Load Development

[LynnJr]

Seating depth has the second biggest affect on your rifles accuracy next only to the powder charge.
Most competitive shooters will load all there rounds within 0.001 variation.

[choprzrul]

Got my new Savage custom shop 6.5 Creedmoor and have done the first 70 rounds for break in. 8 rounds fired after thorough cleaning and complete copper removal from bore. All load ladder rounds were fired from warm barrel. Used a chamber chiller between shots to try and maintain a very consistent barrel temp.

Overcast skies and steady temps right at 70 degrees. Slight crosswind left to right, but generally couldn't feel it until about 50 yards out from the firing line. The breeze was consistent throughout all test rounds. Test fired at 100 yards round robin x3 rounds for each load. 1% increments for the loads.

Here is what my spreadsheet ended up with:

Load Ladder.jpg

And here is a picture of my targets after I was finished with the test:

Targets.jpg

Disregard the bullet holes with the 'X' thru them.....some jackwagon was shooting at my target :-(

I'm very happy with the overall accuracy of this 20" barrel Savage across all loads. Pretty darn good for a factory barrel I think. Interesting data from that table. It is temping to go after that 39.4gr load given the 3 shot group, but when I look at the SD and velocity spread, I question if it is an anomoly....plus, where is that group going to center on a 100 degree day? Is it going to wander off into where the 39.8gr group is centered?

I think I will load 5 each at the following charge weights and evaluate group sizes and where they center:

40.8
41.0
41.2

41.6
41.8
42.0

This is all WAY too much fun :-)

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