.243 Winchester and 95 gr. Berger VLD's

[Browningguy]

I currently shoot a Savage 12FV in .243 Winchester and had always wanted to try this bullet since it seems like a pretty good compromise between BC and velocity for 300-600 yard shooting. Unfortunately no matter what I tried I could not get it to shoot in the factory barrel (100 yard groups of 2-3" were common). I recently installed an 8 twist 28" Lothar Walther barrel and thought I would give them another try since I had a bunch left over from my previous experiments. This was the first try in this barrel so I only used H4350 powder and all of them seated well (about .020") into the lands, no way to get these babys in a magazine with an OAL of 2.87". These were all loaded on a Forster CoAx press with a Forster full length sizing die, brass is Lapua with CCI BR2 primers. It was a pretty windy afternoon at the range yesterday, 10 gusting to 15 quartering right to left. and temperatures around 70.

I decided on 3 shots with each powder weight as it should give me a decent representative idea on grouping, and these were shot round robin style, one shot each working my way around the target so I wouldn't be worried about trying to shoot a tiny group. It was interesting that each higher powder charge shot progressively lower with lots of vertical dispersion, right up to the 41.5 gr. load which it seems to like a lot.

For the next range trip I will load 5 rounds each in .2 grain increments from 41.4-42.4 and see where that leads me. In any case I'm really happy this bullet seems to work in this barrel, I was about to give up completely on VLD's. I was really pleased with the .135" vertical dispersion on the 41.5 gr. load, hopefully I can fine tune it next weekend.

1st target with 39.5 grains

2nd Target 40 grains

3rd Target 40.5 grains

4th Target 41 grains

5th Target 41.5 grains

 

[mattri]

Looks like they liked to be pushed! Good shooting, keep us posted on how they do. I'm contemplating a .243 project soon and have been taking a long look at the 95gr pills.

 

[K22]

I'm averaging slightly over a 1/4 moa at 100 yards out of my Model 700 Remingtion, fitted with a Hogue full bedded stock with 90 grain Noslers, 40.0 grain of IMR 4350, Federal 201M primers, Remingtion Cases, bullet seated to 2.700 COL.

I've been shooting the 243 for over 40 years and tried a lot of bullets / powder combinations but this is the best I've ever used.

 

[Outrider27]

Note that Berger VLDs have Secant ogives, so once you zero in on the powder charge, don't be afraid to tinker a bit with seating depth. Secant ogive bullets tend to be more sensitive to seating depth than Tangent ogive bullets, so it's worth a try.

 

[Browningguy]

Sorry about that, edited the post to include the correct target 3, I had shown target 2 twice. Outrider, after I try out the next groups in .2 grain increments varying the OAL will be my next experiment.