Hey fellas, kinda new to reloading and seem to have high SD. I thought maybe I would share my reloading routine and maybe I can get some help. I do have a mentor but hes very busy and I try not to bother him as he seems aggravated when I ask some basic questions or stuff he thinks I should already know. Anyways here's what I do. This is on a new rifle that was a Christmas present. My better have got me a ruger American predator gen 2 in .308. I have 200rds down the rifle and started to do some load development. I'm using lapua srp, small rifle magnum primers by cci and 45grs of varget with a 165gr sgk bullet soft point. Currently I'm shooting it pretty consistent 3/4" at 100yds but my sds are like a 15, I've always been told the lower the better. In my brass prep this what I do. I'll take a fireformed case and deprime all and anneal with a salt bath, then I'll wet tumble,dry and then dry tumble. After that I'll use a redding FL size die and use the rcbs shell holder set to bump shoulders 1.5-2 thousands. I'll throw powder with a charge master and check & trickle with a a&d fx120 scale. Then I'll seat my bullets with the dry powder lube checking base to ogive measurements with a digital calipers. It's pretty basic what I do. But where or how could I lower sds. Should I be happy with what I got considering it's a 600.00 rig? Thanks for the input!
Help with lower SD
- Thread starter Eferg
- Start date
ronemus
Gold $$ Contributor
SD won't make any difference in group sizes until you get beyond 600 yards. To shrink your groups check that your barrel is fully floated and that the action screws are tight (using a torque wrench is useful to find the settings the rifle likes and reproduce them). What are you using for rests? Are you using wind flags? Definitely read up on good benchrest technique. What sort of chronograph are you using? Models that use skyscreens can be finicky and small screen spacing can reduce accuracy; a radar chronograph is a good investment, and you can get get good deals on older used units. How much scope magnification do you have? You'll be able to hold closer with 20x than the typical 9x hunting scope.
You'll probably get smaller SDs with standard primers, and you should try several brands as a given powder will often prefer one over the others. Bullet jump will affect both group size and velocity/SD, so definitely investigate that (from hard jam to 0.050" jump). It's likely that 45 gr of Varget is a compressed load, and that can increase SD due to cracking powder granules. Trying a powder with 90-95% fill could work better. As your SD and group size improve, sorting brass and bullets will have some benefits.
Those are the ideas that I immediately thought of, but I'm sure you'll get additional ideas from others. There are may threads on each of these topics on this site, and doing searches will easily find them; each topic will produce pages of good advice.
You'll probably get smaller SDs with standard primers, and you should try several brands as a given powder will often prefer one over the others. Bullet jump will affect both group size and velocity/SD, so definitely investigate that (from hard jam to 0.050" jump). It's likely that 45 gr of Varget is a compressed load, and that can increase SD due to cracking powder granules. Trying a powder with 90-95% fill could work better. As your SD and group size improve, sorting brass and bullets will have some benefits.
Those are the ideas that I immediately thought of, but I'm sure you'll get additional ideas from others. There are may threads on each of these topics on this site, and doing searches will easily find them; each topic will produce pages of good advice.
Last edited:
Bill Rodolph
Silver $$ Contributor
Play with neck tension, I usually have good luck with around .002"
ShtrRdy
Silver $$ Contributor
Sounds like you have a good start. Is your FL resizing die the type that uses bushings?
If you don't mind running an experiment on ten rounds try the following:
Wipe outside case neck with fine steel wool
Brush inside case neck with nylon brush.
Lube outside case
Resize with a dwell of 10 seconds
Wipe off lube
Clean primer pocket (many people say this is unnecessary)
Check case length - trim if too long
If you did trim then chamfer inside & outside neck
Prime and load
I learned this approach from my friends who shoot benchrest.
If you don't mind running an experiment on ten rounds try the following:
Wipe outside case neck with fine steel wool
Brush inside case neck with nylon brush.
Lube outside case
Resize with a dwell of 10 seconds
Wipe off lube
Clean primer pocket (many people say this is unnecessary)
Check case length - trim if too long
If you did trim then chamfer inside & outside neck
Prime and load
I learned this approach from my friends who shoot benchrest.
A 15fps SD can be either good or bad depending on what you are using the rounds for. First of all if that is a 5 shot SD then its very likely your true SD will be higher that that. If it's on 20 or 30 rounds you are doing things pretty well.
