exactly, except I anneal and reload on a Dillon 650 and my SD is 5.8 ES 15. I shoot PRS and it works well for me out of my gen 1 rpr
Berger 130 gr hybrid
Winchester SP
41.9 gr h4350
Lapua brass
2763 fps
Suppressed btw

 

[Lunchbox27]

I had a 20” Tikka. Go up in charge. Mine was between 42.0 and 42.4 with H4350, RL16, and 4451 with the 140’s. Bet it will shrink your groups by half.

 

[strat81]

I had a 20” Tikka. Go up in charge. Mine was between 42.0 and 42.4 with H4350, RL16, and 4451 with the 140’s. Bet it will shrink your groups by half.

I'm considering it since I had no pressure signs at 41.7gr of H4350.

 

[Lunchbox27]

I didn’t hit pressure until I moved into the 43.0’s with the above powders.

I bet if you load 5 rounds of each ( 42.0, 42.2, and 42.4 ) you will come away with a smile.

42.4 was my go to load with RL16 and the 140 hpbt or eld. 3/8 or less groups.