7LRM Hornady 175grn ELD-X load data please

[Sneekeehunter]

Can someone please help me with starting point load data for the Hornady 175 eld-x in my new 7LRM. I've planing on using hornady brass, cci primes and h1000. I've got Retumbo and fed primes if need be but based on my research this far the h1000 and cci's are a better choice. I'd love to hear any recipes or advice you have/can give. Even a Quick Load work up would be great but I don't know what my coal will be yet. My gun will be done by the end of the week and I'd like to start somewhere working up some loads. Thank you all!!
-Dan

 

[Sneekeehunter]

Anyone??

 

[jgal72]

Gunwerks load is is 70.5 gr. of H1000, Fed 215, 175 eld-x, OAL 3.405". Just received my Mountainx from them.

 

[Sneekeehunter]

Gunwerks load is is 70.5 gr. of H1000, Fed 215, 175 eld-x, OAL 3.405". Just received my Mountainx from them.

Thanks for the response. I spoke with GW yesterday and was informed they were having a heck of a time getting a "consistent" load with the 175's. They believe it's a quality control issue with the Hornady bullets. Primarily, they are seeing 1-2 grain inconsistencies and .001-.002 thou differences in wall thickness. I got the impression 70.5 was as close to a sweet spot as they had found but they are trying to find that load that will shoot "acceptably" in a "factory" type load they can mass produce.

Let me know how your gun does and if you plan on using that load keep me posted. I'm going to work up a ladder for those specks and see what happens. I'll load up some 180 bergs also to see what my baby likes.

Good luck!
-Dan

 

[Sneekeehunter]

Gunwerks load is is 70.5 gr. of H1000, Fed 215, 175 eld-x, OAL 3.405". Just received my Mountainx from them.

Have you shot this load in your rifle yet? I have and I'm having a heck of a time getting it to shoot at all...

 

[jgal72]

Yes, I shot it when I first got the gun. My first two shots touched every time I shot at 200 yds. Once the barrel got warm it open up a bit. Its been so hot here in PA I haven't shot much in the last six weeks. Hope it cools off soon! I want to shoot it a good bit before going to Colorado in October. The load I gave you was what my turret was made for. I was a little disappointed that the velocity was only 2946 fps. About a week after I received my gun a second turret showed up in the mail. Seems there was a increase in B.C. from the original. Have you tried any others powders? Guns are different, just like people. Just because it shoots in one doesn't mean it will in another. I really question one load working in all 7 LRM's or any caliber for that matter. If I had it to do again, I would just do the load development myself. My thinking when I ordered it was that since I was dropping down all this change, I'll let them shoot it and make sure its OK. Turned out the original barrel they put on the gun didn't shoot to there standards and they re-barreled it.

 

[Sneekeehunter]

Yes, I shot it when I first got the gun. My first two shots touched every time I shot at 200 yds. Once the barrel got warm it open up a bit. Its been so hot here in PA I haven't shot much in the last six weeks. Hope it cools off soon! I want to shoot it a good bit before going to Colorado in October. The load I gave you was what my turret was made for. I was a little disappointed that the velocity was only 2946 fps. About a week after I received my gun a second turret showed up in the mail. Seems there was a increase in B.C. from the original. Have you tried any others powders? Guns are different, just like people. Just because it shoots in one doesn't mean it will in another. I really question one load working in all 7 LRM's or any caliber for that matter. If I had it to do again, I would just do the load development myself. My thinking when I ordered it was that since I was dropping down all this change, I'll let them shoot it and make sure its OK. Turned out the original barrel they put on the gun didn't shoot to there standards and they re-barreled it.

Turns out my bottom metal was touching the trigger and was also causing some stress on the action when it was torqued down. Prior to figuring that out I tried several different variations of Retumbo and CCI primers with the 175's with no luck. The Retumbo ran about 50 fps slower in every charge. Then I found the issues with the BM and fixed those.

I ran a 300 yard ladder test last weekend with these same components (H1000, 175's, fed's) from 67.5 grns up to 72 grns in .5grn increments. I had much better results this go-around. There is definitely a node between 70-71 grains. There was less than 3/4" vertical dispersion between those three charges at 300 yards. I'm going out tomorrow to shoot a 500 yard ladder with 69.9, 70.2, 70.5, 70.8, and 71.1 grains. I'm fairly condiment it's going to end up back at 70.5. I'm running the 175's coal to ogive at 2.696 using a hornady comp. My 70.5 load is averaging about 3011fps in a Proof Research 26" sendero light barrel.

 

[jgal72]

Have you notice any extreme copper fouling with the eldx? I cleaned my gun the other day and it took a lot of work to get all the copper out. I use Boretech elimanator and I probably had to repeat the process ten times to get it clean.

