20 tactical input needed

[bobtails]

I am excited guys, thanks. I have a fair amount of time spent with the 20 cals. I have had 2 204's, currently I have 1- 204 and a 20 VT, recently sold my 20 BR . this will be a fun gun I'm thinking.

 

[Ledd Slinger]

Big fan of the .20TAC, and I miss mine! Prolly would do a .20Prac, or 20-223AI if the .20cal bug bites sometime again in the future, only for the ease of brass procurement.

You do realize that ALL three of those you mentioned use the 223 parent case dont you? Im curious how you had trouble procuring brass for a 20 TAC when all you do is neck down 223, load, and shoot? Matter of fact, thats what you do with all three of those chamberings.

The 30 degree shoulder of the TAC comes along after the first firing. No pre-fireforming needed.

 

[bobtails]

Really no downside to the 20 tac I can see as long as you have your brass

 

[Ledd Slinger]

Really no downside to the 20 tac I can see as long as you have your brass

There is no need to find "20 TAC" brass. The Dakota brass you purchased was an excessive expense that could have been easily avoided. Any old 223 brass works perfectly fine. Just run it in your FL sizer, load, and shoot (provided your chamber is a no turn neck). I highly doubt you will see any difference between the natural 23 degree shoulder on 223 brass and the fireformed brass with 30 degree shoulder. The 20 TAC is a necked down 223 with a 7 degree shoulder improvement. Nothing more. If you want to have good brass, spend your money on Lapua 223 cases. I personally bought 1000 once fired '09 Lake City cases on gunbroker for $45 shipped. Lake city is good brass and cheap as dirt when you find a good deal on it once fired. You can save yourself a lot of money and headache with 20 TAC brass if you just use 223 cases.

As an experiment for your amusement:
Work up a good shooting load with your Dakota brass when the rifle is built. Then take some regular old 223 brass, run it in your sizer to neck it down to 20 cal, load it the same as the Dakota brass, and tell me if it shoots any differently. If there is a difference, im sure it will be very minimal. When you eject the 223 cases after firing, you will then have extra 20 TAC brass.

 

[bobtails]

Ok I can try that.

 

[Phil]

Ok I can try that.

I sent a PM over at the other place for you, we`ll see how long it takes to respond.


Phil.

 

[fourpower]

I have been shooting one for 6 years. has 26in barrel & it is a cooper. 1in12 twist and it don't like 40gr but 39 okay but I guess shoot 32grs because they are great. I have got a lot of coyotes and because they don't blow them up I have been able to sell them. I will shoot them out to 400yds and they are DIT (dead in tracks). this year I have taken rockchucks out to 500. as you can tell I love this gun! I use h-335 powder.

 

[Tim s]

Really no downside to the 20 tac I can see as long as you have your brass

There is no need to find "20 TAC" brass. The Dakota brass you purchased was an excessive expense that could have been easily avoided. Any old 223 brass works perfectly fine. Just run it in your FL sizer, load, and shoot (provided your chamber is a no turn neck). I highly doubt you will see any difference between the natural 23 degree shoulder on 223 brass and the fireformed brass with 30 degree shoulder. The 20 TAC is a necked down 223 with a 7 degree shoulder improvement. Nothing more. If you want to have good brass, spend your money on Lapua 223 cases. I personally bought 1000 once fired '09 Lake City cases on gunbroker for $45 shipped. Lake city is good brass and cheap as dirt when you find a good deal on it once fired. You can save yourself a lot of money and headache with 20 TAC brass if you just use 223 cases.

As an experiment for your amusement:
Work up a good shooting load with your Dakota brass when the rifle is built. Then take some regular old 223 brass, run it in your sizer to neck it down to 20 cal, load it the same as the Dakota brass, and tell me if it shoots any differently. If there is a difference, im sure it will be very minimal. When you eject the 223 cases after firing, you will then have extra 20 TAC brass.

You're going to find the Dakota brass well worth the cost. There is not any 223 cases to compare. You don't even need to neck turn it and it will handle pressures better.
It gives me 3915 fps with 40 Vmax and R10x

 

[fredo]

Big fan of the .20TAC, and I miss mine! Prolly would do a .20Prac, or 20-223AI if the .20cal bug bites sometime again in the future, only for the ease of brass procurement.

You do realize that ALL three of those you mentioned use the 223 parent case dont you? Im curious how you had trouble procuring brass for a 20 TAC when all you do is neck down 223, load, and shoot? Matter of fact, thats what you do with all three of those chamberings.

The 30 degree shoulder of the TAC comes along after the first firing. No pre-fireforming needed.

Thanks for pointing that out, Capt. Obvious.

I was eluding to the fact that 'turn key' Dakota/Lapua .20TAC brass is hard to come by, these days. The allure of the .20TAC for me, at the time, was the simplicity of using said brass. If I were interested in going to go thru the procedure of forming brass, it'd be for either of the above cartridges, as stated...

IMHO, the .20TAC is akin to the .22-243Middlested. After shooting & loading a few thousand rounds of 'turn key' .20TAC, I'd sooner just neck down & roll a .20PRAC (or, .22-243Win), or blow the shoulder all the way to .20-223AI (or, .22-243AI)....than split the difference & need a a custom die set to reload for a .20TAC (or .22-243Middie), again...

