Experience with new GAP 6 Creed and BHTC PR course.

nickw

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Mar 15, 2003
833
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Western MA
I've had a 6 Creed built by GAP for a few months now, but wanted to wait to post until I had some verifiable data and real experience with the rifle / caliber to share. I'm new to LR shooting. Took one other LR rifle couse w/ a .308 a few years ago, but didn't get as much out of it as I did with BHTC. No LR rifle match experience other than 3gun out to 400 yrds. Have wanted to explore this discipline for some time. My interest is the PRS type rifle matches. I sold off a bunch of guns I don't use and got with GAP for a new rig.
Specs:
V2 GAP action
Bartlien 26" varmint contour bbl, 1:7.75 twist, with Badger FTE brake
Manners T6A stock
Vortex HD 5-20X50 Ebr2

Load (my first time loading LR rifle ammo). Lots of experience loading handgun and .223 ammo.
Hornady 6Creed brass
Berger 105gr Hybrid bullets
42gr H4350 Powder
CCI 200 primer (all I could find).

I bought a Copper Creek load development pack (5 loads at different powder charge to find accuracy node). I also went with George's (GAP owner) recommendation to start with 42gr of H4350 with the 105 B/H at 2.810 oal. I had some issue chasing the oal not realizing the meplat (tip of bullet) can vary quite a bit in size (as much as .015" in my experience). In reading on SH and other sites I realized I needed to measure off the ogive for consistent OAL. I was told the 6 Creed likes .020"-.025" of jump. After trying the CC loads and my loads at 300 yards...I settled on a ogive length of 3.155" or .023" off the lands. I've had consistent 1.5" groups at 300 with this rifle. Several 4 shot groups in the 3/4" range opening up with a 5th bad shot by me. I know it will do better, but I did not have much time to play with it. I'm limited to a 300 yard range and needed dope for longer ranges and some good instruction.

I took the rifle earlier this month to train with BHTC in PA. They came highly recommended and both instrs., Freddy and Mike, are shooters first with prec. tac rifle type match experience. In AM on day 1 we covered topics regarding marksmanship, rifle set up, optics, ballistics, how to keep a data book (what pages to use and how to properly fill them out...this was really valuable), range estimation and wind calls. In the afternoon it was off to the range (out to 1050 yards) to zero, practice milling targets, gather dope and work on hold-over drill. Instr. were awesome and I learned a ton. They shared little tricks / short cuts along the way and answered any question. I was shooting with another guy who was shooting a GAP 6 creed gas gun. We were a good team. His rifle dope stayed with mine until 500 yards where his 23" bbl / gas gun started to need more elevation than my 26" bolt. I was really happy with the way my GAP shot and was pumped with all the good dope and range estimation practice we were getting.

On day 2 we had to pick a target from the day before for a morning cold bore shot. One shot. I had been smacking the 600 yard target with ease and was going to pick it for my cold bore. The instr. who had been working with me the day before asked me what target I was going with for cold bore and I told him. He had that disappointed you've got no balls look on his face. I said you want me to shoot Xray target (1050 yards) for my cold bore? He asked, "Why are you here?" He reminded me I had good dope for the range and had a 2nd rnd hit the day before after a wind correction by my spotter. Great....no pressure. We had to shoot one at a time. When they got to me I called Xray....go big or go home I guess. I dialed 7.8mils, locked in behind my gun and checked for wind. I had a wind flag at 800 that was barely moving. I checked the tops of the trees and had little movement. I called no wind and sent it. Spotter yelled impact :) I can't tell you how good that felt.

The rest of the day the instrs worked with us to reinforce/confirm our dope and our milling / range estimation (note: they showed us how to do it with a calculator and a mil-dot master and I would alternate back and forth practicing with each).

Just before lunch we had to get off our guns and the instrs. took all targets off the range and set up 10 targets between 300 and 800 yards. We were told the height of each target and that we had a 1/2 hr to estimate range to each target and determine dope. I used all of the time and felt real pressure, 2nd guessing myself. You got 2 shots for each target, 10pts for 1st rnd hit and 8pts for 2nd rnd hit...miss 2nd shot and you lose 10pts. I guess this is a simulated USMC qual course. USMC requires an 80 to pass. We needed a 60, but Freddy. said it was because he uses smaller targets. The 10 targets were called out at random, each shooter waiting for his turn to shoot. We had 20 sec to get on target and send the shot. My GAP and I went 10 for 10...all first round hits......MONEY! Between the cold bore in the morning and cleaning the qual I was on cloud 9. In all honesty, we had little to no wind to deal with on day 2 and only a little on day 1. I actually hoped for more wind....That said, I couldn't have hoped for more out my new rifle, handloads and the instruction from BHTC. Didn't write this to say look what at I did....I just wanted to share a great shooting experience and how happy I was with my GAP 6 Creed, Vortex, my load and BHTC. One note on the Vortex, great scope overall for the price (got mine from Cameraland - new open box demo for a great price with recommendation from Rob01). The Ebr2 reticle was easy to use. Only complaint is that I'd love to have .1 mil graduations somewhere in the reticle for milling. Tried a guys MSR (in a Steiner) at the course and it was much nicer to mil with.

