Favorite powder - .243 Win/55 grain NBT's

[300winnie]

I spent some time working with RL15 and H380 last year in an attempt to put together a fast load for coyotes. RL15 eventually gave me decent velocity, but only o.k. accuracy. H380 gave me great velocity, but again, only so-so accuracy. When I say so, so accuracy it hovers right around 1 inch/100 yards. I know the gun is capable of better accuracy (at least with other bullets) as I can get sub m.o.a. out of Hornady 100 grain BTSP's all day long with IMR 4831.

If I had to live with what I have I could, but I want to ring as much of the potential as I can out of the gun.

With the above said, what powder(s) would you try next and in what order.

Thanks.

 

[AJ Peacock]

The best I found for my Rem700 was an h380 load that was toward to the top of the Hornady recommended loading (exactly the top, please work up slowly though). The lower loads struggled to get down to 1". The upper load consistently was 5/8"-3/4" 5 shot groups at 100yds.

The lower pressure loads just didn't want to shoot for me in my rifle.

HTH

AJ

 

[300Rumbum]

55 Grain Noslers

Try Varget. 45.0 grains works really well in two of my 243 rifles. Really makes coyotes go down.

 

[biff's reloading]

45gr varget is a max load, but it does work well for me also. i went to 48.2 with win brass in the savage without any signs of pressure, but accuracy was best at 45.3. the very best accuracy was with 39.5gr alliant 10x and nosler 55gr btips. goes 3740fps. its a hot load in my father-in-laws stevens 200, but i went to 42 gr in the savage without trouble. i think the stevens is a little tight, because rem factory 100gr corelokt's leave a bad extractor mark(even shaves off a bit of brass) and bolt lift is very tight. it shoots 125fps faster than the savage with all loads.

just giving an example of why to be careful loading with info from a website...

 

[Falconry]

Friend and I were both reloading for .243 and after trying Varget, and a couple other powders we both had best luck with IMR 4350. This was in 3 different rifles so the loads were not the same, but we had a Rem Model 710 (the cheap one!) shooting .750 3 shot groups at 200 yards. My son's single shot New England Handi-Rifle (good little training rifle) is shooting about 1" groups consistently at 100 yards and I won't complain at all.

 

[john_m44]

I have a Interarms Mark X that has been rebarreled with a douglas XX supreme. The best load that I have found is 43.5 gr IMR 4064 running around 3750. This load will constantly shoot under 1/2 inch and sometimes smaller.
I'm not sure but I belive that Nosler max is 45gr.

One of my other loads that I tried but didn't shoot as good was H 414 that load was much faster.

Thats my .02

 

[MachV]

A full case of H414 may not be the fastest load but has shot great in the 4 243's I tryed it in. Have tryed Varget,380 and R15 but have yet to find a load that will outshoot 51.5 grains of H414. H414 meters very well in the Dillon as long as I keep the brass seperated...Remington brass seams to hold a little more powder.

 

[faucettb]

I'll second the post on H414 behind the 55 grain NBT's. It's giving me great accuracy from both a Remington VLS and an old Ruger #1.

 

[roninflag]

my brother uses varget out of his bar. great results

 

[loaders_loft]

H414, 51.0 gr yields 4050fps in my tikka T-3 lite. Here's the group...

This load yields flat primers so excercise caution. I started at 49gr and went up .5gr each. Once I got this, no more tests were necessary...

0.8" measured outside to outside, essentially 5 shots in 2 holes.

 

[papa45]

45.0 gr Varget gives me 3730 fps out of my Savage with the standard 22" barrel. Groups are a little under 1".