Thread: Load development 22 ARC and dispersion measurement

Started some load development for the 22 ARC.

I'm fortunate to have a crazy accurate 6.5x55 but this gave me some fairly high expectations for my ARC build. Initial firings of the factory 62g, 75g and 88g were a bit mixed - or perhaps my expectations just too high.

Got caught up in all the ladder test, statistics, "groups are too small" and quality postings by a certain @gimp. This shifted my approach to loading up 10 rounds with a couple of powders a bit below max charge with projectiles I want to use to hunt with and shooting them.

I used Gordon's reloading tool coupled with Hornady and Sierra published reloading data to guide what those powder charges would be. Then it became a case of, so how do we measure performance of these loads? With ES of 3-5 shot groups is cast into history books spent far too much time mucking about with spreadsheets.

Long story short - here is a bit of a summary of a few loads I've done. I'm inclined to think 28.5gr Varget + 80gr ELD-X and go hunting.

All of those loads look thoroughly satisfactory for hunting! It certainly looks like the 80gr ELDX shoots well out of your barrel.

Does it meet your requirements?

Nice data. Looks pretty good. Ive found it difficult to get good velicity SDs with these snaller csses/bores.

Originally Posted by Tentman

Nice data. Looks pretty good. Ive found it difficult to get good velicity SDs with these snaller csses/bores.

10 is good in reality

@dombo3 post up some group photos.

Some good results there, I've found the small ARC cases really do produced great accuracy with 100% fill, big fan of the ELDx in the 6mm ARC with the 103gr my fav. Looking forward to an update

Originally Posted by McNotty

@dombo3 post up some group photos.

This is the 80 eld-x with Varget. The orange target is 1" diameter for reference. Both 5 shot groups - bottom one too. Nice thing about the 22 ARC is you can usually see the target being punched.

I used ballistic-X to get the X Y coordinates of each group, punched into excel to subsequently calculate group MR, SD, offset etc. for the collective 10-shots.

Originally Posted by gimp

All of those loads look thoroughly satisfactory for hunting! It certainly looks like the 80gr ELDX shoots well out of your barrel.

Does it meet your requirements?

I'm very happy with the 80 eld-x results. Just that hesitancy about the small calibre thing. But as the majority of shots of taken on game with my Swede have been under 250 yards and the longest has been 450 yards I think it just need to go do it and continue to shoot within MY capability.

Originally Posted by McNotty

@dombo3 post up some group photos.

... and useful to get that perspective that 10 shots is still a small sample. Here is the 62g ...