The 6 Creed is really flat. I'm only pushing the bergers at 3065fps. I think the caliber helps if your slightly off on your milling/range estimation. Barrel has sped up 15fps since I first got it. Guys are running this cal over 3150 with good results as well, but I've read some matches have a 3150fps velocity cap, so I wanted to stay under it anyway. Also didn't want to shoot a super hot load...easier on brass and barrel.

Hope this helps anyone thinking GAP or 6 Creed. As a new shooter / reloader, I was intimidated to get into this, but it is not as bad as I thought and have found the entire experience really enjoyable. I know I have a lot to learn, but looking forward to the journey. Also recommend BHTC in PA for rifle training.




 
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Great write up indeed! GAP must be using a different reamer with a about a 144 throat, my throat is at 104 and I've got a ogive length of 2.115" .020" off lands. .544" at 300yds with Hybrids is my best so far, 3.7" out to 600, hoping to improve on that.
 
Great write up! What kind of barrel life are you expecting? Your rifle / set-up is gorgeous btw.

Hoping for 2-3K rounds on the bbl. Thanks, it did come out cool. I'd like to take credit, but George spec'ed it. I had no idea what it would look like until it showed up.....take that back, he did tell me that he was using a gap field camo Manners T6A.
 
Great write up indeed! GAP must be using a different reamer with a about a 144 throat, my throat is at 104 and I've got a ogive length of 2.115" .020" off lands. .544" at 300yds with Hybrids is my best so far, 3.7" out to 600, hoping to improve on that.

JGorski- 2.115" ogive length does not sound right unless your subtracting the size of the comparator? I wasn't...not sure if I am suppose to. I'm measuring from the back of the case to the top of the sinclair hex style bullet comparator with my round in the 6mm hole in the comparator. I started by determining my max seating depth with a stoney point OAL gauge and a modified 6 creed case I got from CC. After several attempts I settled on a 3.178" ogive length with my bullet touching the lands (my first time doing this). I then measured the ogive off several CC loaded rounds and my loads with a 2.810" oal (when I was chasing oal due to irregular meplat) and came up with 3.160" ogive length or .018 off the lands as a good starting point. I loaded several at this length and several at 3.155 (.023 off the lands) and the 3.155" ogive length shot better. I could very well be doing something wrong, but it seemed to work. Please comment with any advice....Thanks, Nick-
 
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JGorski- 2.115" ogive length does not sound right unless your subtracting the size of the comparator? I wasn't...not sure if I am suppose to. I'm measuring from the back of the case to the top of the sinclair hex style bullet comparator with my round in the 6mm hole in the comparator. I started by determining my max seating depth with a stoney point OAL gauge and a modified 6 creed case I got from CC. After several attempts I settled on a 3.178" ogive length with my bullet touching the lands (my first time doing this). I then measured the ogive off several CC loaded rounds and my loads with a 2.810" oal (when I was chasing oal due to irregular meplat) and came up with 3.160" ogive length or .018 off the lands as a good starting point. I loaded several at this length and several at 3.155 (.023 off the lands) and the 3.155" ogive length shot better. I could very well be doing something wrong, but it seemed to work. Please comment with any advice....Thanks, Nick-

I did zero my calipers out before measuring. With my throat the Hybrids are touching the lands at 2.135"(Ogive), oal is 2.718". Seems like you're doing it all right, GAP just uses a longer throat than my new rifle has.
 
I've had a 6 Creed built by GAP for a few months now, but wanted to wait to post until I had some verifiable data and real experience with the rifle / caliber to share. I'm new to LR shooting. Took one other LR rifle couse w/ a .308 a few years ago, but didn't get as much out of it as I did with BHTC. No LR rifle match experience other than 3gun out to 400 yrds. Have wanted to explore this discipline for some time. My interest is the PRS type rifle matches. I sold off a bunch of guns I don't use and got with GAP for a new rig.
Specs:
V2 GAP action
Bartlien 26" varmint contour bbl, 1:7.75 twist, with Badger FTE brake
Manners T6A stock
Vortex HD 5-20X50 Ebr2

Load (my first time loading LR rifle ammo). Lots of experience loading handgun and .223 ammo.
Hornady 6Creed brass
Berger 105gr Hybrid bullets
42gr H4350 Powder
CCI 200 primer (all I could find).

