Is my Bergara Bergarbage?

[Ronald W Schaefer]

A gun smith buddy of mine & competition bench rest loader/shooter said to tell you to just try another bullet. He says step one in load development should be to find a load in loading manual selecting a powder that is about the fastest velocity you can get using a ~92% loading density in the bullet weight you want to shoot. Then try several bullets with that same powder, primer, brass and seating depth. He said you will be amazed out how some bullet groups you can cover with a dime and some groups look like watering can. I use this technique myself now and it has saved countless work up hours and man...those rifles can really be picky about the bullet they like. Then I do the ladder test to find the nodes and tweak seating depth etc. Just for grins, try 68 grs I-4350 and 180 gr Barnes TTSX or Nolser AB. Max is 70 grs in Nosler book. My son has a Rem 700 Sendero SS heavy barrel with jewel trigger and it shoots a ragged hole with that combo.

 

[Arkansasdad]

Super frustrated. Review of this rifle and reading past experiences make it look fine, but I'm wondering if my barrel is defective? I did a proper break in procedure.

Bergara B14 HMR in 300WinMag. Gunwerks brass that's now on it's second firing. Berger 215s with H1000 powder and CCI 250s.

I try to load to perfection. My shoulder bumping, trimming, and seating is all within .001.


I fire formed my first 100 pieces and gathered data working up a ladder.The groups were all pretty terrible never even reaching 1 MOA but I figured was because of new brass. Now that I have my first round of fire formed brass I loaded as perfect as possible I'm still shooting god awful groups. It doesn't matter if I lock it up in a sled, shoot from a bench, or prone with a bipod.

My Pro Chrono 2 is showing an ES of nearly 200fps.


What in the world is going on? This has been incredibly expensive to shoot such garbage and still nowhere near a good load. Factory ammo wasn't match grade but still shot no better than 1.5MOA.

Advice?

Make sure your chrono is not in the shade and that shadows don't cover it, this can make a difference. Shoot some slower ammo, if your not getting a good burn the flash can do some crazy things to ES. Set your chrono out to 20 yds. to check this part. I would think that it is the method not the rifle that is giving you these results. I know that some recipes give better ES than others but a 200 spread is definitely to much to be ammo or the rifle as far as my experience goes. Happy shooting.

P.S. Please keep us informed this is where we all learn.

 

[freddiej]

101stCurrahee,
My sympathies/Empathies for your frustration.
I have been in your shoes. I had quite a few guns of clients over the years with similar ES and load problems.
Since I have seen multiples asking about your set up being loose or your scope being bad. I will disregard those and go straight to the gun itself and the brass.
first thing: The first sign indicator of heavy or varying brass is wide ES stats. do you have a bell curve like sets? a cluster of speeds in the middle and then strays shooting very low and then some shooting very high? if so weigh your brass. It is likely that all manufacturers sometimes have a couple heavy or really light pieces in every 50 count or 100 count lot. I have seen it before with Winchester, Rem, Federal, prolific with Privi, even Norma, Lapua, and Nosler brasses I have found an occasional few that were supper light or super heavy. the worst is Privi. the next worst is Winchester. I once found a 25 grain heavier piece of brass in an otherwise wonderful 1 grain spread in 100 count box. 99 of them were all within a spread of 241 to 242 grains (300 win mag) the last one was 267 grains. that piece was immediately culled.
IF the weights are okay, then I would think the problem lies in the powder, primer and projo.
Presuming you are as good as we all want to be, then I will have to say something that I do not like to have to put out there.
have you taken a tight patch and checked for a tight spot in your barrel? It happens to the best barrel manufacturers. there is an imperfection in the barrel.
From your targets you do not have a soft spot in the barrel or your groups would look more like a string.
That is all I have for you since most everyone else covered the rest of the possibilities.

 

[DJ Fergus]

101stCurrahee,
My sympathies/Empathies for your frustration.
I have been in your shoes. I had quite a few guns of clients over the years with similar ES and load problems.
Since I have seen multiples asking about your set up being loose or your scope being bad. I will disregard those and go straight to the gun itself and the brass.
first thing: The first sign indicator of heavy or varying brass is wide ES stats. do you have a bell curve like sets? a cluster of speeds in the middle and then strays shooting very low and then some shooting very high? if so weigh your brass. It is likely that all manufacturers sometimes have a couple heavy or really light pieces in every 50 count or 100 count lot. I have seen it before with Winchester, Rem, Federal, prolific with Privi, even Norma, Lapua, and Nosler brasses I have found an occasional few that were supper light or super heavy. the worst is Privi. the next worst is Winchester. I once found a 25 grain heavier piece of brass in an otherwise wonderful 1 grain spread in 100 count box. 99 of them were all within a spread of 241 to 242 grains (300 win mag) the last one was 267 grains. that piece was immediately culled.
IF the weights are okay, then I would think the problem lies in the powder, primer and projo.
Presuming you are as good as we all want to be, then I will have to say something that I do not like to have to put out there.
have you taken a tight patch and checked for a tight spot in your barrel? It happens to the best barrel manufacturers. there is an imperfection in the barrel.
From your targets you do not have a soft spot in the barrel or your groups would look more like a string.
That is all I have for you since most everyone else covered the rest of the possibilities.

