Took the new Kimber .243 out for a spin today. I'm trying to work up a load that will serve for general medium-sized game, so I've gone to the 95 grain Partition first.

Have a lot of H414 on hand so I thought I'd give that a go. Ladder tested using virgin FL-sized Lapua brass, Federal 210M primers, at 300 yards.

All shots prone, with Harris bipod and a rear wedge bag.

Optics are a Leupold VX-3 2-8x36 in Talley lightweights.



Despite the ~200 FPS velocity spread, the shots landed in such a "small" area I'm having trouble picking out the nodes.

The only obvious one I see is from 42-43g, very small vertical spread there. Despite being "max +" loads from the book, there were no pressure signs except for slightly flattened primers. No sticky bolt lift, no cratering, no base expansion on the case.

Am I missing anything here? I'd prefer to run a ladder at 600 yards but I'm worried this little VX-3 will run out of elevation!!!

Thanks in advance for the help-

I'm not familiar with your shooting skill, but would suggest shorter range, better bench/rest equipment. You may be getting wind, mirage, etc. That is, you're not really testing the loads. Otherwise, you seem to have the concept of a ladder down. Kindly don't take offense, none intended.

I think 300 yards should be plenty.I don't know what 600 yards would tell you that 300 won't. You only need enough distance to get enough shot dispersal so you can see the clusters. I'd run the test again using 1x brass and a more powerful scope if you can get one and a better bench set up. A more proper and smaller bullseye wouldn't hurt.
I have an old weaver T10 that I use for load developement and ladder test.

You have got about a 4 inch group there at 300 yards from prone, but no "nodes" of sweet loads; this might not be too bad. (Really should shoot ladders from a bench with front rest and rear bag) Have you heard of "compensation" where rounds of different velocities land in the same place? There has been a lot of study done on it with military rifles.

I'd be doing this with a benchrest and bags but 42.5 and 43 are where I would go next.

Well, a buddy of mine is selling his Weaver T-36 for a song anyway, so I'm going to buy it just for load testing. Should give me better ability to hold on a fine point at distance.

For me, prone on a bipod with a rear bag is as stable or more so than I can get on a bench, short of a full on Lead Sled, etc. I shot a lot up to 800 from the prone, so I'm confident there. I think I was just having a hard time getting a consistent point of aim through the duplex reticle in an 8x scope. Next time I'll use a 1" black pasted with the new scope and see how that goes.

Yeah, 8x is not enough at 300 on a big bull like you had.

It's possible that you could pick out a "node" from an Audette type ladder but IMO (worth what you paid for it) the Audette is best used to find a safe load with a velocity that is acceptable. IOW start lower and work up loading one load at each powder charge until you hit MAX (shiny spots on case head, hard bolt lift, no increase in velocity) or you get to a velocity that you want.

THEN you do a seating depth test at that powder charge to find the accuracy node

For example I wanted to find a load in a rebarrel in 6.5 rem mag to shoot the 130 gr Scirrocco II using RL17. At the time there was no data on RL17 so I picked a low load and worked up till I got where I wanted to be in velocity

First range day


Second range day


Now I could try to "read the tea leaves" and declare a node here or there, but essentially I found out the powder charge that would put me at 3175 to 3200 fps with that bullet. That is what I was hoping for and there were NO pressure signs. Those ballistics would enable me to shoot my 4.5x14 Zeiss RapidZ 800 reticle at the full 14 power.

Seating depth changes also effect velocity in a minor way so then it is time to pick the charge, 54.5 grains, and do a seating depth test. Loading 4 or 5 at each seating depth to look for group size, extreme spread and standard deviation



So one of the best groups with the lowest ES and SD at .060" off the lands at ~3175 fps + (chrono 15' from muzzle)

That load has proved very consistent. It would have taken a lot less components to find if there had been load data to begin with

IMO look for your velocity with Audette at 300 yds and look for seating depth at 200 yds

Eezy peezy