 

[c-ne-elk]

I have also seen extreme copper fouling using the ELD-X while using it in a 6.5. Also could never get them to group using a 26 Nosler.
In my Gunwerks MtnX 7 LRM and in my Matt Spoon 7 LRM I use 180 g Bergers both the VLD Hunter and Hybrid's. They shoot so good and have performed so well there is no way you could get me to try another bullet in the 7 LRM. Might think about switching to them...

 

[Sneekeehunter]

They definitely are finicky. I think I found the sweet spot .22tho of the lands. One thing that I've found is that you must weigh the 175's. I've noticed quite a big difference in weight. Once I weeded out the outliers and kept them with .001 of a gram then they perform much better. They do seem to copper foul a gun up pretty good. I tried the 180vld's but I need to work up another ladder with them after I get a load worked up for the 175's.

 

[Sneekeehunter]

I didn't have much trouble cleaning it today. I cleaned it after about 100 rounds. It took exactly 8 patches to clean it. I used wipeout and two patches, gave her a good scrub with a nylon brush and let it sit for 25 minutes then used 4 more with wipeout until they came out clean and the used one to oil and 2 to dry swab. No more copper in that baby!!

My ladder test today was pretty productive and surprising. 70.2 grns H1000 loaded to ogive of 2.696 had the least verticals dispersion. 3 shot group measured 2.01" center to center horizontal dispersion and .90" vertical dispersion at 500 yards. I think that equates to about .25moa @ 500 yards. Interestingly 70.5 grns was the third worst group with vertical dispersion about 2" in that load. 69.9 grns was the second best group with a vertical dispersion about 1.1". I'm fairly confident that the sweet spot is between 70 and 70.2 grains.

I've already loaded up 5 different seating depth loads with 70.2 to try. I started .010 off the lands and worked back .020 thou for each load. I'll be pretty happy if she will hold that .25moa @ 500!

 

[Sneekeehunter]

Well I'm scratching my head. None of my loads were "acceptable" and most of them were scattered worse than 00buck. The best group was loaded @ 2.653 to the ogive. Best I can tell that's about .062 thou off the lands. That's not terribly out of reach but a little surprising. I also discovered that 70.1 grn of H1000 over the federal 215's is the fastest most stable load with a SD of about 12fps. I loaded up some Berger 180 vld's at the same seating depth and charge and they shot WAY better than the 175 eld-x's.

I also loaded up three exact same loads with only the primers being different. I tried fed 215's, cci 250's and Remington #9's. The Feds were the fastest and best grouping shots.

One thing I've noticed is that there is little to no vertical dispersion (with 70.1grns at 2.653 over fed 215's) in my groups but there is about a 3-4 inch horizontal spread in the best load combinations. Any idea what could be causing this! Wind was nominal at the range. Maybe 5mph tops. I can't see a 5mph wind pushing it 4" @ 200 yards. "Stumped!"

 

[jgal72]

Your not the only one scratching your head. Shot my mountainx with lousy results this week. Best I could get was a 2 inch group at 100 yards with The load data Gunwerks gave me. Whats interesting is that I ordered 3 boxes of ammo with this gun. Gun was shipped without ammo. When I question where was my ammo, Garrett told me there not loading the eldx's for sale yet. I had to email twice to get the load data. I didn't question it at the time because I just wanted to get my gun. Told 5 to 6 months when ordered, took 11. My friend has a Magnus 7LRM. After 3 years his starts blowing primers and splitting necks. 72.0 grains H1000 180 VLD. The load they gave him when he bought the gun. Now Gunwerks is telling him the load is too hot and they changed it? How about notifying your customers! I ran into a gentleman at the range on Saturday who has a 7LRM from Gunwerks. He has over 400 rounds in his and can't get it to shoot consistently. He has boiled it down to the brass not being very good. He told he tried turning the necks which helped, but still not great. I tried different bullets to see how they shot. I did get 1/2 moa with Nosler 160 accubond with RL 26 powder. Its hard to get those to shoot bad! Sorry for getting off thread but my frustration boiled over this weekend. I plan on calling Gunwerks today to discuss my gun. I just hope I can get someone to answer the phone, which is becoming a problem.

 

[c-ne-elk]

Jgal - Between me and my buddies we have 4 different 7 LRM's. 2 are Mtn X's. All are about 3 years old with lots of rounds down their tubes. We all shoot 180 Bergers some shoot VLD's and some shoot Hybrids. It has been a journey. We had one gun that was blowing primer's turned out it was a dirty throat, there was a time when Hornadays brass was manufactured with the necks too thick and yet another time when Hodgen's H1000 powder came in it was super hot and we had to reduce our loads with it until we used it up.
Even with all the bunps along the way these were minor setbacks that were easily overcome (once they were figured out). We use our LRM's mainly for hunting so they dont get the round count as our weekly shooters (less than 300 rounds per year out of our LRM's -vs- 1000+ out of our other rifles)
Dont give up on your MtnX. Its a great rifle in a great cartridge!