Trigger magazine: 25 creedmoor - ultimate hybrid or ballistic bastard?

Nope, generalized statement based on quite a few responses over the last few years from several folks about how the .257 caliber needed/needs an upgrade and to be brought into modern times. That's the reason that the .257 Blackjack bullet hasn't even really shown up on the gun rag editor radar. That .25CM ad would have been a perfect time to show-off a brand new bullet and cartridge. It's a game changer, but they're allegiances are to all-hail Whorenady and their cartridges and what Whorenady says is the best. If Whorenady didn't make it, they don't want to promote it, because it will never be good enough.
Yep I don't mind some hornady stuff like the VMAX. But everyone and their brother seems to think hornady is head and shoulders better than everything else. At least by me
 
A lot of fake news with a dash of voodoo sprinkled in. There are no 25 cal bullets that can run with the 6's and 6.5's. That's a hard cold fact. There are no 25 cal bullets anywhere close to .330 G7 BC. Cartridges do determine BC, sectional density and form factor do. You can't bend physics anymore than you can make water run uphill... which is a physics thing. The larger corporate manufacturers of ammo, bullets and guns spend a lot of money marketing their wares and you can bet any published BC's from Nosler, Hornady, Speer, etc are an exaggeration ( I was nice and didn't say lie)

Hey, I'm not knocking the Creed, it's a good little cartridge. But the 6 Creed and 6.5 Creed are going to be out shouting the 25 Creed for quite a while until the bullet makers star doing some R&D and produce some long, sleek, heavy for cal bullets in .257[

I am not sure if you are kidding or not so I'll just address the statements as they came.

"There are no 25 cal bullets anywhere close to .330 G7 BC" - Our prototype run averaged 0.330 G7 at 1000 yds over various 10 round strings of fire. Our production run has not been tested over an Oehler 88 or Oehler89 system but the shooting community has reported 0.345-0.350 G7 on the production run 131 gr ACEs loud and clear. We put focus on making the meplats more consistent and more pointy for the production run resulting in a 0.23" longer bullet and about 0.015 G7 points to boot.

Yes, a lot of companies have abused their marketing powers and brand loyalty to over represent their bullets historically and even currently. Our whole company philosophy is to provide actual #'s, and as the magazine article indicates and the competition shooting community knows, our published BC of 0.330 G7 at 2940 fps is "Conservative".

The shooters running 0.330 G7 are shooting over their small and medium sized targets at 800 - 1000 yds. The messages I get from people about this are some of the best texts and PM's I get on my phone.

A comment from the shooting community easily found with Google.

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A statement by one of the best marksmen in the USA.


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Follow up by this top shooter after more testing and laying down 3-4" groups at 900 yds

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Another shooter easily found by search engine on forums

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Anyhow, the information and reception of Conservative BC #'s is there when you want to research it. It's here on this forum as well.

Regarding the last sentence of your post: "until the bullet makers star doing some R&D and produce some long, sleek, heavy for cal bullets in .257"

That R&D was done years ago and the prototypes were made last spring and one of the most efficient for weight bullets to hit the market was released in September 2018.

It happened to be a 25 Caliber that weighs 131 grains.

After we produce 3 high performance 25 Cal bullets, our cartridge with brass and dies and reamers, we will release other bullets too.

Lots of good things to come.

MJ
 
MY bad, I thought I had read they were claiming a .370 G7. That said,
I'm not dismissing your field experiences but at the same time I would be VERY surprised that the BJ 131 BC is greater than the Berger 6.5 140 Hybrid

I don't mind the skepticism or the generalities of these types of statements. We get them a lot.

As most of the guys know, we spent a couple of years looking at nearly every single modern projectile from the efficiency of what might as well be the G7 Standard, the Lapua Scenar and upwards in efficiency to the latest and greatest.

We looked at boat tail length, boat tail diameter, boat tail angle, bearing surface length, hybrid section lengths, nose lengths, ogive radius, and the ratios of all these elements together.

Why are some bullets under-performers when everything seems pretty much right? Why do a handful of bullets seem to work just that much better? There are very specific reasons once you line them all up and look closely.

