Ladder test help

ohiohunter

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I loaded up a handful of bullets in 0.2gr increments to ladder test my 300wm at 400yds. After culling 2 charges the rest of the group all reside within 1.5" vertical. Three things could happen here 1) someone who is better at this than me will tell me what my load is. 2) I close my eyes and pick a load. 3) I do it all over again at longer distance. Which is it going to be guys?

25" Bartlein 5r barrel shooting 215gr bergers about 0.040 off the lands in RWS brass with fed 215M primers.
 
here it is... I think my dart will land on ~71.5gr.. yes no?
 

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I'm with wildcater on this one. There is no node that jumps out at me. Perhaps instead of shooting charges with just .2 grains of difference, I would suggest a .5 grain difference and re-shoot your test. Maybe load from 70 to 74 grains in half grain increments and make sure your are at least 300 yards from target.
 
I'm with wildcater on this one. There is no node that jumps out at me. Perhaps instead of shooting charges with just .2 grains of difference, I would suggest a .5 grain difference and re-shoot your test. Maybe load from 70 to 74 grains in half grain increments and make sure your are at least 300 yards from target.

I agree.

I would suggest that 0.2 grains becomes almost meaningless in the capacity of a 300WM. I use 0.5gr in my 7mm Rem and 7mm Wby, for example. 0.3gr is saved for my 35 Remington.
 
Did you run into pressure yet? If not I would load some up to 74 grains, as was said before, and shoot them looking for pressures signs. If you did hit pressure I would look seriously at 71.6 as long as there wasn't pressure there. 71.4, 71.6, 71.8 look to have an acceptable amount of vertical for 400 yards.
Keep us informed as to how it goes. Good luck.
Jon
 
I agree with the .5g increment. Or pick your 71.5g load and tweak seating depth until you tighten the group. Any more I have been loading to velocity in .5g jumps all on the same target looking for an obvious node with the chrono. Looking at the target and vel. Often the target does not show conclusive. Like yours. Vel will often show a node, but not always. So I find acceptable vel then tweek seating depth if needed to get better group.

Steve
 
Anymore I load to whole numbers find the best node then work a .5g up and down to see if I can get it tighter. Once I find the charge I like then I start working on seating depth.
 
What powder? If 4831sc or Re22 I wouldn't go any higher, H-1000 or Retumbo you're not getting warmed up yet.
 
What powder? If 4831sc or Re22 I wouldn't go any higher, H-1000 or Retumbo you're not getting warmed up yet.

H-1000 in rws brass. My primers aren't pancaked, but flat w/ round on the edge. Everything reads rws has 3-4gr less capacity.
 
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