Thread: Load development in the SI

Originally Posted by Strider B

Hey thanks for the replies

Everything is tight and snug where it should be. VX3i 4-14 scope is new

My previous .308 was a Rem700 s/s. It had a couple of inches on my Kimber which is 15" with a greystone can but was reliably hitting a 200 x 200 gong out to 600m, knocked over animals from 100 to 500m with a 165gr HPBT on 40.5gr of 2206h pushing 2650fps. The bulk of my hunting shots are 150-300m but I do get out target shooting gongs a bit to check wind drift and shooting at different angles affect my POI because its nice to know it can reach out a bit further if I need to.

Its been a bit different shooting my Kimber in comparison to my Rem 700 which is a fair bit heavier but i've put plenty of rounds through the Kimber and feel comfortable with my shooting but perhaps I need to put in some more time to get used to the rifle.

I may just be chasing the unreachable dream with this set up but would like to think it would shoot sub 1" reliably.

Greetings Strider B,
I am with Micky Duck on a rifle capable of 1 inch groups at 100 yards is fine for shooting out to 500 yards and ample for shots out to 300. While it would be nice to think that all rifles will stack all their shots inside 0.5 MoA in the real world these rifles are rare. Often claims of half minute rifles are backed up with one group or less, always a three shot group. I would suggest that your groups approaching 1 MoA are pretty good performance from a light rifle.
As a suggestion of what you might try here are a couple. Perhaps you could revisit the 165 grain projectile but in the Nosler BT. Also your load of 40.5 grains of AR2206H for the 165 grain in your Remington is very light, below start loads in the Hodgdon Data. They would have had less than 2,500 fps in their 24 inch barrel so I suspect that you would have had less than 2,400 fps in what I gather was a 17 or 18 inch barrel rather than 2,650 fps.
You may also find that your better results with the light loads are due to you being able to control the light rifle better.
All that said, your current results are fine for your normal shooting to 300 yards or a bit more so you could just go hunting with it as is. Perhaps another heavier rifle for the long range gongs? Hunting is only as complicated as we make it.
Regards Grandpamac.