You are shooting a 308 with a 22" barrel so you can expect velocities in the 2550-2575 fps range with the 165's and the rifle is realistically a 800 yd rifle. Depending on what you intend to do, hunt, plink, or target shoot and at what range will determine what kind of consistency you need.
As to your load, 45 grains of target is a max load and will be hard on your cases. Most people shooting for accuracy will tend toward the 43-43.5 grain range for accuracy. Leave the 45 for hunting.
You are doing a lot of work loading for an under 7 lb hunting rifle. I don't understand the double cleaning at all. I also don't think that salt bath annealing is a good approach, it was all the rage a few years ago but I never used it and haven't heard of its use recently.
I see @ShtrRdy has given you a recommendation and I would agree with his approach. With the caveat that you need to shoot the cases then prep them the way he mentions. It should eliminate anything related to cleaning and annealing.
You are shooting a 308 with a 22" barrel so you can expect velocities in the 2550-2575 fps range with the 165's and the rifle is realistically a 800 yd rifle. Depending on what you intend to do, hunt, plink, or target shoot and at what range will determine what kind of consistency you need.
As to your load, 45 grains of target is a max load and will be hard on your cases. Most people shooting for accuracy will tend toward the 43-43.5 grain range for accuracy. Leave the 45 for hunting.
You are doing a lot of work loading for an under 7 lb hunting rifle. I don't understand the double cleaning at all. I also don't think that salt bath annealing is a good approach, it was all the rage a few years ago but I never used it and haven't heard of its use recently.
I see @ShtrRdy has given you a recommendation and I would agree with his approach. With the caveat that you need to shoot the cases then prep them the way he mentions. It should eliminate anything related to cleaning and annealing.
SD doesn't matter unless your shooting long distance. For a factory rifle repeatable 3/4" groups is good for deer hunting out to at least 300 yards. It cost a lot of money to try different bullets and powders. A SD of 15 isn't bad. Many short range bench rest records were set with SD over 20. Group size is all that matterss. I wouldn't worry about what the FPS or SD is. Deer don't know what these numbers mean. You might shoot 6" groups standing at 100 yrds.
My 6BR usually shoots .400" groups with a SD over 20. Rem 700 rifle Kreiger barrel.
Using a athlon chronograph, scope magnification is 24x i believe. I'll try less powder and see the results. Thank you for the reply
The double cleaning is just for pretty brass that's all lol. This is just a hunting rig that I'm playing with for load development and getting some bench time. I'll try less cleaning and less powder. Thank you for the reply
I don't believe that it is a bushing die, I believe it's just a regular redding die. I will definitely try 10rds and report back eventually. Thank you for the reply
Fast14riot
Gold $$ Contributor
Whats the intended max distance for you and this rifle? No offense intended, but how well can you shoot at that distance? If you are a 1+moa shooter at 600 yards, an SD of 15 is going to be within your normal group dispersion. If you can clean a 1000y target, and SD of 15, if you're not tuned properly, can show up on target as vertical dispersion.
Fwiw, an off the shelf hunting gun shooting 0.75 moa at 100 is money well spent in my book. Test at 300 and farther a few times to see what it will do and leave well enough alone. Chasing numbers is an expensive game.
Fwiw, an off the shelf hunting gun shooting 0.75 moa at 100 is money well spent in my book. Test at 300 and farther a few times to see what it will do and leave well enough alone. Chasing numbers is an expensive game.
I'm only going to address your issue about lower SD's, since that's what you're asking about.
First . . . what temperature is your salt bath at when you're annealing? Regardless, I don't believe you can get good results with salt bath annealing like you can with flame or induction.
When you wet tumble, are you using SS pin media? What ingredients are you using in your water? Are you using cold or hot water? How long are you wet tumbling?
When you "dry tumble", what does that mean. . . like you're dry tumbling with other media (walnut or corncob). Or is that a reference as to how you dry your brass after wet tumbling?
What do you use to seat your bullets? When seating your bullets, does the seating feel very consistent . . .assuming you can get any kind of feel? How consistent are your bullets being seated?
Are you trimming you cases to a consistent length. Are you chamfering your case mouths?
Describe how you seat your primers (e.g. with a hand help primer seater, seating to a consistent depth below flush or until it feels like their getting a proper "crush")?
It's good that you've got an FX-120i that should, on it own, consistently give you SD's in the low to mid teens.
YUP! Lots of issues and questions that contribute to lower SD's.