I bought a Copper Creek load development pack (5 loads at different powder charge to find accuracy node). I also went with George's (GAP owner) recommendation to start with 42gr of H4350 with the 105 B/H at 2.810 oal. I had some issue chasing the oal not realizing the meplat (tip of bullet) can vary quite a bit in size (as much as .015" in my experience). In reading on SH and other sites I realized I needed to measure off the ogive for consistent OAL. I was told the 6 Creed likes .020"-.025" of jump. After trying the CC loads and my loads at 300 yards...I settled on a ogive length of 3.155" or .023" off the lands. I've had consistent 1.5" groups at 300 with this rifle. Several 4 shot groups in the 3/4" range opening up with a 5th bad shot by me. I know it will do better, but I did not have much time to play with it. I'm limited to a 300 yard range and needed dope for longer ranges and some good instruction.

I took the rifle earlier this month to train with BHTC in PA. They came highly recommended and both instrs., Freddy and Mike, are shooters first with prec. tac rifle type match experience. In AM on day 1 we covered topics regarding marksmanship, rifle set up, optics, ballistics, how to keep a data book (what pages to use and how to properly fill them out...this was really valuable), range estimation and wind calls. In the afternoon it was off to the range (out to 1050 yards) to zero, practice milling targets, gather dope and work on hold-over drill. Instr. were awesome and I learned a ton. They shared little tricks / short cuts along the way and answered any question. I was shooting with another guy who was shooting a GAP 6 creed gas gun. We were a good team. His rifle dope stayed with mine until 500 yards where his 23" bbl / gas gun started to need more elevation than my 26" bolt. I was really happy with the way my GAP shot and was pumped with all the good dope and range estimation practice we were getting.

On day 2 we had to pick a target from the day before for a morning cold bore shot. One shot. I had been smacking the 600 yard target with ease and was going to pick it for my cold bore. The instr. who had been working with me the day before asked me what target I was going with for cold bore and I told him. He had that disappointed you've got no balls look on his face. I said you want me to shoot Xray target (1050 yards) for my cold bore? He asked, "Why are you here?" He reminded me I had good dope for the range and had a 2nd rnd hit the day before after a wind correction by my spotter. Great....no pressure. We had to shoot one at a time. When they got to me I called Xray....go big or go home I guess. I dialed 7.8mils, locked in behind my gun and checked for wind. I had a wind flag at 800 that was barely moving. I checked the tops of the trees and had little movement. I called no wind and sent it. Spotter yelled impact :) I can't tell you how good that felt.

The rest of the day the instrs worked with us to reinforce/confirm our dope and our milling / range estimation (note: they showed us how to do it with a calculator and a mil-dot master and I would alternate back and forth practicing with each).

Just before lunch we had to get off our guns and the instrs. took all targets off the range and set up 10 targets between 300 and 800 yards. We were told the height of each target and that we had a 1/2 hr to estimate range to each target and determine dope. I used all of the time and felt real pressure, 2nd guessing myself. You got 2 shots for each target, 10pts for 1st rnd hit and 8pts for 2nd rnd hit...miss 2nd shot and you lose 10pts. I guess this is a simulated USMC qual course. USMC requires an 80 to pass. We needed a 60, but Freddy. said it was because he uses smaller targets. The 10 targets were called out at random, each shooter waiting for his turn to shoot. We had 20 sec to get on target and send the shot. My GAP and I went 10 for 10...all first round hits......MONEY! Between the cold bore in the morning and cleaning the qual I was on cloud 9. In all honesty, we had little to no wind to deal with on day 2 and only a little on day 1. I actually hoped for more wind....That said, I couldn't have hoped for more out my new rifle, handloads and the instruction from BHTC. Didn't write this to say look what at I did....I just wanted to share a great shooting experience and how happy I was with my GAP 6 Creed, Vortex, my load and BHTC. One note on the Vortex, great scope overall for the price (got mine from Cameraland - new open box demo for a great price with recommendation from Rob01). The Ebr2 reticle was easy to use. Only complaint is that I'd love to have .1 mil graduations somewhere in the reticle for milling. Tried a guys MSR (in a Steiner) at the course and it was much nicer to mil with.

The 6 Creed is really flat. I'm only pushing the bergers at 3065fps. I think the caliber helps if your slightly off on your milling/range estimation. Barrel has sped up 15fps since I first got it. Guys are running this cal over 3150 with good results as well, but I've read some matches have a 3150fps velocity cap, so I wanted to stay under it anyway. Also didn't want to shoot a super hot load...easier on brass and barrel.

Hope this helps anyone thinking GAP or 6 Creed. As a new shooter / reloader, I was intimidated to get into this, but it is not as bad as I thought and have found the entire experience really enjoyable. I know I have a lot to learn, but looking forward to the journey. Also recommend BHTC in PA for rifle training.





