TwoEyedJack
Member
I have a Ruger Hawkeye stainless laminated in .308 that I have been developing loads for. I glass bedded and free floated it, and cut a few coils off the trigger spring and the trigger is now pretty reasonable.
Almost all the brass I have is Lake City. I found a load that is pretty accurate, using a 168 gr. Hornady BTHP match bullet, Remington magnum primer, and 43.8 gr. Reloader 15, seated about .020 off the lands. This load puts 4 shots touching, then one outside the group that increases the group to 1". Another load using a 165 gr. Sierra BTHP Game Kings and IMR4064 gives similar results. So I was thinking maybe I could do a little better with commercial brass.
The only commercial brass I have is Hornady, so I prepped 20 casings the same way I have the LC. Trim to length, deburr the neck, deburr the primer pocket, etc. Using the same loading data as above, the groups were horrible. Like over 6".
I also bought a box of factory Hornady "match" ammo 155 gr. A-Max, which was horrible as well.
Is Hornady brass that bad? I might have to spring for some Winchester or Lapua brass to see what this rifle can do.
Almost all the brass I have is Lake City. I found a load that is pretty accurate, using a 168 gr. Hornady BTHP match bullet, Remington magnum primer, and 43.8 gr. Reloader 15, seated about .020 off the lands. This load puts 4 shots touching, then one outside the group that increases the group to 1". Another load using a 165 gr. Sierra BTHP Game Kings and IMR4064 gives similar results. So I was thinking maybe I could do a little better with commercial brass.
The only commercial brass I have is Hornady, so I prepped 20 casings the same way I have the LC. Trim to length, deburr the neck, deburr the primer pocket, etc. Using the same loading data as above, the groups were horrible. Like over 6".
I also bought a box of factory Hornady "match" ammo 155 gr. A-Max, which was horrible as well.
Is Hornady brass that bad? I might have to spring for some Winchester or Lapua brass to see what this rifle can do.