When you review that data it's quite obvious that the designer at JLK really pushed a few big things forward in the ballistics world and did not get as much credit as due.

Other custom makers like Hoover and a few small shops really hit homeruns with way-ahead-of-their-time form factors, and due to the nature of their production capacity these things never really made it to the market in a way the average shooter was aware of their advantages.

I love the 140 hybrid and the 180 hybrid and the 230 hybrid. BUT it's not that hard to out-design them ballistically.

I cannot speak for Berger and their design team, but those bullets represent a very balanced and well shooting family of designs that has stood the test of time. I know they know how to make more aggressive bullets, but their product line was superior at the point of entry and still claims many titles and shooters' loyalties today despite more efficient designs.

To push the envelope on any design parameter you enter into trade-offs. I won't get too in depth on the how and why we decided to push X% this far in one design element and cut Y% to just there, but it should be pretty clear the combination of pushing the envelop closer to the edge but not too far worked out pretty well.

Our next bullet designed for hunters follows the same philosophy and will outrun this 131 ACE in same-parent-case comparisons to 1000-1100 yards and hit a bit harder on the way out there too!

It was designed for HUNTERS but the side effects of such an efficient design will benefit midrange target shooters and a lot of BR, x47, and Creed case users in competitions.
 
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I don't mind the skepticism or the generalities of these types of statements. We get them a lot.

As most of the guys know, we spent a couple of years looking at nearly every single modern projectile from the efficiency of what might as well be the G7 Standard, the Lapua Scenar and upwards in efficiency to the latest and greatest.

We looked at boat tail length, boat tail diameter, boat tail angle, bearing surface length, hybrid section lengths, nose lengths, ogive radius, and the ratios of all these elements together.

Why are some bullets under-performers when everything seems pretty much right? Why do a handful of bullets seem to work just that much better? There are very specific reasons once you line them all up and look closely.

When you review that data it's quite obvious that the designer at JLK really pushed a few big things forward in the ballistics world and did not get as much credit as due.

Other custom makers like Hoover and a few small shops really hit homeruns with way-ahead-of-their-time form factors, and due to the nature of their production capacity these things never really made it to the market in a way the average shooter was aware of their advantages.

I love the 140 hybrid and the 180 hybrid and the 230 hybrid. BUT it's not that hard to out-design them ballistically.

I cannot speak for Berger and their design team, but those bullets represent a very balanced and well shooting family of designs that has stood the test of time. I know they know how to make more aggressive bullets, but their product line was superior at the point of entry and still claims many titles and shooters' loyalties today despite more efficient designs.

To push the envelope on any design parameter you enter into trade-offs. I won't get too in depth on the how and why we decided to push X% this far in one design element and cut Y% to just there, but it should be pretty clear the combination of pushing the envelop closer to the edge but not too far worked out pretty well.

Our next bullet designed for hunters follows the same philosophy and will outrun this 131 ACE in same-parent-case comparisons to 1000-1100 yards and hit a bit harder on the way out there too!

It was designed for HUNTERS but the side effects of such an efficient design will benefit midrange target shooters and a lot of BR, x47, and Creed case users in competitions.

When I first read this thread, I saw no mention of the 131 ACE. I saw an attachment with a list of 25 cal bullets and mention of .330 BC which seemed to assigned to the "25 Creed" the way it was written. I've been away from this forum for a few years so this is my first encounter with your project. After reading through this this other thread..
https://www.longrangehunting.com/th...blackjack-bullets-for-you-to-drool-on.204117/
it looks like you have a good thing here. Congrats to bringing the Quaterbore into the LR world.
 
I have a serious question, rather than only focusing on the .25 why not offer bullets for the 6mm and 7mm? If your bullets break a record or win matches you will be backed up 6 months easy.
 
