Maximum COAL to fit in a Remington 700 223 SA magazine

[AndrewB]

I am speccing a reamer for a 223 Remington 700 SPS Varmint. I will be loading 40-55 gr bullets and want them to be able to fit in the remington factory magazine for this rifle and also hit the lands. It looks like 2.34 is the COAL I want to work with on these so I will be able to fit 40-55 gr bullets well in the case. 12 twist for PD's

Does anyone know the Maximum COAL to fit in a Remington 700 223 SA magazine. The rifle is at my gunsmith otherwise I would be able to figure it out on my own. I kind of think that the max coal for a 223 is around 2.4 inches

Can anyone confirm that?

Thanks

 

[K22]

If the newer Remington's are like the older ones, they have a lot of free bore, and trying to seat close to the lands in my experience is futile even with 50 and 55 grain bullets.

There are inexpensive tools for measuring the max. chamber length. The one I have used is the Sinclair gauge, it's cheap and easy to use. Using a tool like this take the guess work out of the issue and provides the exact chamber length of YOUR RIFLE.

As far as the magazine, this is simple to determine, just seat a bullet long in a "dumping" case and push the bullet back in a seating die until it fits. But I doubt you will need to do this since this is not the limiting factor with Remington rifles. If you seat a bullet a minimum of 1 bullet diameter in the case (the standard rule of thumb for seating depth in the case to provide sufficient neck tension), it should fit the magazine with room to spare.

The good news is that I have never had any trouble developing 1/2 moa loads with the long free bore in the Remington's and seating bullet well off the lands.

 

[B23]

The 223 magazine boxes have the little spacer piece welded in the back so as you know they don't allow as long of a COAL as a standard SA mag box. I just measured the inside length of the magazine box that came out of my Rem LTR 223 and it was 2.36. These factory mag boxes tend to vary a little from the factory and I'd think setting this up to have a 2.34 OAL with one of the 55gr bullets would be pushing things a little to close for comfort. Not to mention you wouldn't have much bullet shank in the neck to grip on to, especially, with the 40's.

Using something like a 55gr Sierra Blitzking, which is a fabulous PD bullet, with a 2.34 OAL as touching then switched to a 40gr BK and tried to touch or get close to the lands the bullet would barely have any shank in the neck to hold it, maybe around .080 in the neck. Even the longer 55 BK would only have around .130 thou.

If you're going to only shoot the 40-55 gr bullets and those are appropriate for your 12tw barrel you don't need to set it up with that much freebore and I'd run a lot shorter OAL probably something more like the standard 2.26 OAL.

Also, besides the 55gr Sierra BK another awesome PD bullet is the Hornady 53gr Vmax. It has the BC of a heavier bullet but is still only 53gr so it has the velocity of a lighter bullet. The 53gr Vmax is my "go to" bullet in my 9tw 223AI and 12tw 22-250.

 

[AndrewB]

Thanks for measuring the inside of the magazine for me. I actually am setting the reamer up for the 53 vmax. Best PD bullet ever. I seated those where I like them and will get the reamer made for those. I can easily push them back in another 10 thousands to help avoid magazine issues. The 40 grains will also fit in the neck at 2.34 COAL, although there is not a lot of bullet in the neck for them - but a workable amount.

K22, I am having a reamer ground so that I can shoot the shorter bullets at the lands. You are correct, the short bullets would fall out of the case before hitting the lands in a factory chamber.

 

[William Vogel]

I cut the spacer out of my 700 PSS and I load cartridges that are 2.545 COL. The follower is short in the back and the last round in the magazine can slip back into that empty space and get a nose up attitude but the rifle actually never fed well.