I have a custom rifle in 6.5-06 and have not been able to buy properly head stamped cases for it. I saw that Huntingtons has RWS brass in 6.5x68 RWS for sale for less than having head stamped brass made up. What is the difference between them and can a 65-06 be reamed out to 6.5x68 RWS. Who has the reamer and skill to do an o6 length pre-64 model 70??? I am real tired of wildcats when a structured round exists.

The 6.5x68 uses a different (larger) boltface diameter than the '06 family. The case diameter is also somewhat larger. So doing a conversion like this, would be much akin to doing a conversion from a standard to magnum cartridge. You have to consider all the issues involved with bolt face enlargement, extractor, ejector, feed rails, box length etc etc. On top of that, you have make sure that your barrel contour is heavy enough to handle the larger chamber size.

The 6.5x68 is ballisticly a .264 Rem Mag without a belt. It is very highly thought of in some (Central) European countries. A lot of people marvel at the velocity possible with light bullets - the caliber (and its rimmed sister 6.5x68R) is often used to hunt Chamois. Ammo and components are available, although, as with most things European, not particularly cheap. Downside: as with most overbore cases, the caliber is somewhat hard on barrels.

Btw, I can appreciate your feelings about wildcat cartridges. They seem like all the rage when you first plan for them. After a while, they turn out to be associated with quite a few drawbacks (extra work, no headstamped cases etc), and you start to wonder whether a boring .270 Win, a .25-06 or something like that would not have done the job??

- mike

You are so right and then some. I just received an e-mail from Tom Burgess in which he discussed some of my issues and said in the overall scheme of things, in a few years the new calibers will be shown to do not much more than their predicessors. They are harder to make feed and do not really offer much of an improvement.

lb404



RWS makes a 6,5X65 which is a 3006 case but it's 65mm long and It would clean out the camber of your rifle some say the 6,5X65 was made soo that hunter could clean out the camber of their 6,5X57, I'm not sure how much truth there is behind that



There is also a 6,5X64 brenneke which is more or less a 7X64 necked down to 6,5. I know there are brass for the caliber but I'm not sure of the range of ammo.



6,5X68 is the little brother of the 8X68S and it eats barrels



Cheers

/ JOHAN

Thanks for the tip on the 6.5x68 eating barrels. I like the idea of the 6.5x65 RWS. Is there much loading data available for it and US powders?

lb404



I have not looked in the latest RWS manual, but reloading data from the 6,5-06 could be used. the 6,5X65 has a slightly larger case capacity. here is one intereting article: http://home.snafu.de/l.moeller/6,5mm/6,5x57-vs-6,5x65.htm

A program like quickload would be a good help to develop loads with American powders





Cheers

/ JOHAN