That was my challenge too when I first started precision reloading where I was getting SD's in the low to mid teens (often worse) and my goal was to see if I could just get down consistently into some single digits with my .308. It took some time to work it all out and now I'm consistently getting between 4.5 and 6.5 SD's. I actually didn't think I could do that with a .308. 
Do you realize how much effort it takes to lower the sd?
You have to have überconsistent brass, that means selected by volume, neck turned, ideal headspace.
That means selected bullets.
That means charge weight exact up to 1 kernel of powder i.e. .02gr.
That means rounds totally even, meaning variance not greater than .002”.
That meand concentricity variance not greater than .002”.
Has anyone mentioned consistent ignition and anal things done to primer pockets and primers (like selection by weight)?
Salt bath annealing? Where is Lou Murdica? Amp anneal or not anneal at all.
People here spend awfully lot of time and money to lower their SDs. There are no easy answers for simple questions.
You have to have überconsistent brass, that means selected by volume, neck turned, ideal headspace.
That means selected bullets.
That means charge weight exact up to 1 kernel of powder i.e. .02gr.
That means rounds totally even, meaning variance not greater than .002”.
That meand concentricity variance not greater than .002”.
Has anyone mentioned consistent ignition and anal things done to primer pockets and primers (like selection by weight)?
Salt bath annealing? Where is Lou Murdica? Amp anneal or not anneal at all
.People here spend awfully lot of time and money to lower their SDs. There are no easy answers for simple questions.
Id like to think I'm a decent shot. I have a custom rig that's consistently shoots in the .2s group wise. My range is limited right now to 100yds but soon in the future I do believe I can stretch it to 450yds right out my back door. That's the plan either way for now. I just would like a solid load that shoots well. If that's correcting some of my loading routines that's what I'll do.
Attachments
NF1E
Gold $$ Contributor
Awesome. I shoot mostly 100 and 150 on my in the yard range. Stretched it out to 300 and decided it was not worth the effort. I have an extended range 10 minutes away and almost never go there anymore. 100 is the fun spot. I really like the NRA MR-31C targets for my enjoyment. First 2 targets are load development for an M14 type rifle , second two are done with a UINTAH uppered bolt AR using commercial GMM ammo. May not accomplish a whole lot but sure do have fun doing it. Whatta Hobby!
Salt bath annealing is 550°c I leave it in for a 5 countI'm only going to address your issue about lower SD's, since that's what you're asking about.
First . . . what temperature is your salt bath at when you're annealing? Regardless, I don't believe you can get good results with salt bath annealing like you can with flame or induction.
When you wet tumble, are you using SS pin media? What ingredients are you using in your water? Are you using cold or hot water? How long are you wet tumbling?
When you "dry tumble", what does that mean. . . like you're dry tumbling with other media (walnut or corncob). Or is that a reference as to how you dry your brass after wet tumbling?
What do you use to seat your bullets? When seating your bullets, does the seating feel very consistent . . .assuming you can get any kind of feel? How consistent are your bullets being seated?
Are you trimming you cases to a consistent length. Are you chamfering your case mouths?
Describe how you seat your primers (e.g. with a hand help primer seater, seating to a consistent depth below flush or until it feels like their getting a proper "crush")?
It's good that you've got an FX-120i that should, on it own, consistently give you SD's in the low to mid teens.
YUP! Lots of issues and questions that contribute to lower SD's.
Wet tumbling is ss pins with a dash of dawn and lemi shine
Dry tumbling with walnut media with a shot of nufinish wax
Seating is done with a redding die with the micro seater, haven't noticed any feel.
I did just get a rcbs pro trimmer with the three way head but haven't trimmed yet.
Using the rcbs hand primer
Thank you for the reply this definitely seems like another rabbit hole for to go down
Ok, here where IMHO you can make some improvements:
Consistent case length helps with consistent release of the bullet and consistent blowby during initial ignition. I'd recommend you trim your cases.
One sure way to really make some different in SD's is to sort you're primers by weight and use them so that there's the least amount of difference in those that you're loading to shoot.
