Just starting to load for a 6.5 Creedmoor. Does anyone have any good loads that they would recommend?

Thanks!

My 6.5 Creedmoor likes 43.7gr of H4350 and the 123Lapua Secnar. 41.5gr H4350 and 140 ELDX works good as well. I load them around .005-.008 off the lands. Both those are book loads from the Berger manual. Hornady factory loads are around .040 off the lands and shoot well, just not as good.

My barrel is not too specific as to it's preferences but it does like to have them close to the lands. Your seating depth may vary.

If you have trouble finding H4350 try IMR Enduron 4451. The burn rate is close to H4350. I have been wanting to try Reloader 16 as well but can't find it around here. Reports are good for that. IMR 4350 should work fine too but just not as temp insensitive as the Hodgdon Extreme powders. Competitive shooters flock to the temp insensitive powders because of the long strings of fire. it is not such an issue to the rest of the community.

You're going to like your new cartridge choice.

Joe

Thanks Joe

I didn't think about RL-16 which I have. Was also going to try RL-17 and H4350.

I have some reports that RL16 works really good. Been wanting to try it.

Joe

quote:

Originally posted by Joe Henderson:
I have some reports that RL16 works really good. Been wanting to try it.

Joe

Do you have any RL-16 load data?

Most of the data your see for 4451 is going to be pretty conservative at this point. I have shot it some in my 6.5 Creed and it is pretty good, just not quite as good as H4350 in mine. Charge weight on 4451 is going to be pretty close to the same weight of H4350, they are really close to each other. In my experience though, I can't get quite the speed of H-4350 (down 50 fps or so). Some say that it takes a bit more of 4451 to get the same speed as H4350, but that put it between accuracy nodes on mine and I couldn't grab the next higher node. So, back to H4350 I went.

My rifle has a 22" Bartlein barrel and was put together by Jon Beanland. It likes 42.3 grains (+/-) of H4350 with nearly any 140 grain bullet. That is towards the top end of what the average is for a good shooting load in the Creed. If you do quite a bit of research on it you will find that 41.5-42.5 seems to be the sweet spot for most folks. That does come with a caveat though. Most of that was done with the older lots of powder. The newer lots seem to be a bit slower, and may need a heavier charge to get the same speed.

No substitute for testing in your own rifle, but that is a place to start.

The old Hornady 140 AMAX factory load, back when they put the load specs on the ammo boxes, was 41.5 of H4350. However, folks that actually pulled down the factory ammo and weighed charges said it could be anywhere up to 42.5 just depending on what lot of ammo it was. It seems as they got in slower lots, they would increase the charge weight to maintain the same velocity.

Good luck finding H4350 though, it is about like unicorn tears. Every time I see it I buy all I can get.

I've settled on Win 760 for this case. Best groups and velocity of several tried.

H4350 is becoming a more common sight on local reloading emporium shelves. I need to grab a caddy the next time I'm in town (Nampa, Idaho).
Varget is getting more common, as well.