6.5 x 55 homeloaders blues

[Rutland lad]

Righto.
I’ve tried Barnes 120 grain TSX and TTSX in my 6.5 using RS60 and couldn’t get a satisfactory group or sweet spot. It would throw a nice half MOA group but then wouldn’t do it again under the same conditions. So it wasn’t consistent..
Moved onto Fox in 123 grain - same story.
Now about to try TTSX in 100 grain, and hopefully Yew Tree in 116 grain. Becoming really fed up, as when I feed it Sako Gamehead Pro in 130 grain it’s half MOA every time. Again and again.
I’d be happy to go stalking with the Fox or the TTSX if it would do half MOA consistently.
I’m almost convinced that barrel length and harmonics mean it just doesn’t like the length of the copper/mono metal rounds in that weight. I’m hopeful that the length of the 100 grain TTSX will be similar to that of the lead 130 grain but I’m beginning to lose faith.
Tell me to keep at it !!

 

[supersport]

Ditch the home loads an go with the sako gamehead pro 130grn.

 

[Foxyboy43]

Lead ain’t dead! Sierra 120 Prohunters or 130 Gamechangers and N160. Brilliant!!

 

[Norfolk Deer Search]

It took me over 50 bullets to get Barnes to shoot straight in 6.5x55 when i used to shoot one, I found seating depth to be the key.

it took a lot of time and patience and money to get it to shoot straight.

my initial load was for 140gn ttsx which was my bread ans butter until I went to 120’s for flatter trajectory, but in the end I went 270

 

[D13REW]

HI Rutland Lad,

I've been experimenting with fox 100grn, Barnes ttsx 100grn and about to move on to Pregrine VRG-4 118grn in my 23" Blaser. I'm not struck on the barnes despite all the good publicity but as its an expensive hobby haven't messed with seating depth.
If I can be any help please PM

Andy

 

[srvet]

Righto.
I’ve tried Barnes 120 grain TSX and TTSX in my 6.5 using RS60 and couldn’t get a satisfactory group or sweet spot. It would throw a nice half MOA group but then wouldn’t do it again under the same conditions. So it wasn’t consistent..
Moved onto Fox in 123 grain - same story.
Now about to try TTSX in 100 grain, and hopefully Yew Tree in 116 grain. Becoming really fed up, as when I feed it Sako Gamehead Pro in 130 grain it’s half MOA every time. Again and again.
I’d be happy to go stalking with the Fox or the TTSX if it would do half MOA consistently.
I’m almost convinced that barrel length and harmonics mean it just doesn’t like the length of the copper/mono metal rounds in that weight. I’m hopeful that the length of the 100 grain TTSX will be similar to that of the lead 130 grain but I’m beginning to lose faith.
Tell me to keep at it !!

What velocities were you getting? Only reason I ask is that I worked up a load in a 308 that initially didn’t shoot. When I looked at barrel time on QL the ladder test I shot was between two predicted nodes. I increased the charge accordingly and found a nice accurate node. What seating depths have you tried?

 

[Jelen]

Righto.
I’ve tried Barnes 120 grain TSX and TTSX in my 6.5 using RS60 and couldn’t get a satisfactory group or sweet spot. It would throw a nice half MOA group but then wouldn’t do it again under the same conditions. So it wasn’t consistent..
Moved onto Fox in 123 grain - same story.
Now about to try TTSX in 100 grain, and hopefully Yew Tree in 116 grain. Becoming really fed up, as when I feed it Sako Gamehead Pro in 130 grain it’s half MOA every time. Again and again.
I’d be happy to go stalking with the Fox or the TTSX if it would do half MOA consistently.
I’m almost convinced that barrel length and harmonics mean it just doesn’t like the length of the copper/mono metal rounds in that weight. I’m hopeful that the length of the 100 grain TTSX will be similar to that of the lead 130 grain but I’m beginning to lose faith.
Tell me to keep at it !!

I had the same problems with Barnes 120gr and gave up before I bankrupted myself.
The TTSX 100gr with 46gr of RL16 did work and produced sub 1 MOA groups however I didn't get to shoot any deer with them.
Then I tried the Yew Tree 112gr with RL17 (RS60). I was getting 1 MOA and very good consistent ES of 9-11fps, but it required a bit of playing about with seating depth to achieve half MOA consistently. My current load fired through a 20" 1 in 8 twist barrel is:
Lapua brass. CCI BR2 primers. RL17 48.4gr. CBTO 2.490 which is 55thou off the lands. MV 3158fps.
I have only shot 2 Roe with this load and bullet. The POA was HILAR and the deer were DRT. The second deer left a good blood trail but only because when it dropped it slid down the hill. Terminal performance was as good as the Nosler 120 BTips or 130 AB's. However the meat damage was less and there was no jellying or excessive bruising.
I hope that helps .

