While I despise the cannelure on Hornady bullets, over the years I have regressed and learned to live with them. But today, something odd caught my eye. In reloading some .280 test rounds, the cannelure looked uneven when I visually inspected the first round. After checking my setup for any "loose ends," I took another bullet out of the box and quickly noticed it looked much the same as the first. I then measured the base of the bullet to the beginning (bottom groove) of the cannelure. The six measurements I took ranged from .597 to .602.

I have not shot any of these and have no control lots to see if this discrepancy will make a difference. I did contact Hornady with the lot number, which happens to be 2050383, for those who may be interested.

I have no use for cannelures either, with the possible exception of bullets for some auto/semi-auto rifles that tend to hammer the bullets as they are chambered.

I've noticed the same type of cannelure inconsistency as Bobby mentions in Winchester and Remington bulk bullets. The cannelure itself can hardly be conducive to accuracy, and inconsistent placement of the cannelure must only cause further accuracy problems.

It seems that Nosler recently dropped the "cannelure", which is more of a rebate, on their heavy caliber Partitions. Maybe it's just happenstance, but I loaded some of these new Partitions (225 gr/.338) recently and experienced noticeably better accuracy than than with the cannelured Partitions from this same rifle.

How many match bullets have you ever seen with a cannelure? I rest my case on the accuracy characteristics of cannelures.

While I'd agree that the cannelure don't enhanse accuracy it's also not a serious deterrent either.

Hornady's cannelured interlocks have a reputation for excellent hunting accuracy and I've shot many good groups with them.

The cannelure however also aids in encapsulating the lead core to some extent and helps prevent the shedding of the core from the jacket. It acts somewhat like another interlock feature.

I rarely use the cannelure for anything and almost never crimp my hunting bullets or any bullets for that matter at least in boltaction rifles. I'm not sure but I think Hornady is among the very few companies still canneluring and IMO it's an asset.

I like the channelure, and use it for a mild crimp whenever it lines up with my OAL setting. Mostly, it doesn't matter though, since I use a Lee factory crimp die and can put the crimp wherever I want to. I do like the channelure when loading for the 45-70, and try to use it whenever possible.