Hi,
It's been awhile since I posted anything here and I have some reloading questions. Encouraged by the experience of some members, I got an FN SPR several years back. I absolutely love the rifle. I shot my first F class match this past Sunday at River Bend Gun Club and I'm excited to do it again. The other guys looked at me kinda funny in a puzzled way when they notice I had to dial in around 17 MOA to reach 600 yards (100yrd zero). I scored okay with the handload and it also worked great in an Armalite AR-10 SASS my girlfriend used in the same match albeit, around (2470 ft/sec) 82 ft/sec slower than the the FN.
It's my first handload actually, it was pretty accurate so I left it alone for years. Originally I was trying to get near 2650 ft/sec per the Sierra reloading manual but i see now they are far too conservative and Hornaday's manual says 2600 is max. Since my load is similar to one below I found here, I thought someone might share their thoughts on this combination.
"Reloader-15 in 308
Last fall I started loading 44.0 gr. of RL-15 in Winchester cases /w a Sierra 168 gr. BTHP and CCI-200 primer. In October I chronographed this load at 2569 ft/sec out of my 24" barreled FN SPR in 308. Accuracy was outstanding. As far as my limited ability to determine pressure goes - case extraction was easy and the primers were not flatten ( in fact the spent primers still retained a slight radius around their perimeter). Temperature on the day I chronographed my loads was only 45 degrees. Has any body else used this load and how safe do you think this load will be as far as pressure this summer when temps are over 95 degrees?"
I'm also getting around the same velocity. It's around 2552 ft/sec from an SPR 24"
168 SMK
winchester brass
42.8gr of RL-15
Fed 210 primers
OACL 2.800
Research in the past few days is leading me to understand that winchester brass has more internal volume than other brands and needs a bit more powder to achieve the same pressure as other brass. This could account for the slower performance than what i was originally expecting. Some people suggest to increase powder by 1 to 1.5 gn to compensate for winchester brass. But how was i getting roughly similar velocity using the same powder as someone else using more of it? Is the stated velocity a typo? Because i was expecting something faster from the other guy's loadout. Is it conceivable that a 1 to 1.5 gr increase is only going to produce 17 ft/sec difference?
Before i came across that post, I estimated that i should bump up the load to 44gr (closer to what others here are using) to get in the neighborhood of 2650 ft/sec or 13ish MOA dialed in the scope. But after seeing that load, i'm not sure what to expect now. The manuals seem to think above 44 is too much. I wanted a rough calculation before I work up test ladder loads to try at the public 100yrd range.
I see a few guys on here using varget in the SPR and most use 175 smk for the added wind stability. Before I do that, I still have lots of RL-15, winchester brass and SMK168's i'd like to use for now. What's been users experience with the FN SPR and RL-15? Anyone else using this combination to safely get above 2600 ft/sec?
I'm also thinking about investing in a barrel mounted chronograph so I can use the local indoor ranges - making load development more productive and fun. Around Atlanta, a trip to the public WMA range to set up a chronograph is practically a road trip.
Thanks
Tom
It's been awhile since I posted anything here and I have some reloading questions. Encouraged by the experience of some members, I got an FN SPR several years back. I absolutely love the rifle. I shot my first F class match this past Sunday at River Bend Gun Club and I'm excited to do it again. The other guys looked at me kinda funny in a puzzled way when they notice I had to dial in around 17 MOA to reach 600 yards (100yrd zero). I scored okay with the handload and it also worked great in an Armalite AR-10 SASS my girlfriend used in the same match albeit, around (2470 ft/sec) 82 ft/sec slower than the the FN.
It's my first handload actually, it was pretty accurate so I left it alone for years. Originally I was trying to get near 2650 ft/sec per the Sierra reloading manual but i see now they are far too conservative and Hornaday's manual says 2600 is max. Since my load is similar to one below I found here, I thought someone might share their thoughts on this combination.
"Reloader-15 in 308
Last fall I started loading 44.0 gr. of RL-15 in Winchester cases /w a Sierra 168 gr. BTHP and CCI-200 primer. In October I chronographed this load at 2569 ft/sec out of my 24" barreled FN SPR in 308. Accuracy was outstanding. As far as my limited ability to determine pressure goes - case extraction was easy and the primers were not flatten ( in fact the spent primers still retained a slight radius around their perimeter). Temperature on the day I chronographed my loads was only 45 degrees. Has any body else used this load and how safe do you think this load will be as far as pressure this summer when temps are over 95 degrees?"
I'm also getting around the same velocity. It's around 2552 ft/sec from an SPR 24"
168 SMK
winchester brass
42.8gr of RL-15
Fed 210 primers
OACL 2.800
Research in the past few days is leading me to understand that winchester brass has more internal volume than other brands and needs a bit more powder to achieve the same pressure as other brass. This could account for the slower performance than what i was originally expecting. Some people suggest to increase powder by 1 to 1.5 gn to compensate for winchester brass. But how was i getting roughly similar velocity using the same powder as someone else using more of it? Is the stated velocity a typo? Because i was expecting something faster from the other guy's loadout. Is it conceivable that a 1 to 1.5 gr increase is only going to produce 17 ft/sec difference?
Before i came across that post, I estimated that i should bump up the load to 44gr (closer to what others here are using) to get in the neighborhood of 2650 ft/sec or 13ish MOA dialed in the scope. But after seeing that load, i'm not sure what to expect now. The manuals seem to think above 44 is too much. I wanted a rough calculation before I work up test ladder loads to try at the public 100yrd range.
I see a few guys on here using varget in the SPR and most use 175 smk for the added wind stability. Before I do that, I still have lots of RL-15, winchester brass and SMK168's i'd like to use for now. What's been users experience with the FN SPR and RL-15? Anyone else using this combination to safely get above 2600 ft/sec?
I'm also thinking about investing in a barrel mounted chronograph so I can use the local indoor ranges - making load development more productive and fun. Around Atlanta, a trip to the public WMA range to set up a chronograph is practically a road trip.
Thanks
Tom
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