Few questions about the 35whelen

Has anyone ever tryed W748 in their whelen? How was the velocity and accuracy? I hear a lot about RL15 which I will try, but right now I'm using some IMR4064 I have on hand and also some varget and W748. Never hear a thing about 748.

Planing on using 225gr Ballistic tips and Barnes TSX, what velocity should I expect out of a 24" tube? Is 2700FPS reachable without very hot loads?

The rifle is a Remington CDL, it is by far the most accurate rifle out of the box I have ever owned. Completley stock except for trigger adj. to 3lb. Just very new to the 35 whelen caliber and thought I could find some good info here.

Thanx
Ryan

Redneck,

Concerning W748 I have not used it. It is a bit faster then your IMR 4064 and Varget but slower then IMR 3031, so it may have some application. I have tried IMR 3031 with some lighter weight bullets 180 -200 grain. You will have good success with 4064 and Varget though, for sure.

I like your choice of bullets and you should be able to reach 2700 fps in you CDL. Just for the record, I prefer Reloader 15 as well.

BigBullet

I've reloaded the Whelen for a few years and found that Reloader 15 gave me the absolute best combination of accuracy and velocity in my rifle. 4320 and 4064 worked well accuracy wise but were 100 to 200 fps behind R-15 in terms of velocity given comparable accuracy.

Are you thinking that WW748 might work because R-15 will also work in 223 and 308? It might, but I use BL-C2 in my 223 and have stuck with 4064 in the 308 due to accuracy issues.

If your rifle is a 1 in 16 twist you might find that the Barnes bullets are too long to stabilize properly. This was the case with my rifle and their 250's. I didn't try the 225's because of horrible fouling problems I had with the 250's.

Hunter, I use w748 and IMR 4064 in my 308 and they work fine. I figured they shouldnt be too far off eachother in the whelen either. I want to get the best possible velocity so I may have to look at RL15 a little better. Thanx guys, keep them coming.

I'll have to second what HunterMontana says comparing the velocity spread between 4064 and RL 15.

Used 4064 early on, but changed to RL 15 and have used it ever since in my Whelen with Barnes 225 original X's and Nos 225 Partitions. My stock Ruger 77 pushes both very accurately just above 2600fps with max loads.

Just got some Nos 225 BT's to play with. Load development in process with RL 15.

Next project will be Barnes 225 TSX's.
Sako

Ive had really good results using other WW ball powders but havent tried 748. I intend to give some ramshot powdwers a try in a couple rifles, which are supposed to be similar to the Winchester line but less temprature sensative. I love the metering qualities, low standard deviation and potential accuracy Ive gotten from ball powders.

That being said, Ive pretty much setteled on Rlr-15 for my Whelen as well.

Redneck7MM:

The only powder I use in the 35 Whelen is 4064. I have used it since 1972. A charge of 56/4064/250 Speer Hot Core,= 2615fps, with groups around an inch. The same charge with a 225 Ballistic tip gives right at 2700fps, with about the same accuracy. The 225 grainer is deadly on elk, and really holds together well.

Jerry

Hate to add extranious data to your discussion but I've had good luck with RL-15 for a maximum load, but I use the 250 grain X bullets, not the 225s. If I reload for Barnes bullets again, I may try this lighter bullet too. I exceeded the book load, because it was used with 250 grain Hornady round nose bullets in the Hodgdon manual, using 59.5 grains of RL-15 at 2593 fps with my 22" Remington 700 Classic. The book maximum load of BL-C(2), 59.0 grains, gives me 2521 fps. I got my load data for the RL-15 from the late Finn Aagaard's article in Handloader 184 "Medium Bores .338-06 vs. .35 Whelen". He did not recommend the 59.5 grain load, stopping at 59.0 grains of RL-15. He recommend 60.0 grains of RL-15 with the 225 grain Barnes X.

55.8 gr. IMR4895, Sierra 2850 225 gr., 3.25" CI200 2772 fps

I started out with 4064 and the first load I tried gave me ~.5 MOA, I've never looked back. I have found that WW748 is outstanding in .308. The Whelen has more capacity but I don't see why it would not give satisfactory performance, WW ball powders tend to meter very well which is a plus. RL15 should also give good results.