Is there anyone out there willing to lead me down the road to a safe and accurate 308 load for a bolt gun. I want to shoot 100 to 800 yrds. Thanks in advance for any response.

Try the NRA they have some great reloading how to for beginer to pro.

www.NRA.org

Hey SEALDOGGY, You might want to purchase some books that deal specifically with BenchRest. There are some shooting techniques you can "learn wrong" that will be difficult to unlearn.

Attend some BenchRest Matches in your area too. You can learn a whole lot from seeing things first-hand. Ask at your local Gun Shops if they have a BenchRester on board and go shoot with him.

As for your 308Win Loads, you have a good bullet, but your rifle may still prefer a slightly different brand. Only shooting will tell you.

1) Buy 300-500 (non-nickle plated) cases from the same Lot. I like Federal, but there are plenty of good brands.

2) Partial-Full Lenght Resize(P-FLR) the entire Lot.

3) Do a "Full Case Prep" on the entire Lot:
a. Square the Primer Pockets.
b. Deburr the Flash Hole.
c. Trim them all to the same length.
d. Deburr the outside of the neck.
e. Chamfer the inside of the neck with a Lyman VLD tool.
f. Polish the mouth with "0000SteelWool" wrapped around an old 22 brush screwed into the VLD Handle. (Do not use a power tool to do this.)

4) Weight sort the entire Lot:
a. After weighing a case, put a small piece of Scotch Magic Transparent Tape on the case and write the weight on it. (Do not use a different Tape, or you will regret it when it is time to remove it.)
b. Write that same case weight on a Legal Pad.

5) After all cases are weighed, take another sheet of paper and do a Pareto Analysis (list them in order from the lightest case to the highest) and keep a running Talley of how many there are at each weight.

Once this is done, you can separate the cases into Lots of any size you desire. I like 9, 15 or 18 per Group.

Now, with all that done, there is some question about if all the above will actually "help" your Final Groups or not. I know I question it myself and yet I still do it. What it does for me is "build confidence" in the Final Load. I know I've done everything possible to get the cases as close to being exactly alike as possible. But, I've no argument at all with folks who say this is a waste of time. Maybe it is.

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I like the Fed-210M Gold Medal Primers. But most do fine.

Since you are using a Bolt Action, you can also assemble your Loads around lots of various Powders. This is not always the best idea for semi-autos, but that isn't a problem for you.

I also like Hodgdon H-380 with 168gr and above bullets in "my" 308Wins. Just flip open a Hodgdon Manual and use the Starting Loads for the specific Bullet weight you will be using.

Seat the Bullet to either Kiss-the-Lands or 0.010" Into-the-Lands. (I like to Moly Coat all my Bullets, but that is another topic all together.)

Each time you open a new box of Bullets, recheck the Seating Depth with one specific Bullet from that box. There is some variation from Lot to Lot as well as the Throat Errosion moving the Throat back slightly. Use that same exact bullet to reset the Seating Die for the new distance to Kiss-the-Lands.

If you will be competing in Timed Fire, you may need to Load the magazing of your rifle. If that is the situation, then the length of the rifle's magazine must be taken into consideration for the "Cartridge Length".

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Have your trigger smoothed and put a nice BIG scope on the rifle.

Keep the barrel CLEAN!

ALWAYS watch for Pressure Signs.

Wear out a couple of barrels and you should be ready to go. Best of luck to you.

[ 04-12-2003, 03:06: Message edited by: Hot Core ]