 

[Rutland lad]

I had the same problems with Barnes 120gr and gave up before I bankrupted myself.
The TTSX 100gr with 46gr of RL16 did work and produced sub 1 MOA groups however I didn't get to shoot any deer with them.
Then I tried the Yew Tree 112gr with RL17 (RS60). I was getting 1 MOA and very good consistent ES of 9-11fps, but it required a bit of playing about with seating depth to achieve half MOA consistently. My current load fired through a 20" 1 in 8 twist barrel is:
Lapua brass. CCI BR2 primers. RL17 48.4gr. CBTO 2.490 which is 55thou off the lands. MV 3158fps.
I have only shot 2 Roe with this load and bullet. The POA was HILAR and the deer were DRT. The second deer left a good blood trail but only because when it dropped it slid down the hill. Terminal performance was as good as the Nosler 120 BTips or 130 AB's. However the meat damage was less and there was no jellying or excessive bruising.
I hope that helps .

Is that with the 116 grain Yew Tree ?

I thank everyone for their replies.
In answer to you all, I don’t want to stay with lead as one of my permissions is moving towards lead free. I don’t want to lose it so I need to move to mono.
Velocity achieved was around 2,850 FPS and at the end of the development seating was nearly 100,000” back from lands.
More money and time required no doubt.

 

[gixer1]

Play with seating depth, there is a thread on here where I chased constancy with copper and was about to give up and then messed around with seating depth (very small increments) and found the sweet spot…my problem was all the info that seemed to point at higher velocities was apparently incorrect after speaking to the bullet manufacturer they basically said as long as you are over 2200fps at your target range they will expand perfectly well.

regards,
Gixer

 

[Jelen]

Is that with the 116 grain Yew Tree ?

I thank everyone for their replies.
In answer to you all, I don’t want to stay with lead as one of my permissions is moving towards lead free. I don’t want to lose it so I need to move to mono.
Velocity achieved was around 2,850 FPS and at the end of the development seating was nearly 100,000” back from lands.
More money and time required no doubt.

Yew Tree originally were going to make a 116gr 6.5mm bullet. The final production run ended up at 112gr, I'm not sure why.
The bullets are made on CNC lathes to a tolerance of 2 microns. I decided to weigh them before loading. After weighing 15 I gave up as my scales were registering nil variance.
In comparison Hornady 129gr SST could weigh anywhere between 128 -130gr last time I weighed them some years ago.

 

[Dorsettaff]

Rutland...I share your pain.....

I have a Blaser R8 which shoots 140 grain Amax, SST, Partitions, BTs etc etc all day long sub MOA.

Feed it 120 Barnes or GMX over RS60 and it spits them out all over the place.

Switched to Yew Tree 112 and Fox 100/123 and its back to sub 0.5moa

Little tweaks to what Rich (Yew Tree) and Ed (Fox/Edinburgh Rifles) advise both in powder and seating depths and it loves them !

Both Ed and Rich will advise regarding best powder weights and seating depths.

Peregrines are next on the trial list!

 

[Ozalid]

Lead ain’t dead! Sierra 120 Prohunters or 130 Gamechangers and N160. Brilliant!!

What he said

The best advice I have been given was "with 6.5x55 don't worry about the jump" all I did with the 130gr Gamechangers was copy the OAL of the Hornady Superformance SST's which group superbly well in my Sako, I think the OAL was 2.19" I daren't check what the jump is...

 

[Foxyboy43]

Far from scientific but for me an interesting experiment and yes I know……. (Pause to watch the SD ballistics vultures circling).
The attached was off sticks at 100 yds+. GMK 120s loaded with 44/44.5 and 45 gns were by far the least satisfactory and not something I would use for deer - yet. Plan is to experiment with seating depth as per many other posts - I simply could not reach the lands with the GMX so seating was a best guess!
Note the best group was a moderate load with good ol’ Remington Corelokts! Thanks to “Spice”, bless him, I now have a good stock of them and will be using them on Reds later this year.