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I have a serious question, rather than only focusing on the .25 why not offer bullets for the 6mm and 7mm? If your bullets break a record or win matches you will be backed up 6 months easy.
I believe the Designer is fulfilling a need that hasn't been addressed, ever. David Tubb has already wrung out one of the best designs on a high B.C. 6mm bullet. There are many high B.C 7mm bullets on the market already. The niche market for the .257 comes at a good time as there will be a comparatively low recoil for a 131 grain bullet in both PRS and for hunting. The retained energy with a high sectional density will provide great penetration and good expansion for medium bone density deer and antelope sized animals at distances up to 600-900 yards with 2050+ FPS & 1200+ ft.lbs. of remaining energy at 900 yards in a SST sized case. For long distance target, 1500 - 1600 yds can easily be attained before declining to a transonic velocity, dependant upon elevation and other atmospheric factors. Subsonic velocity will probably not appear until after reaching ~1875 yds. There clearly has been a demand and need for this bullet since they came out with the 300 & 600 yd. Match bullets more than 25 years ago as there has been a rich and long history of quarter-bore Cartridges. Actually most of us are very proud of the bullet designer and others like him including cartridge designers that have the wherewithal and vision to address Hunter and Shooter's needs.
1850+ FPS & 1000+ft.lbs @ 1100 yds is nothing to sneeze at. Thank you Gentlemen !
 
I have a serious question, rather than only focusing on the .25 why not offer bullets for the 6mm and 7mm? If your bullets break a record or win matches you will be backed up 6 months easy.

We will definitely release our version of a Blackjack 284 when we get two more 257s out into the market to get 25 Cal back on it's feet. My Partner just mentioned his surprising level of anticipation for it when we were on the phone a few minutes ago in a different conversation. : )

That's likely a couple years out since we will have our three 257's, and then a lot of savings will go toward the Blackjack Cartridge which will require a lot to launch it as big and accessibly as we plan to.
 
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What I'd like from Blackjack is to do the same for the larger calipers as you've done for 25 caliber. Berger is building 308 bullets for 10 twists. I'd like to see the highest possible form factor bullets for 7 twists in 7mm, 308, and 338. Maybe in the future even faster twists. But I'm sure there are limits.

Look at the changes in 22 caliber bullets and twists. Twist rates have gone from 14 to 7 in my history shooting 22 cal. We need the same for the larger calipers where the potential BC are much higher.
 
What I'd like from Blackjack is to do the same for the larger calipers as you've done for 25 caliber. Berger is building 308 bullets for 10 twists. I'd like to see the highest possible form factor bullets for 7 twists in 7mm, 308, and 338. Maybe in the future even faster twists. But I'm sure there are limits.

Look at the changes in 22 caliber bullets and twists. Twist rates have gone from 14 to 7 in my history shooting 22 cal. We need the same for the larger calipers where the potential BC are much higher.

Here is an interesting article on the difficulties faced in the larger calibers

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sou...FjAAegQIARAB&usg=AOvVaw2VcmFIBg0ScYsiLlc9f--l
 
Here is an interesting article on the difficulties faced in the larger calibers

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sou...FjAAegQIARAB&usg=AOvVaw2VcmFIBg0ScYsiLlc9f--l
That article is dated. There are now heavy 30 cal bullets with better form factors. Like the 230 Sierra HPMK. My question is why can't the bigger caliper bullets be designed with even better form factors? Don't increase the weight above current levels. Instead shorten the bearing surface and lengthen the nose and boattail. That would improve the form factor. I know there are limits to how far that can be pushed both from making the bullets and getting them to shoot and perform on game.
 
That article is dated. There are now heavy 30 cal bullets with better form factors. Like the 230 Sierra HPMK. My question is why can't the bigger caliper bullets be designed with even better form factors? Don't increase the weight above current levels. Instead shorten the bearing surface and lengthen the nose and boattail. That would improve the form factor. I know there are limits to how far that can be pushed both from making the bullets and getting them to shoot and perform on game.
Unless hunters are after big boned elk or moose, there may be a resurgence of smaller than 30 caliber heavy Magnums. I like variety, but I have to admit a three gun arsenal may just include a 7mm, 6.5, and 257 caliber, and finally depending how the 257 shoots, I may get rid of my 6.5 Creedmoor or rebarrel to a .308. I don't need a 223 or 22/250 for anything.
 
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