Just bought a Howa 1500 in .223 Remington. I wanted a light varmint rifle/plinker. New caliber for me to reload. Need suggestions on a load. I have some 50 grain Hornady V-max pellets I use with my 22-250. I'm using Varget with good accuracy in my 22-250. Are the standard .224 diameter bullets the ones to use in the .223 Rem (I think they are, just want to make sure).

Any load recipes with the 50 grain pellets? Is a different weight bullet recommended? What's the best powder or powders for accurate loads? Thanks for any help.

.224 Diameter is correct.....50 grains is good and I like 27.5 grains of BLC-2

Try H-335 with the lighter bullets. Varget in 223 works well with the very heavy bullets but probably not as well with lighter ones. I've never gotten even decent accuracy with BL-C2. I've also used AA-2230 and WW-748 with good success with lighter bullets but I think H-335 is the goto powder. H-335 was recommended to me by a custom AR manufacturer and I've not looked back since......DJ

I liked Accurate 2015BR with the 50 gr Nosler Ballistic Tip or the Hornady V-Max. I got better results with the Nosler bullet in my 1 in 12" twist Savage. IF I were to start loading for a .223 today, I would start with Hodgdons Benchmark powder for all bullets to see if it performs as well as the new Nosler loading manual says.

Currently my favorite load is a Hornady 52gr A-Max powered by 22.5gr of Reloader 10. I use CCI #400 primers. This load has only been used for paper so I can't say how it would perform on Varmints.

Rick