I was out this morning working on my trigger pull with a .22LR bolt gun, shooting 3 different brands and types of ammo (Fed Champion, SK Rifle Match and Eley Club) for 5 round groups. 50 shots of the Federal gave me an SD of 20.4 and it really showed on target with not so tight groups and often throwing shots way off. The SK Match gave me a 50 round SD of 15.1 producing somewhat tight groups and a few that was get unexpectedly thrown way off. The Eley Club gave me a 50 round SD of 8.8 and I got consistent 5 round ragged holes. While the lowest SD during load development doesn't tell you which load is the best one to use, it's definitely an indicator for consistency for what you'll see on paper . . . especially when the SD has 30 or more shots recorded.
The temperature is good. But, you may be over annealing with a "5 count"??? Is this covering the necks AND shoulders?
How much time are you tumbling them? This is good to remove any residual oxidation and salt bath solution left on the cases.
I'd say this is good too, where I think it would leave a hint of that wax in the necks, tending to help with smooth consistent seating.
Hmmm??? With no feel, it's hard to know how consistent or to what extent your "neck tension" is like. This is an area that does effect SD's. Have you measured how consistent you CBTO's are?
With the wet tumbling your case mouths are probably getting a good peening, which will effect seating consistency AND result in marring the jacket of the bullets. Chamfering them will help a lot in consistent seating and avoiding any marring of the jackets. You should use your 3-way trimmer every time.
Consistent case length helps with consistent release of the bullet and consistent blowby during initial ignition. I'd recommend you trim your cases.
So, you're seating by feel. You might want to measure your case's primer pocket depths and the heights of your primers and after seating, then taking those numbers and measuring primer seating depth, calculate how far you're actually seating them near the bottom of the pockets. You'll want to be sure you're seating them down close to the bottom for consistent ignition.
One sure way to really make some different in SD's is to sort you're primers by weight and use them so that there's the least amount of difference in those that you're loading to shoot.
Yup! There's a lot of pieces to the pie that affect SD's.
I was out this morning working on my trigger pull with a .22LR bolt gun, shooting 3 different brands and types of ammo (Fed Champion, SK Rifle Match and Eley Club) for 5 round groups. 50 shots of the Federal gave me an SD of 20.4 and it really showed on target with not so tight groups and often throwing shots way off. The SK Match gave me a 50 round SD of 15.1 producing somewhat tight groups and a few that was get unexpectedly thrown way off. The Eley Club gave me a 50 round SD of 8.8 and I got consistent 5 round ragged holes. While the lowest SD during load development doesn't tell you which load is the best one to use, it's definitely an indicator for consistency for what you'll see on paper . . . especially when the SD has 30 or more shots recorded.
searcher
Gold $$ Contributor
As others noted, getting low single digit SD's won't necessarily get you a better group. Ideally, you get the good group AND low SD's, but they don't always need to go hand in hand. Some might be inclined to think that going from a SD of 20 to 5 will improve their group dramatically. It usually doesn't work that way. I'd stop using the stainless pins. They can do more harm than good in worse case - but if you want to tumble, I'd go with corn cob media or crushed walnut shells. I've tried about every method and that is the one I always fell back to. The use of neck lube (of any kind) can be tricky to apply evenly inside the case neck and differences in amount applied can create variation.
My most successful habits used to get good SD's involves getting equal neck tension on all your brass, along with consistent neck/bullet lubrication. Applying moly, HBN or other lube to the actual bullet creates uniformity. It really is hard to improve upon that method, though some don't like to apply it or go to the extra expense of buying the stuff one needs to do it or for fear it might mess up their barrel or because your first shot or two might hit a bit off on target until the barrel becomes somewhat coated inside from those first few shots. Whether you wish to apply it might depend on whether you will use your rifle for targets or hunting. I coat most all of my high-volume varmint loads and target loads - but not my big game rifles where I want repeatability on first shot. Another thing I do is turn the necks on the brass to make them uniform. These two things create a more equal, consistent release of the bullet. IF your load is already tweaked for the best powder/bullet combo, these two things will help and usually be noticeable on target. They won't make anything worse, for sure.
I've not used the salt bath annealing method, so can't comment on that. Annealing does help in general, if done correctly. Using your Lapua brass, you should be able to get lower SD's without annealing at all. Whether the brass is hard or soft, it is whether the rounds are releasing the same. At some point all brass benefits form annealing, but you don't have to do it after every firing to get lower SD's. Given you are just getting into reloading, an annealing machine might not make sense for you. If you decide to go down the rabbit hole, save your money and buy an AMP machine if it is in your budget. If you only plan to shoot informal targets, plink and hunt with it - it is completely unnecessary.