You are right on about the brass.

 

[stljc2]

First...Did you pressure test with the powder your using to see if you have any evidence of over pressure? Like ejector swipe marks ect. If no then you need to find the threshold of pressure while looking at velocity, es, sd. I utilize .3 grain step ups from the lowest book recommendation loading 3 shells at each load and load up to max recommended load. IF I run into pressure signs STOP there..drop back a few grains and make that your next loaded max and see what it tells you (again es,sd, velocity average. Of course you MUST RECORD all results. If you've don this, and still no acceptable results, then the next question is going to be components. Maybe you should experiment a little with different powders and seating? NO DISRESPECT MENT HERE...Just trying to help. I don't know you and you don't know me ...so for what it's worth I hope it helped some..ifnot and your far more advanced in reloading than me I hope you won't take offence.

 

[Dean2]

Afternoon Gentleman! In full transparency, it should be known that I work for Bergara in Lawrenceville, Georgia.

I'm not here to get into any debates or try to dissuade your opinions on Bergara. I simply wanted to reach out to make sure that 101stCurrahee had our contact information so we can help diagnose his concerns. There are a ton of variables that go into hand loads and that's why we always benchmark with either match or premium factory loads for feed, function and accuracy purposes. If it will perform for factory loads then you can reasonably expect to improve using safe reloading. practices. For the 300 WM specifically, our go to load is the Norma 180 gr Oryx. Another bullet that shoots extremely consistent for us are the 185 Gr Juggernauts.

As for the bedding, the rifle should not need it. It is molded around an aluminum mini-chassis that is very solid. What i have seen sometimes is that a little bit of paint gets built up on the pillars and that can cause the gun to be fussy until removed.
View attachment 191949
At any rate, we absolutely guarantee our product to perform as advertised. If you believe you have an issue please do not hesitate to call us at 877-892-7544 or feel free to email me directly and I will have a technical support person call you. My email is [email protected].

Thanks,

Nate Treadaway

Have had customers who got friendly and helpful service from the Canadian warranty outlet, even if they took 2 or 3 tries to get it fixed right. This however is a whole other level of customer service and Care when the CEO of the distributor will deal directly with issues. Very impressed with your approach.

 

[101stCurrahee]

Have had customers who got friendly and helpful service from the Canadian warranty outlet, even if they took 2 or 3 tries to get it fixed right. This however is a whole other level of customer service and Care when the CEO of the distributor will deal directly with issues. Very impressed with your approach.

Update- 100% going in. Had a sniper acquaintance come shoot it. Walking up "It's probably shooter error or your load."

One 3 shot group later "*** is wrong with your rifle."

Smith checked the bore with a camera and said it didn't look right.

 

[Lee Goodwin]

For my part, it is a lot of money, and since you have rifle in hand....I would contact the manufacturer, and, in the mean time I would shoot the **** out of it. I would start with 165 grain nosler bullets, their seconds, from the pro shop, and start low on the powder load and work up. Then if satisfied I would go 190 grain custom comp Nosler's...and load light and work up. That caliber can kick like a mofo and I think you just gotta play with it a while. It may like flat base bullets better?
Make it your spring journey to figure that rifle out like some crazy red head you fell in love with along the way.

 

[Uncle yib]

Super frustrated. Review of this rifle and reading past experiences make it look fine, but I'm wondering if my barrel is defective? I did a proper break in procedure.

Bergara B14 HMR in 300WinMag. Gunwerks brass that's now on it's second firing. Berger 215s with H1000 powder and CCI 250s.

I try to load to perfection. My shoulder bumping, trimming, and seating is all within .001.


I fire formed my first 100 pieces and gathered data working up a ladder.The groups were all pretty terrible never even reaching 1 MOA but I figured was because of new brass. Now that I have my first round of fire formed brass I loaded as perfect as possible I'm still shooting god awful groups. It doesn't matter if I lock it up in a sled, shoot from a bench, or prone with a bipod.

My Pro Chrono 2 is showing an ES of nearly 200fps.


What in the world is going on? This has been incredibly expensive to shoot such garbage and still nowhere near a good load. Factory ammo wasn't match grade but still shot no better than 1.5MOA.

Advice?