 

[Rutland lad]

My main point is consistent accuracy. I’m not chasing velocity as I don’t want something that’s stinking hot. If I can get half MOA I’d be delirious.
I’d be very keen to get a UK based manufacturer as I don’t think things from the US will be readily available for a while.
The search continues.
Hot off the press - my mate also has MO3 in 6.5 x 55 and has fed it some Sako Gamehead factory with the Barnes TTSX and it’s doing half MOA.
WTF - is going on. This seems to disprove my theory of it being the length of the bullet that’s the issue.
More work.
Below is the Fox results - initially I was very pleased but this was a one off three shot group. Couldn’t repeat it again. Pity as I’d be very happy with this if it was consistent.

 

[stalkerboydy]

It took me over 50 bullets to get Barnes to shoot straight in 6.5x55 when i used to shoot one, I found seating depth to be the key.

it took a lot of time and patience and money to get it to shoot straight.

my initial load was for 140gn ttsx which was my bread ans butter until I went to 120’s for flatter trajectory, but in the end I went 270

And thanks to your help advice along with experience it took me 9 rounds to get them putting on top of each other at 100yrds which my 6.5x55 still does to this day

 

[stalkerboydy]

Righto.
I’ve tried Barnes 120 grain TSX and TTSX in my 6.5 using RS60 and couldn’t get a satisfactory group or sweet spot. It would throw a nice half MOA group but then wouldn’t do it again under the same conditions. So it wasn’t consistent..
Moved onto Fox in 123 grain - same story.
Now about to try TTSX in 100 grain, and hopefully Yew Tree in 116 grain. Becoming really fed up, as when I feed it Sako Gamehead Pro in 130 grain it’s half MOA every time. Again and again.
I’d be happy to go stalking with the Fox or the TTSX if it would do half MOA consistently.
I’m almost convinced that barrel length and harmonics mean it just doesn’t like the length of the copper/mono metal rounds in that weight. I’m hopeful that the length of the 100 grain TTSX will be similar to that of the lead 130 grain but I’m beginning to lose faith.
Tell me to keep at it !!

Probably a silly question but have you tried a different powder . As yet I've had no problems with my 6.5x55 ( if i do my bit ) putting bullet on bullet using Barnes TTSX 120gr LRX 127gr and Fox 123gr

 

[Rutland lad]

Probably a silly question but have you tried a different powder . As yet I've had no problems with my 6.5x55 ( if i do my bit ) putting bullet on bullet using Barnes TTSX 120gr LRX 127gr and Fox 123gr

No I’ve not yet tried a different powder. There is a reason, I’m reloading my .300 Winmag using RS60 and being practical and tight (and I don’t want any mistakes) I’m hoping that RS60 would satisfy both. Data seems to suggest it will, but just not yet !

 

[Jelen]

What is going on is that every barrel/rifle is very slightly different and no 2 rifles are exactly the same. The rifle that came off the production line after your mates may re-act to the Sako Gameheads differently than his.
As to your reloads, keep tweaking the seating depth methodically even though it hurts the wallet.
The way I do it (and there are different methods) is to do my seating depth testing with 3 shot groups at 5thou increments, at 200m which shows up any flyers/loose groups better than at 100m. Each group is shot through a cold barrel and mod' which takes a lot of time! I found a sweet spot which shrunk my +1.5MOA groups into a 1MOA horizontal group. I then repeated that at 2thou either side. Still at 1 MOA but a little ragged. I finally confirmed it by shooting a 5 round group at 200m on a day when the weather conditions were nearly identical. Job done, albeit after expending over 75 bullets.
Keep at it and good luck.

 

[stalkerboydy]

No I’ve not yet tried a different powder. There is a reason, I’m reloading my .300 Winmag using RS60 and being practical and tight (and I don’t want any mistakes) I’m hoping that RS60 would satisfy both. Data seems to suggest it will, but just not yet !

Okay no problems. Might be of use in the future Vhit N560 is the powder i use. Good luck I'm sure you will get the results you wish for

 

[charlieboy-shooter]

No I’ve not yet tried a different powder. There is a reason, I’m reloading my .300 Winmag using RS60 and being practical and tight (and I don’t want any mistakes) I’m hoping that RS60 would satisfy both. Data seems to suggest it will, but just not yet !

Okay no problems. Might be of use in the future Vhit N560 is the powder i use. Good luck I'm sure you will get the results you wish for

Hi Guys,

Coming to the party a bit late. So have been looking at these type of threads recently. I have noticed that it would seem to me at least, that most powders mentioned seem to be double base to reach the required velocities to stabilize the bullets. Is that statement correct ?
So does that mean powders like RS62 or the N1-- versions of Viht would generally be unsuitable for the monolithics bullets. Is it a reality that those of us which prefer a single base powder just need to accept that they just won't work.

Very much interested for 6.5x55 and .308win with 20" barrels.

Thanks