Thread: Stupid Question. bare with me please

@Mroach - glad to hear you're enjoying reloading! It's a great way to enhance your enjoyment of your shooting and possibly hunting.

I have a 6.5 Creedmoor in a Howa 1500. I've shot a whole load of different combinations in it and I found that Re26 is an interesting but fickle option. You can get high speeds out of it but it was inconsistent for me in regards to velocity and groups. The best combination I tried was in Lapua SRP brass but that only gave the same velocity as I could get with Re16 so there wasn't really any point pursuing that combination.

Re16 is a really good powder for the 6.5CM. It tends to give a little more speed than the equivalent amount of AR2209 and I've had superb consistency velocity wise and also grouping. The biggest problem with it currently is the exorbitant price and erratic availability.

Overall it seems the wisest choice these days is to try 2209 to see if it gives you the speed and precision you're looking for in your rifle. If so, but a decent supply of it to keep you shooting for as long as possible.

Another potentially good option might also be Winchester Staball 6.5 - I never tried it myself as it used to be more expensive than ADI and similarly priced to the Alliant powders (remember those not so long ago days?).

As far as overall length goes you won't go wrong following the Hornady manual and sticking to 2.800"(71.1mm) with the 147 Eld-M. They aren't particularly sensitive to seating depth so it's really down to seeing which powder your rifle/barrel combo likes.