Do a full length size on a small batch of 10 and then do your regular load on a batch of 10 and see if there's any difference sometimes new fully length sized brass shoots a little bit more accurately than neck sizing

 

[david g ranes]

101stCurrahee,
My sympathies/Empathies for your frustration.
I have been in your shoes. I had quite a few guns of clients over the years with similar ES and load problems.
Since I have seen multiples asking about your set up being loose or your scope being bad. I will disregard those and go straight to the gun itself and the brass.
first thing: The first sign indicator of heavy or varying brass is wide ES stats. do you have a bell curve like sets? a cluster of speeds in the middle and then strays shooting very low and then some shooting very high? if so weigh your brass. It is likely that all manufacturers sometimes have a couple heavy or really light pieces in every 50 count or 100 count lot. I have seen it before with Winchester, Rem, Federal, prolific with Privi, even Norma, Lapua, and Nosler brasses I have found an occasional few that were supper light or super heavy. the worst is Privi. the next worst is Winchester. I once found a 25 grain heavier piece of brass in an otherwise wonderful 1 grain spread in 100 count box. 99 of them were all within a spread of 241 to 242 grains (300 win mag) the last one was 267 grains. that piece was immediately culled.
IF the weights are okay, then I would think the problem lies in the powder, primer and projo.
Presuming you are as good as we all want to be, then I will have to say something that I do not like to have to put out there.
have you taken a tight patch and checked for a tight spot in your barrel? It happens to the best barrel manufacturers. there is an imperfection in the barrel.
From your targets you do not have a soft spot in the barrel or your groups would look more like a string.
That is all I have for you since most everyone else covered the rest of the possibilities.

I bought a b14 hmr in 6 creedmoor about 8 inches from the muzzle I would hit a tight spot when cleaning it but after a few rounds down the barrel it disappeared so not sure what the problem was but there moto is their barrels make the difference so I hope they don't have a lot of lemons my gun didn't come around till I had 120 shells ran through it was beginning to worry. David

 

[Muntell]

First off, a load with a 200 fps ES is not the best way to judge rifle accuracy. You need to figure out what is causing the big variation. That said, factory ammo doesn't shoot well either so I would measure the ES on the Factory stuff too. If they are also very wide that will tell you a few things. Second, I have worked on quite a few Bergara and they are prone to multiple defects. In order, bedding is bad, glass or pillar bed to fix, Chamber issues, needs to go back for new barrel. The chamber issues are sometimes so bad you can actually see them on the once fired cases and or they show up in measuring the various critical points. Also check to see it has enough throat, short throated chambers have been an issue too. Crown issues and sundry feeding issues round out the common defects. Unfortunately the track record of the warranty depot for fixing these issues properly is very poor and Bergara won't pay for a qualified smith to fix them locally. The good news is, except for the ones with poorly made chambers, once bedded and crowned most of them shot really good. The feeding issues are usually not that hard to repair.

My personal opinion after experience with them and the very poor customer support, there are much better rifles in the same price range. Let us know what you find.

I was thinking of buying a Bergara until I read your comment. What other rifles are in the same price range?

 

[JAYgs8163]

Be sure to update this when you get the rifle back Bergara. Everyone's interested now to see how this turns out and what the cause is. Good luck and glad to see Nate at Bergara getting on the thread and discussing.

 

[Dean2]

I was thinking of buying a Bergara until I read your comment. What other rifles are in the same price range?

Down there they are only about 1k. I would take a Tikka or Weatherby Vanguard with the sub MOA guarantee for less money, a Sako for slightly more or a Cooper. If I was specifically wanting to go lang range the Vanguard or a Savage would be where I started. At least with the Savage you can spin on an aftermarket barrel and still be about the same 1k into it but 99% of Savage factory barrels are perfectly capable of well under sub moa. .

 

[rustyshackleford]

Okay, I know the OP has said he is moving on to another rifle but I'm going to throw this out there anyway.
I have a Pro Chrono also and if I don't keep fresh batteries in it it gets flaky.
OP you said you are using CCI primers. Try some other brands. Federal 215 work better than any other in my particular 300 Winnie.
I have a M70 Supergrade in 308 that would not shoot worth beans. I literally spent hundreds of dollars on different reloading components trying to find that secret recipe that would shoot. Nothing seemed to work so I sat one day and went over everything I had tried. After thinking about it till my head hurt I realized I had tried only boat tailed bullets. I bought a box of flat base spitzer and it shot like a different gun. Problem solved.
Good luck with whatever you decide to do.

I read about the Satterlee development method and attempted it over a pro chrono. When I started the ladder portion it was overcast and I had the diffusers on. If memory serves I got like 2850 in a 30-06 with a 165 BTSP and thought I had a node based on the other velocities so I loaded up a few more and ate lunch and went to shoot a group over the chrono. Group was horrible and velocity had shot up about 100-150 ft sec. what had happened was the powder didn't like the primers for sure but the cloud cover had become partial so going from cloud cover to sunlight did that to my readings. I switched primers and that same combo is one of the most accurate loads from that gun with the lowest ES / SD I've ever had. Life is easier with a magnetospeed