browningguy
Member
Took my new AA 24" 6.5 Grendel out hunting this past week for the first time with success, it may be my new favorite deer and pig gun. I don't have pics of all the dead animals, sorry for those that like that.
I was shooting the 123gr. SST loads, one broadside on a spike at 105 yards left a nice clean 1" hole through the heart and offside, just a short 15 yard run and down like a sack of bricks. Next up were hogs, I got one good sized one, 180 pounds, took him moving from left to right and quartering away, just behind the nearside shoulder and straight through the offside shoulder, he might have slid about 2 feet after the shot but no more movement than that. I later had a double on a medium size (76 and 83 pounds) pair of hogs at around 90 yards, did not get to laser it, both were taken with angled facing shots through the nearside shoulder and completely through to the offside rear leg.
Saturday afternoon the owner had set up a 42" square piece of sheet steel across the pond, lasered it at 615 yards. He wanted to have a little competition so we took five shots each at it. I was high on the first shot, then four in a row.
What do I like about the cartridge?
Very low recoil, with the 24" barrel it's heavy enough that recoil is just barely more than a .223 in a standard weight rifle. It seems to me it would be really handy walking rifle with an 18-20" barrel, honestly I bought it for shooting 600+ yard targets so didn't consider those, but for strictly hunting I certainly would.
It's enough gun. Meaning I wasn't sure how a 6.5mm 123 gr. bullet at a pretty sedate 2600 FPS would do, pigs can be notoriously tough. But the field results really did exceed my expectations. I've been reloading the SST bullets in .308 and 30-06 for several years so I knew they could do the job, just wasn't sure about the relatively lightweight bullet in the 6.5.
I have the AA 24" upper, and using the lower I normally use for 3 gun, this one with a fixed stock and RRA match trigger, the scope on it now is a Burris 4.5-14. It comes standard with 2 mounting studs, one for a bipod and still space for a sling.
I was shooting the 123gr. SST loads, one broadside on a spike at 105 yards left a nice clean 1" hole through the heart and offside, just a short 15 yard run and down like a sack of bricks. Next up were hogs, I got one good sized one, 180 pounds, took him moving from left to right and quartering away, just behind the nearside shoulder and straight through the offside shoulder, he might have slid about 2 feet after the shot but no more movement than that. I later had a double on a medium size (76 and 83 pounds) pair of hogs at around 90 yards, did not get to laser it, both were taken with angled facing shots through the nearside shoulder and completely through to the offside rear leg.
Saturday afternoon the owner had set up a 42" square piece of sheet steel across the pond, lasered it at 615 yards. He wanted to have a little competition so we took five shots each at it. I was high on the first shot, then four in a row.
What do I like about the cartridge?
Very low recoil, with the 24" barrel it's heavy enough that recoil is just barely more than a .223 in a standard weight rifle. It seems to me it would be really handy walking rifle with an 18-20" barrel, honestly I bought it for shooting 600+ yard targets so didn't consider those, but for strictly hunting I certainly would.
It's enough gun. Meaning I wasn't sure how a 6.5mm 123 gr. bullet at a pretty sedate 2600 FPS would do, pigs can be notoriously tough. But the field results really did exceed my expectations. I've been reloading the SST bullets in .308 and 30-06 for several years so I knew they could do the job, just wasn't sure about the relatively lightweight bullet in the 6.5.
I have the AA 24" upper, and using the lower I normally use for 3 gun, this one with a fixed stock and RRA match trigger, the scope on it now is a Burris 4.5-14. It comes standard with 2 mounting studs, one for a bipod and still space for a sling.
