little help with a 140r berger for a 260

[Firearrow]

Im still a few months away from my build being completed, but I am gathering my components and load info. I plan on using H4350, Lapua brass, and 140gr Bergers. From what I have gathered the min charge weight is about 40.0, and the loads get warm around 43.5ish.

Was hoping someone will chime in on the charge weights, and what your experiences are with primers. Was looking at Fed 210, 210M, and CCI Lg Rifle BR.

Thanks
Garett

 

[matt_3479]

I'm running lapua brass, 140 Berger hybrids and 140 Amax, h-4350 at 42 grains .005 thou off lands and its throwin them in between .3-.4's at the moment. Had lots of groups around the .2's but not everytime

 

[Firearrow]

Thanks for info. If you don't mind me asking what did you use as your starting charge weight and when did you start to see some pressure signs, and what primers are you using?

 

[tucker4682]

Im still a few months away from my build being completed, but I am gathering my components and load info. I plan on using H4350, Lapua brass, and 140gr Bergers. From what I have gathered the min charge weight is about 40.0, and the loads get warm around 43.5ish.

Was hoping someone will chime in on the charge weights, and what your experiences are with primers. Was looking at Fed 210, 210M, and CCI Lg Rifle BR.

Thanks
Garett

As far as the loads go you will figure out what it likes when you get it up and shooting. In my experience the Fed 210M primers are the best out there and I used them for my load development. With that being said I wish I had used Win LR primers in load development, because they have been the most consistent primers that I can actually buy. The Fed 210M have been out of stock everywhere for a few years. There is a difference in poi between the 2 primers. It won't matter so much what you decide to use as long as you can get enough of it to repeat it as long as neccisarry to find the sweet spot in your gun. My 260 will shoot Bergers, Amax, Sierras, from FC brass, or Laupua, or Nosler. Just figure out what you like what you want to use and make a commitment to it until you decide that it will, or won't work. That would have saved me a lot of money. In the beginning I was in such a hurry to try different components I didn't get finished with the one test before I started another. My load development was only half done, and I had a lot of rounds down the barrel.

 

[matt_3479]

Thanks for info. If you don't mind me asking what did you use as your starting charge weight and when did you start to see some pressure signs, and what primers are you using?

As far as primers I'm using fed 210M. But the cci br2 worked well too. My situation is a little strange. I had the gun by extremely talented and fantastic gunsmiths but when I received the gun I tried 6 seating depths, 2 powders, 3 primers and 3 bullets and couldn't get a group to break an inch.

The rifle is a stiller tac 30, benchmark 1:8twist sendero contour barrel finished st 26, jewel trigger, McMillan a5 stock, nightforce nxs scope. I send it back to the smiths and they looked it over and shot it and nothing seemed to be wrong but it just wouldn't shoot. They swapped rings and bam! Right away started shooting. I got the rifle back late in the year and load development never really got started. Because they didn't want to over charge the load they started with a safe 42gr oh H-4350 .005 thou off the lands and it shot amazing. So I bought some new rings and stuck with the load up until now. I will be re starting load development on it too see if I can keep or increase accuracy and pick up addition fps. But when the rifle wasn't shooting, I believe i started st 42grs, and went up to 46-46.5. I'll have to check my book to verify. I had some pressure there but nothing major.

 

[Firearrow]

Thanks for the reply. I just wanted a target charge weight for min/max to load up so that I am ready to go after I get the rifle and I get the barrel broke in. I know I could do a max pressure test, and I will be getting my rifle in the early summer to set a true max. I am a little leery about pushing the limits on a new rifle that I just spent a ton of money on and on vergin Lapua brass. Call me a wuss.

 

[lamiglas]

mine likes lapua brass, 40.5 gr of h4350, cci 200, 140 berger vlds at 10 thou off the lands. I just did load development for my nephew's new 260 last weekend. using same ingredients, here is what I did. mounted/ leveled scope, boresighted it to get it on paper. loaded one each at 40, 40.5, 41, 41.5, 42, 42.5, 43, 43.5. As I shot these I looked over each case for pressure signs (ejector marks, flat primers, heavy bolt etc). I didn't see any pressure issues all the way up but didn't test any further because I don't have any interest in going beyond 43.5 for this gun/ application. Now, at 100 yards not alot can be taken from this, but I noticed that the first three loads were in one hole about .3 and then the remaining loads went up about 1 inch and opened the total group up to about 1.25 inches. next step, I loaded 3 each at the charges listed. 40, and 40.5 both went around .5. 41 was incredibly small, in the .1s and 41.5 and 42 were both near .5. 42.5 to 43.5 were in the .9 to 1.2 inch range. I loaded up 6 more at 41 to confirm the load, and they both were unbelievably small. so my gun likes 40.5 and my nephew's likes 41. I feel that this was a pretty quick method for finding what your gun likes. good luck

 

[Firearrow]

Thanks for the info.