115 grain bergers and varget

[cmillard]

i am wondering where to start at with the 115 grain berger in a 6BR with varget. am using some h 4350 right now (30.5 grains)--actually just testing it right now. were should i start at with varget?

 

[RonAKA]

I would estimate about 25 grains of Varget as a start. You will likely be into compressed loads before you hit max. pressure.

 

[cmillard]

thanks for the info. thats what i am finding with h4350. i should give some h380 a try. but that might be for another day.

 

[Laurie]

Cole,
I reckon you'd be able to pack a heavier charge in and get higher MVs with Reloder 15 or Viht N550 than with VarGet or H4350. Possibly Re17 too? This trio is denser partly thanks to having small and regular grain shapes, also the addition of nitro-glycerine makes the grains heavier. A top UK F-Open shooter got some really impressive MVs from the 115gn DTAC and N550 a couple of years back. Mind you, he was running some serious pressures too in a strong RPA Quadlock! I've found that Re15 and N550 are the way to go with hot .223R 90gn VLD loads, a not dissimilar scenario.

Another possibility is ball powders, but you rarely see them mentioned with regard to 6BR for some reason. Win 760 / Hodgdon H414 should be in the right burning rate area, but I don't think I've ever seen any loads / results quoted. I always worry about pressures spiking with ball types, and they usually burn that bit dirtier, so this maybe affects accuracy in small precision 6mm numbers?

Laurie,
York, England

 

[cmillard]

Thanks Laurie. I am curious as to why hodgdon has not tried a short cut or super short cut varget like they have on some of their other powders? i have thought about using h-380 in my 6BR but have not got around to doing it yet. i kind of want to stick to the single base powders.

 

[Laurie]

Cole,

mentioning super short-cut powders that are single-base, there is IMR-4007SSC that is maybe slightly slower burning than Re15 and Varget, but could still fit the bill. I bought a couple of tins recently to try it as an alternative to N550 in .308W with heavy bullets, but haven't got around to it yet. I did try it last week in .223 Rem with 90s and it gave compressed charges at rather lower MVs than Re15 or N550, so have dropped it from that programme. It might just work in the BR with heavy bullets though. However, it's not noted as a powder that produces particularly high MVs even in those cartridges it's ideally suited to according to Wolfe Publishing's 'Propellant Profiles' from 'Handloader' magazine. Still, just a thought - 115gn is pushing the 6BR's boundaries, so looking outside the box might help.

 

[Steve Blair]

What twist are you shooting, Cole? I am using a 7.5" Bartlein 6mm Remington to shoot 115 Berger and DTAC bullets and share Laurie's concern about 6BR case capacity. If you had a long throat, say about .160", you might get 32-33 grains RL-17 into the case. That would get a little past 2800 in a 30" barrel.

 

[cmillard]

thanks for the replies. i never gave 4007ssc a look. thanks! i have a 27.25", 8" twist 5R krieger with about .115 fb. i shot my 6BR yesterday morning before there was much light, so my CED was not picking up the velocity. but, shooting 25.0-25.6 grains of varget shot the 115 bergers great, as did 30.5 h4350. none of these powder charges showed any signs of over pressure, so i will bump it up a notch and shoot when it is a little lighter out. thanks!

 

[canderson]

Cole,

I hope you will keep us informed. I have been trying to determine if the 115 vld's are better than a 105 or 108 out of my dasher. From the research that I have done, I cannot get the 115 to shoot accurate enough or fast enough to warrant changing from the 105 vld's. I was able to shoot the 115's at 2850 compared to the 105's at 3000+. I was trying RL-17 in a 30" krieger.

 

[johara1]

I can't get the 105's to shoot out of my dasher but it will shoot the 115's in the mid ones with RL 15 and RL 17. Vel. is 2900+ and the twist is 7.75 to 1,and it's 27" long........jim

 

[cmillard]

Laurie, did you compare the grain size between imr 4007ssc and varget?

 

[TonyR]

Cole.
You might also give N540 with CCI 450s a try. My 6mmBR gave me what I believe is an honest 2820 fps with the 115 Berger out of a 1:8 31 inch Krieger. Nice round holes to 1000 yards at sealevel with temps in the mid 50s and above. That barrel would shoot excellent vertical with the 105s and Varget but I could never get the velocity and the node was fairly narrow compared to the node with N540. That barrel is throated for the 107 SMK so the 115 seats out of the donut if it is jammed 0.015 or so. I found that the lower velocity offset the higher BC of the 115 but that was compared with the old 105VLD. The new 105 VLD appears to have a lower BC so you might see a net gain with the 115. The 115s gave excellent vertical in my gun.

 

[cmillard]

i want to stick with the single based powders. i live in iowa, so the seasonal changes are big

 

[762willdo]

My best luck with the 108-115's has been with RE-17 with it i get my best vel. as well as accuracy, my load of 108BIB BT and 33grns of re-17 lit by 450's shoots TINY little holes @300 and 500 havn't tried it at 1000yds yet.

The above load was shot at sea level and 80 degree temps