Stuff 42.2 grains of h4350 and load them short. 2.190 to ogive (2.800). You'll be VERY happy you tried it. You can even do it to copper creek ammo. I've got your EXACT same rifle. GAPS love jumping these bullets. Everyone I've ever had. Here's 4 shots of Copper Creek 105's at 110 yards. I simply seated them 20/1000's deeper.
 
This is 23 thou off lands,(2.112") again with a 104 throat at 300yds. and 41.8grs 100V. 3107avg. I have the backer sheet on top because it shows more detail.
dAuY1vY.jpg
 
I got to play with my litle 6creed few days ago.seems after 2-300rds it speeds up about 45-70fps..accuracy still there after rethroating it.. i got all the way to 42.2h4350 with no preasure sign.. but 41.8 average 3119fps with 4ES looks promising.. youre going to love that riffle mate..i feel like im cheating shooting agains 308:)
2014-06-29%2007.08.08_zpsoa8p1yp8.png
 
So did the load development pack from CC work well ?

It was very helpful. I bought it because I didn't know if I'd be set up to load for 6 Creed before the rifle got here. I also bought a box of CC's off the shelf 6Creed bolt gun load to get me zeroed at 100. This load was super accurate at 100....ragged hole. When you get the cc load dev. pack, there are 5 color coded loads (5rnds of each load for a total of 25 loaded rounds). Each load is a slightly faster than the first. There is a chart and explanation with the pack. I shot the loads over a chrono (pact) while I shot each 5rnd group at 300 yards. I then logged the load color, avg. velocity and group size. Everything was under moa (3") at 300 yards. However my load of 42gr of H4350 @ 2.810" oal shot the best (I was able to get set up to load before rifle arrived) with a 4 shot 3/4" group with a 5th bad shot by me that opened it up to 1.5". My load gave me a velocity of 3050fps as did the CC off the shelf bolt gun load (never shot this load at 300 yards which was a mistake). Each of the CC loads in the dev. pack were faster than my load and as I tried each load and the velocity increased my accuracy dropped off. I didn't want to be over 3150fps anyways, so I stopped and went back to my load. It was cool to see how a change in velocity effected accuracy. I then tried to load more of my load and it was then that I realized I was chasing the oal by measuring the oal (from tip/meplat) instead of from the ogive. After getting a comparator I then measured my loads and cc's loads and came up with an ogive length to start at...this initial load was .018 off the lands or 3.160" (I have a dial caliper so I'm not zeroing my caliper - measurement is from back of case to top of comparator with round lightly seated in the comparator's 6mm hole) using the sinclair hex style comparator. I then loaded more rounds .005" shorter (.023 off the lands). The gun shot better at .023 off the lands....consistent 1.5" groups at 300 with the occasional sub 1" group. This is not a bench rest gun and I hope to start shooting tac rifle matches so 1/2 moa accuracy is good enough for me. I will play with the OAL some more and try to fine tune it as I'm sure the rifle will shoot 1/4 moa, but I'm not going to drive myself crazy with it. Even after the BHTC class I've only got 175 rounds through the gun. The bbl is still breaking in and I'm seeing some velocity increase in the bbl (started at 3050fps and now at 3065fps) so don't want to get real crazy with load dev. until barrel settles in. Hope this helps.
 
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Can you snap and send me a close up next time you have it out?

Shoot me an email and I can send you some pics...that said, you can see all the impact data books and available pages at link below. I have the modular data book. http://www.impactdatabooks.com/Modular_Data_Book_p/modular.htm

Included pages in my book were: (depending on your type of shooting, firearm etc., some of these pages won't be necessary and you may want to add others.)
Shooter info
Come up sheet
Ballistic charts for .223 and .308
Range estimation / Basic size sheet (ordinary objects you would see on the street, license plates, tire rim, etc.)
Steel target reference size chart set
Signs size chart set
Yards to meters conversion and common conversion formulas
Wind observation methods
Leads for moving targets
Angle fire info
Mil value adjustments
Mil value quick reference
MOA adj. values
Shot log ML-ECHO (very important...used to log each shot fired, important reference.)
Shot log B-B (same as ML-ECHO but with blank target size/area)
Lateral movers shot log B-LM
Sniper range card (also very useful...good detailed card will help determining ranges and help finding targets)
Cold bore shot log
Round count log
Maintenance log

Recommend the page separators as they help separate page types and make finding info easier.
Also recommend a data book cover....think I got it from TRIAD Tactical. Tag on data book cover says GRT Gear. Great for holding other needed accessories like mildot master, pens, pencil, notebook, etc...

Hope this helps...