If you intend on using your rifle for hunting, I'd just tweak your powder (or make a change or two to see the differences you get in accuracy), and I'd be inclined to keep it at the higher level you are at, assuming it is a proven load in hot weather. If you are after pure accuracy, I'd drop the amount of powder down two or three grains and work up slowly in 3/10th grain increments. If you see no improvement in accuracy, I'd change powders to see what may work better. I can only speak from personal experience, but I have found that when a good powder is found, it will shoot a variety of bullets well. I can only recall a few times I couldn't get a bullet to shoot much better by changing powders. I can recall scores of times when I switched bullets, using the same powder and never got a great result.
As for your rifle, don't discount a factory rifle from having the potential to be accurate (with the right load). Experimentation is key. I have a factory Ruger .243 Win.. I tried a lot of powders and thought it hopeless to get under 1/2 MOA until I tried Rel 15. Sadly, I owned that rifle for many years before I tried that powder and, as a result, it sat in the back of the gun safe for many years. Not anymore.
As you can tell from all the replies you have gotten, there is no one magic cure for improving SD's. It involves a lot of very small things that add up - but it is also not always necessary to do half of the things they (myself included) say to do. I routinely get single-digit SD's using crappy brass, cheap primers and brass that I only anneal every three to five firings. But - the brass has all been neck turned and all have very carefully weight powder charges - perhaps the two most important things in my opinion. Having your range right out your back door is very cool and will be a real help!
My most successful habits used to get good SD's involves getting equal neck tension on all your brass, along with consistent neck/bullet lubrication. Applying moly, HBN or other lube to the actual bullet creates uniformity. It really is hard to improve upon that method, though some don't like to apply it or go to the extra expense of buying the stuff one needs to do it or for fear it might mess up their barrel or because your first shot or two might hit a bit off on target until the barrel becomes somewhat coated inside from those first few shots. Whether you wish to apply it might depend on whether you will use your rifle for targets or hunting. I coat most all of my high-volume varmint loads and target loads - but not my big game rifles where I want repeatability on first shot. Another thing I do is turn the necks on the brass to make them uniform. These two things create a more equal, consistent release of the bullet. IF your load is already tweaked for the best powder/bullet combo, these two things will help and usually be noticeable on target. They won't make anything worse, for sure.
I've not used the salt bath annealing method, so can't comment on that. Annealing does help in general, if done correctly. Using your Lapua brass, you should be able to get lower SD's without annealing at all. Whether the brass is hard or soft, it is whether the rounds are releasing the same. At some point all brass benefits form annealing, but you don't have to do it after every firing to get lower SD's. Given you are just getting into reloading, an annealing machine might not make sense for you. If you decide to go down the rabbit hole, save your money and buy an AMP machine if it is in your budget. If you only plan to shoot informal targets, plink and hunt with it - it is completely unnecessary.
If you intend on using your rifle for hunting, I'd just tweak your powder (or make a change or two to see the differences you get in accuracy), and I'd be inclined to keep it at the higher level you are at, assuming it is a proven load in hot weather. If you are after pure accuracy, I'd drop the amount of powder down two or three grains and work up slowly in 3/10th grain increments. If you see no improvement in accuracy, I'd change powders to see what may work better. I can only speak from personal experience, but I have found that when a good powder is found, it will shoot a variety of bullets well. I can only recall a few times I couldn't get a bullet to shoot much better by changing powders. I can recall scores of times when I switched bullets, using the same powder and never got a great result.
As for your rifle, don't discount a factory rifle from having the potential to be accurate (with the right load). Experimentation is key. I have a factory Ruger .243 Win.. I tried a lot of powders and thought it hopeless to get under 1/2 MOA until I tried Rel 15. Sadly, I owned that rifle for many years before I tried that powder and, as a result, it sat in the back of the gun safe for many years. Not anymore.
As you can tell from all the replies you have gotten, there is no one magic cure for improving SD's. It involves a lot of very small things that add up - but it is also not always necessary to do half of the things they (myself included) say to do. I routinely get single-digit SD's using crappy brass, cheap primers and brass that I only anneal every three to five firings. But - the brass has all been neck turned and all have very carefully weight powder charges - perhaps the two most important things in my opinion. Having your range right out your back door is very cool and will be a real help!
ShtrRdy
Silver $$ Contributor
I would like to understand why salt bath annealing wouldn't provide a more consistent temperature than flame annealing?
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