Seating depth

[CodyK]

My rifle (6.5 creedmoor) shoots Hornady 140, 143, and 147 grain bullets great. So when I found a deal on some Barnes 140 and 145 Match Burners (HPBT) I grabbed 500 of each. I have never been able to get them to shoot anywhere near as good as the Hornady. One problem is their length. In order to seat them .020 off the lands, my COAL would be 2.95”. Max length to feed from my magazine is 2.89”. I’m not opposed to single feeding them, but it just seems crazy to seat them that far out. There will still be enough bullet in the case, which I understand to be at least a calibers worth. But I was wondering if anyone has loaded these bullets up, or had to load anything that long?


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[Havok1]

Why specifically .02 of the lands? If you haven’t tested a variety of OAL’s that would be a good start. Different rifles like different things.

 

[CodyK]

Why specifically .02 of the lands? If you haven’t tested a variety of OAL’s that would be a good start. Different rifles like different things.

Doesn’t have to be specifically .020, I just mentioned that because that’s been a starting point for me before. Main issue is, to even get them mag length, I’m already .080 off. And if I seat them at Barnes published length, I’m .190 off. If I was getting consistent results at those lengths, I wouldn’t bother worrying about it. But I’ve seen this rifle shoot some fantastic groups with the 140 grain Hornady’s, so it’s driving me crazy that I haven’t been able to get these to do anything similar. I’ve seated them out to about 2.86”, roughly .100 jump, and it didn’t improve the results. Had kind of given up, but wondering if I should try to work up a new load, seated closer to the lands.


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[Havok1]

Doesn’t have to be specifically .020, I just mentioned that because that’s been a starting point for me before. Main issue is, to even get them mag length, I’m already .080 off. And if I seat them at Barnes published length, I’m .190 off. If I was getting consistent results at those lengths, I wouldn’t bother worrying about it. But I’ve seen this rifle shoot some fantastic groups with the 140 grain Hornady’s, so it’s driving me crazy that I haven’t been able to get these to do anything similar. I’ve seated them out to about 2.86”, roughly .100 jump, and it didn’t improve the results. Had kind of given up, but wondering if I should try to work up a new load, seated closer to the lands.


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Only thing I could say is play around with different things until you find somethjng that works well. Maybe a different powder would give better results if you haven’t tried that.

 

[Riksors]

I’d start with matching the best shooting hornady bullet ogive to the barnes bullet ogive and go from there.

 

[RankAmateur]

My rifle (6.5 creedmoor) shoots Hornady 140, 143, and 147 grain bullets great. So when I found a deal on some Barnes 140 and 145 Match Burners (HPBT) I grabbed 500 of each. I have never been able to get them to shoot anywhere near as good as the Hornady. One problem is their length. In order to seat them .020 off the lands, my COAL would be 2.95”. Max length to feed from my magazine is 2.89”. I’m not opposed to single feeding them, but it just seems crazy to seat them that far out. There will still be enough bullet in the case, which I understand to be at least a calibers worth. But I was wondering if anyone has loaded these bullets up, or had to load anything that long?


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Please forgive me if I'm assuming something here. You mention a desired starting COAL (2.95) in order to be .02 off the lands. According to the JBM list, the Hornady 147s are 1.440 inches long, while the 140 Match burners are shorter (1.341"). Your post seemed to suggest that the Barnes bullets were longer which created a problem when seating? I presume you are measuring using CBTO relative to the lands. How much longer are the Barnes bullets ogive to meplat than the Hornadys?

 

[CodyK]

Please forgive me if I'm assuming something here. You mention a desired starting COAL (2.95) in order to be .02 off the lands. According to the JBM list, the Hornady 147s are 1.440 inches long, while the 140 Match burners are shorter (1.341"). Your post seemed to suggest that the Barnes bullets were longer which created a problem when seating? I presume you are measuring using CBTO relative to the lands. How much longer are the Barnes bullets ogive to meplat than the Hornadys?