So, back to the topic at hand:

Since Rob has a stash of brass, and dies in hand, he's good to go!

But for anyone else reading along interested, it'd very likely be more practical (literally) to run a .20Prac with a simple neck down with a .223 bushing die. Alternately, a .20-223AI will net more capacity (performance) for the time/prep/die investment, as compared to a .20TAC...

 

[SmokinJoe]

bobtails, the X-Caliber barrels are good to go. I have 3 working & all showed almost zero copper from the 1st shot, plus they are accurate, too. Only thing better than 20TAC is 20-223AI, which will give 100-200 fps more with about same pressures. 20TAC & 20-223AI are both easy to make from 223 brass, only difference is die availability, but you can use a 223AI type S FL die for the 20-223AI with correct bushing. When I started with 20-223AI, MrMajestic turned me onto H4895 as a good powder with 40 class bullets and it turned out to be unbelieveable. A case full (actually about half way up the neck with a slow drop) in 20-223AI FF (which would be similar to a 20Prac) or full power in 20TAC or 20-223AI gives great velocity & accuracy plus it shoots pretty clean & pressures are not high at all. This loading is pretty idiot proof. I use either CCI 450 or Fed 205 primers with accuracy edge going to Fed 205. MrMajestic uses WW brass in his & is getting up to 4150 fps with no problems in a 28" barrel; I get 4050 fps using IMI brass in a 26" barrel. Using H4895 in 20TAC I get 3950-3975 fps w/40's & no pressure signs in 24-26" barrels. Hope this helps, Joe

 

[Ledd Slinger]

Thanks for pointing that out, Capt. Obvious.

If I were interested in going to go thru the procedure of forming brass, it'd be for either of the above cartridges, as stated...

You still dont have a clue fredo...as usual. Plenty of keyboard experience no doubt, not so much with hand loading. There is no forming "procedure". Run it in your sizer, just like you would any piece if brass, load it, shoot it. All the forming is automatic. The amount of time it takes to load 20 TAC from 223 cases is exactly the same as if you were using actual 20 TAC brass. Theres no extra steps needed unless you have a tight neck chamber.

 

[bobtails]

If I had to buy 223 brass only one I would consider is Lapua but that's just me. They are 60 per hundred. I got these Dakota 67 per hundred so I'm good with that. I do have 5 lbs of 4895 on hand that I don't currently use. I'd like to try it with the 39 gr sierras.

 

[fredo]

Thanks for pointing that out, Capt. Obvious.

If I were interested in going to go thru the procedure of forming brass, it'd be for either of the above cartridges, as stated...

You still dont have a clue fredo...as usual. Plenty of keyboard experience no doubt, not so much with hand loading. There is no forming "procedure". Run it in your sizer, just like you would any piece if brass, load it, shoot it. All the forming is automatic. The amount of time it takes to load 20 TAC from 223 cases is exactly the same as if you were using actual 20 TAC brass. Theres no extra steps needed unless you have a tight neck chamber.

Ledd, you might wanna ask bobtails how many p-dogs he saw me dust from 4-750yds with my .20TAC that last time we shot together, LOL!
They were my handloads too, BTW...

Also, I could put you in touch with the gent who now owns that rifle? He dropped me a note saying how my reloads shot better in that .20TAC, than many of his multi thousand dollar bolt guns?

If you were actually following along and not nitpicking for some silly reason, you might have noticed that I reiterated:

IF I'd want to bother forming a .20 caliber cartridge from .223 brass, I'd just go with a 20-223AI.
That opinion is formed after enjoying well over 1K rounds of shooting, and reloading for, the .20TAC.

Just sayin', you may wanna slow ya roll on assuming that you're nitpicking a keyboard commando...

 

[Ledd Slinger]

If I had to buy 223 brass only one I would consider is Lapua but that's just me. They are 60 per hundred. I got these Dakota 67 per hundred so I'm good with that. I do have 5 lbs of 4895 on hand that I don't currently use. I'd like to try it with the 39 gr sierras.

Excellent choices on the brass. Im sure the Dakota brass is awesome. I was just trying to make folks reading this thread realize that using 223 brass in a 20 TAC is a piece of cake.

 

[mattri]

223 necked down to a 204 is the 20 Practical, 20 "Tactical" offers absolutely nothing other than added steps and that god awful stupid name.

http://www.accurateshooter.com/cartridge-guides/20caliber/

20 Practical and the 39gr BK is boringly accurate.

 

[bobtails]

223 necked down to a 204 is the 20 Practical, 20 "Tactical" offers absolutely nothing other than added steps and that god awful stupid name.

http://www.accurateshooter.com/cartridge-guides/20caliber/

20 Practical and the 39gr BK is boringly accurate.

But I've got my " tactical " brass so no steps

 

[mattri]

Right right! What was I thinking?

That "TACTICAL" brass in a TACTICAL case, black webbing, some netting and a few straps- bound to be better than a plain old "practical" case.

I stand corrected.

 

[bobtails]

Right right! What was I thinking?

That "TACTICAL" brass in a TACTICAL case, black webbing, some netting and a few straps- bound to be better than a plain old "practical" case.

I stand corrected.

Right you are