I know there is a difference between .223 and 5.56, but.....?

[Geofois]

I see it for sale and sometimes on the box itself it says .223/5.56 as if it was the same thing. I think 5.56 is a thicker shell inward so has higher pressure, but correct me if I'm wrong. Do the kick the same? Do they reach out the same and accuracy at 200 yards? What about 400 yards? I see .223 for sale for about $.285 a round and 5.56 for $.31 a round both federal online.

[Jonathan Doe]

Ruger Mini-14 is marked 223 Remington, but they say it will handle 5.56.

[760knox]

Just go with the AR-15 thats made for 5.56 so you can shoot both
Also the 5.56 seems to kick a little more that the .223, I shot the federal stuff (223) and the green tip (556) from lake-city. As far as accuracy I haven't seen that much of a difference, but the place I shoot goes out to about 300 yards and im not really going for bullseye shots.

[PoofNoEyebrows]

5.56x45 does not abide by SAAMI specs, so yes they run a little hotter and yes they generally have thicker brass. Accuracy is going to boil down to several factors and not be reliant on a simple 5.56 vs. .223 comparison. Barrel length & rifling, weight & type of round, powder charge, lot consistency, etc are all going to come into play. The "green tips" you are referring too are probably M855 ball rounds. I could consistently hit the wheelhouse at 500 meters with them out of an A2 while in the Marines but believe me there is much better ammo out there for long distance. As far as recoil, are you serious?

[mif_slim]

200 hundred yards is nothing for the 223/556. As PNE said, accuracy its not on the round alone but all the other factors with it.

Although the 5.56 creates higher pressure it doesnt "out shoot" a .223. It just creats higher pressure to operate a dirty M4 for better reliability. A 62gr bullet flying at 3000fps pushed by 35,000PSI vs the same projectile and speed at 30,000PSI isnt going to fly faster or better.

[GeoffLinder]

As long as you have a 5.56 or .223 Wylde chamber in your rifle .223 and 5.56 ammo will be pretty much the same thing for you.

If your rifle is chambered in .223 Remington then you should be very cautious shooting .556 NATO ammo as the chamber leade is shorter in the .223 chamber and some 5.56 NATO bullet profiles can touch the lands when chambered and create an over-pressure situation.

[SixPointEight]

200 hundred yards is nothing for the 223/556. As PNE said, accuracy its not on the round alone but all the other factors with it.

Although the 5.56 creates higher pressure it doesnt "out shoot" a .223. It just creats higher pressure to operate a dirty M4 for better reliability. A 62gr bullet flying at 3000fps pushed by 35,000PSI vs the same projectile and speed at 30,000PSI isnt going to fly faster or better.

Dude! 30k psi vs 35k psi will make the bullet fly faster. Usually the velocity difference is on the order of 100-150fps depending on the barrel etc etc. What's that mean down range? A couple extra yards of fragmentation, and just a hair flatter shooting. To Joe Average, it just don't make no difference

[popeye4]

http://ammo.ar15.com/ammo/project/hist_diff.html

[Geofois]

ok great, thanks for all the info. I didn't think there would be much kick either way. The .223 was just a 2.5 cents cheaper per round. My brother will just be irritated if I get .223 vs 5.56, hehe. For our purposes it won't matter at all.

[pennstater]

PoofNoEyebrows: what a great handle!

[NotEnufGarage]

Ruger Mini-14 is marked 223 Remington, but they say it will handle 5.56.

If by "they" you mean Ruger, you're right. It says so in the Mini-14 owners manual.

[NotEnufGarage]

I think most of the 5.56 is made to looser tolerances than .223, but since it's designed for higher pressures that's probably okay, as long as your rifle is designed to handle it.

Commercial .223 is better packaged, so fewer dented rounds than bulk packed 5.56 I would imagine with the volumes they produce there is more charge variation round to round, but still within specs. Ditto for bullet weight variation.

None of that really matters for plinking, target practice type rounds. If you're going to be shooting distance, you'll want more consistent loads and probably should look into loading your own.

[mif_slim]

Dude! 30k psi vs 35k psi will make the bullet fly faster

True, but let's take for example an paintball gun. The old Angels use to run 1200PSI, the Shocker ran low pressure 320PSI, the Blazer/auto cockers ran 450PSI but they all chrono 295-300fps... O_o lol

[SixPointEight]

.22-250 (65,000) runs the roughly the same pressure as 5.56 (63,000) , but can run some of the same bullets 400fps faster, for a given barrel length.

Volume must have an effect.

And in paintball guns I would assume both volume and it's efficiency would come into effect, though I don't know much about how they work.

For firearms I would assume efficiencies are about the same, which could be way wrong.

All I know is a lot of black magic happens inside that brass

[mif_slim]

Lol. The PSI is diffrent from chamber/barrel length etc etc. If I said a 16" barrel pushing 35,000PSI and snotty 16" pushing 30,000PSi are equal in velocity given the same gr bullet.... Then that's a diffrent story, but the example I gave before could of been shot from a 12" vs a 50" bbl. A 30kPSi is getting 3000fps from a 24" bbl while maybe a 16" bbl is pushing 35kPSi making 3000PSI is what I was trying to say.. Lol... Confusing from my iPhone..