223 Load Testing

[MAshooter1]

Got a chance to bring my 20" AR build out to play during the warm weather this weekend. I have some Dogtown 55gr projectiles I need to get rid of (bought in the shortage after Sandy Hook) before I get to my bulk Hornady FMJBT collection. Doing load development with H335, I started at 23gr and went to 23.4, 23.8, 24.2, 24.6 and finally 25 grains. Bullets were seated to magazine capacity.

One interesting topic of note is how grossly inaccurate measuring COAL from tip to head is, especially with these non-uniformed meplats on the dogtown HP's. I was shocked at the variance I was getting, but when I measured by the ogive, it was +/- .001". Markedly different results...just some food for thought. The Hornady bullet measurement kit really is worth its weight.

Anyways, on to the groups. They are ordered 1-5, 23-25gr. At this point, 23.8gr looks promising, so I may experiment with that and see if seating depth affects accuracy or if it was just me on a good day. At this point, I'm not sure if I'm capable of shooting sub-MOA yet either, so it may have been dumb luck. These are 4" diameter targets, taken at 75yds. The individually circled shots are discarded because someone got to my fancy 5 group target before I did

 

[DW357]

Not bad and thanks for sharing this. What is your barrel twist rate? Just curious.

 

[MAshooter1]

1:7. At this point I'm anticipating that the heavier 62 or 77's might shoot more favorably out of it, but we'll see what happens. If I had to bet, I'd say this may be the best accuracy I'm gonna get out of "budget" bullets, although it's rumored that the dogtowns are blem Nosler bullets.

 

[MAshooter1]

Here's a shot of the brass. Lowest charge in the back, highest in front.

 

[mac1911]

Here's a shot of the brass. Lowest charge in the back, highest in front.

for what its worth the 55 fmj bulk bullets shoot pretty good for me even out of my 1/7 barrel although I dont get as good as groups as my 1/9 with the same load H335 24 grains and i also run my plinking ammo with W844. with a scope Im right there on MOA with both the hornady 55fmj and some unknown discount soft points I picked up many years ago.

when i plop down and shoot prone with a sling at 100 yards i shoot about the same with the bulk 55s and my 69 and 77 grain match loads.

i say go with the best group and run with it

 

[MAshooter1]

for what its worth the 55 fmj bulk bullets shoot pretty good for me even out of my 1/7 barrel although I dont get as good as groups as my 1/9 with the same load H335 24 grains and i also run my plinking ammo with W844. with a scope Im right there on MOA with both the hornady 55fmj and some unknown discount soft points I picked up many years ago.

when i plop down and shoot prone with a sling at 100 yards i shoot about the same with the bulk 55s and my 69 and 77 grain match loads.

i say go with the best group and run with it

I have a 1:9 16" Ruger SR556 but I'm skeptical because it's non-free-floated and it's a piston system. Maybe I'll give that a whirl with the same load ladder and see what I get.

 

[55_grain]

If you're going to be doing load development, use the same brass, whichever headstamp you have the most of. I bet there's measureable weight difference (and therefore case capacity) between the half dozen brands of brass you have there.

 

[Doogz]

Nice groups for bulk. I have really good results with the hornady 55 fmjbt out of my AR556 (1:8) and CZ 527 (1:9).

So good that I don't really bother with more expensive stuff like VMAX or SMK unless I'm shooting over 200yd.

 

[highscore]

1:7. At this point I'm anticipating that the heavier 62 or 77's might shoot more favorably out of it, but we'll see what happens. If I had to bet, I'd say this may be the best accuracy I'm gonna get out of "budget" bullets, although it's rumored that the dogtowns are blem Nosler bullets.

1-7 may be a bit fast for the 55's but each barrel is different. Once about a time my son was on the CT Junior team and we used to get Sierra seconds, 77's and 80's. I wouldn't let him shoot them past 200 yards but I did cull out the ones that looked crapy and out of what I considered a decent weight range. Once, I took the crappiest of the crappy 77 grain bullets (yes, it's a technical term) 25 of them and loaded them. Some of these bullets weren't even closed. Shot a 25 shot group that easily measured 1.5 inches at 200 yards, shooting prone out of my Krieger 6.5 twist barreled service rifle. To say we were surprised is a gross understatement, I expected some of them to some apart before making it to the target. I wouldn't expect long term success with these bullets but it worked that day. I also shot a very good 25 round group with the same gun shooting 52 grain bullets, I think they were Montana Gold. Shouldn't group well out of a 6.5 twist but they did, You never know...

 

[akma]

First you will never know if can shoot sub MOA with poor ammo. As 55_grain said use the same headstamp. I also keep the weight to within 1 grain. A Hornady bullet and case gauge imperative for consistent rounds.

 

[mac1911]

I was where you are now not to long ago.
It took a while for me and my gear to catch up to my minds expectations.
I took the advice of many better shooters and basically stopped load testing for a while focused on shooting better and getting more accurate guns.
When I started I tried the OCW method and really didn't get it and was not shooting all that well to really benefit from that.
Fast forward and now I have much better rifles and scopes and shoot better.
The dog town bullets I know nothing about.
The hornady 55 bulk are the most accurate bullets I have used under 10¢ I have just touched MOA with them with out much effort.
Several years ago I was challenged by a fellow club member who told me to spend more time shooting than testing loads.
It's funny I took out some loads the other day I loaded up 8 years ago hornady 75s. Back then I wrote them off because of poor groups. I ran them through the same gun with a much better scope and I was getting just under MOA.

If your using a scope try the targets with the 1" aiming dot with 1" grid I like red. They really stand out and the grid will help you keep aligned. Also will show a lot of movement your doing.
My scope has a 1/8" dot in the middle of the cross hairs which really helps centering the crosshairs over the aiming dot.
Keep at it.

Also I'm not sure playing with bullet seating length with the 55s is worth the effort. There's not much bearing surface sitting in the neck of the case as it is... I would buy better bullets to play with?