Yeah, I’m referring to CBTO for the 140 grain BTHP. The top pic is the Barnes. The second pic is the Hornady. Overall length of the Barnes is 1.355 (ogive to meplat is .623) and the overall length of the Hornady bullet is 1.337 (ogive to meplat is.587)

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[CodyK]

Couldn’t get my last post to let me edit it, but I’m at the range right now doing some testing. Loaded up 3 shots each of 6 different seating depths. At .020 off the lands, it was a perfect clover leaf group, and at .025 off the lands, which was about 2.94” OAL, I just put 3 shots damn near through the same hole. No pressure signs. I still have a few more groups to shoot, but it’s definitely nice to see these bullets grouping. I was just a little leery seating them out that far.


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[RankAmateur]

Couldn’t get my last post to let me edit it, but I’m at the range right now doing some testing. Loaded up 3 shots each of 6 different seating depths. At .020 off the lands, it was a perfect clover leaf group, and at .025 off the lands, which was about 2.94” OAL, I just put 3 shots damn near through the same hole. No pressure signs. I still have a few more groups to shoot, but it’s definitely nice to see these bullets grouping. I was just a little leery seating them out that far.


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Nice and congrats. Hope you find a forgiving seating depth node with some width. I've had numerous experiences of finding a "screamer" node (same hole) that was only 1-3 thou wide. Made it difficult to maintain. I'm usually happy when I find a node that is at least 6 thou wide, then try to seat right in the middle.

Again, good for you!

 

[Ozzman]

Personally, I stopped chasing the lands in each of my hunting rifles years ago.

The biggest boost in accuracy I have experienced in reloading is full-length sizing of the brass, with a 0.002 shoulder bump on the spent cartridge. I make sure to keep cartridges exclusively for that particular rifle and anneal every other reload session.

If not already, I recommend you find the "jam point" on your rifle first before you make your loads.

 

[CodyK]

Personally, I stopped chasing the lands in each of my hunting rifles years ago.

The biggest boost in accuracy I have experienced in reloading is full-length sizing of the brass, with a 0.002 shoulder bump on the spent cartridge. I make sure to keep cartridges exclusively for that particular rifle and anneal every other reload session.

If not already, I recommend you find the "jam point" on your rifle first before you make your loads.

Yeah, that’s the first thing I do. I was just concerned that in order to get where I have found success (.020-.035) I was gonna have to seat them at an overall length that I have never really came close to. So I took a shot and loaded them to where Barnes had listed in their reloading data, 2.78”. That was not working at all! It looks like these are gonna have to be seated out to over 2.94” COAL.


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[Ozzman]

Yeah, that’s the first thing I do. I was just concerned that in order to get where I have found success (.020-.035) I was gonna have to seat them at an overall length that I have never really came close to. So I took a shot and loaded them to where Barnes had listed in their reloading data, 2.78”. That was not working at all! It looks like these are gonna have to be seated out to over 2.94” COAL.


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Wow, so you already found the jam point and backed it off 0.020, and it is still that much LONGER than the max OAL?...
According to the book, max OAL is 2.82, and while not it's not that strange to be slightly longer, a difference of 0.12" is a lot IMO.

Just be aware that exceeding or not meeting SAAMI specifications for any cartridge, (i.e. 6.5 Creed), it ceases being a 6.5 Creed and becomes "something" different.

No biggie. That's part of the fun of reloading. I recommend you work up a load at these various lengths as safely as you can. At 0.020 off the jam point, you should still be fine, however, make sure to work your way up and check for velocity inconsistencies, pressure signs, and accuracy. Compare bullet performances between seating depths: 2.94" vs. 2.89" (magazine max), vs. 2.82 (max OAL).

Let us know what you find.

 

[Vaquero]

I might load the chamber by hand. But I make sure all my rounds will fit in the magazine and cycle reliably.
Some day my paper puncher might need to do something more serious.

 

[dee]

A lot of jump sometimes isn’t a bad thing.

Bullet Jump Research

shortactioncustoms.com

 

[Axxe55]

A lot of jump sometimes isn’t a bad thing.

Bullet Jump Research

shortactioncustoms.com

every rifle has a sweet spot for seating depthand it'ssomething that can be experimented with very easily

 

[dee]

every rifle has a sweet spot for seating depthand it'ssomething that can be experimented with very easily

While I agree to an extent for years it was considered taboo to jump the bullet an “excessive” amount. Berger vld for one gets a bad wrap on this as it was commonly said that if you can’t seat close don’t bother with them and stick to tangent ogive profiles. My experience along with several others has been opposite. The secant or vld can handle jump but it typically is more than most think is acceptable.