Hey, when you guys work up a load for long range, how do you prefer to do it. Lowest std dev in velocity or more on the side of 100 yard accuracy or little of both? Got a load that seems to shoot consistently accurate with 94gr of retumbo and 190gr matchking out of my 300RUM, but velocity dev. is rather large, around 50ft/sec. But if I up it to 96gr, that goes down but accuracy seems to be off but seems to shoot better at 500 yards. I am new at long range shooting but not reloading. But wonder if you guys sometimes see this.

It is a common experience though 50 fps spreads might be bothersome. Try a change of primers just for grins. How does it shoot at 1000 yds?

Accurate is as accurate does. Test at the range you intend to shoot.

From what I have been able to learn about 1000yd shooting you want the least extreme spread in velocity--all other things being equal. If your 500yd groups are less than 1 MOA, you are definitely on the right path to good shooting at the longer distance. Horizontal dispersion is pretty much controlled by wind velocity but vertical dispersion is determined by velocity of the bullet.

Ol' John

Now hold on guys, I am not ready to graduate to 1000 yards yet. It will take me alot more time to find the right amount balance here. With the load that has good velocity spread for ok accuracy at 100 yards, I can get about the same accuracy at 500 yards that has the large spread but good accuracy at 100. Understand? Could be me too. I have to drive 2 hours to a farm to do this long shooting. I am not shooting MOA yet at 500 with any of them. More like 1.5 or more MOA at 500yards and .7MOA at 100yards. Still working on it. Thanks for the replys

Your more consistant velocity loading might not be settled down yet at 100yd, move back to the 200yd line and see how they compare there.
Also, you might try the 220gr MK in your RUM

Isn't Sierra making a 230 - 250 grain match king for the 30?
Wouldn't, with the right twist barrel, make a better long range bullet for this cartridge?
Jim

When working up a long range load for my 6.5/284, and living here in the east finding long enough ranges to shoot at was not possible. So I reverted to the lowest std deviations and was rewarded with awesome performance at ranges to nearly 1 mile when shooting out west. By using a ballistic calculator/program just substitute a few varing velocities and see the difference in impact points based on varing velocities. Wind cannot be totally beaten, but drop can be for the most part be taken out consideration for practical purposes. I will also add that these wonder loads also shot supurbly at 100 yards.