Anyone shoot 600 yds with their boolits?

[mace2364]

Hi All,

I’m looking for ideas for a good 600 yd boolit load. They have these vintage military rifle shoots locally, and they go out to 600 yds, and I’d like to come up with a boolit load for shooting these. I am currently using jacketed bullets for this. But I’d really like to have some good cast loads to use as well.

I own a variety of suitable rifles and I have something in almost all of the bolt action military calibers. I have never tried shooting any real distance with my cast boolits so far.

Does anyone here shoot 5-600 yds with their boolits? And might they have a recommendation as to where I might begin working on a suitable load?

I’ve messed around some with loads from the article on “cast bullets in military rifles”, but I was also wondering if anyone had actually tried the 600yd load at 600.


Thanks in advance!

[dverna]

Larry Gibson has done a bunch of work at 600 yards but IIRC he did not use military rifles. Would still be valuable to look up his posts.

[andrew375]

I've shot cast in my 7.62 match rifles out to 600 on occasion. The bullet is the 200gr Lee loaded to around 2000 fps.

[BLAHUT]

I shoot at 1000yds with my cast boolits, just in a 45/70, 500+ gr, I keep them at about 1200 FPS, very accurate for me.

[ascast]

yes, I used to shoot a Werndl a lot. 11mm Mauser, French Gras, 41 Swiss, Remington Keene, Murata, Bueamont all bolt guns I have shot at 600. Perhaps you could narrow your list a bit.

[nueces5]

I have done it, it is difficult with iron sights, but using a scope on my CZ308 is easier.
From 600 meters I have not been able to hit consistently. I use lyman 311466 and 314299 loaded with win 760 in the cz308 and in the mauser 765x54 in an Argentine mauser 1909

[mace2364]

yes, I used to shoot a Werndl a lot. 11mm Mauser, French Gras, 41 Swiss, Remington Keene, Murata, Bueamont all bolt guns I have shot at 600. Perhaps you could narrow your list a bit.

I have a Mauser 71/84, but I haven’t done any loading for it yet. I haven’t yet tweaked my case conversion to the point it’ll work. I also have a Beaumont. That one I have loaded some ammo that did fire-but that’s as far as I’ve gotten with it. I’d be very interested to hear what you have to say regarding loading for those.

I have most of the bolt action rifles from the World Wars. Eventually, I’d like to come up with good cast loads for all of them.

Currently I’m using jacketed bullets for these shoots, but I’d really like to find at least a couple boolit loads to use. Shooting 600 isn’t so much the problem, as coming up with a boolit load that’ll do it well. I’ve never tried shooting cast that far.

[30calflash]

I've not tried it, would love to but no range better than 300 yds here.

Everything I've read basically use a heavy for the caliber bullet, having a decent BC helps.

IIRC the 311284 designed for the Krag was used successfully back in the day to 1000 yards. This on the older 5V bull.

[Larry Gibson]

Are you going to shoot Lubed & GC'd cast, PC'd cast or PP'd cast bullets?

[Martin Luber]

We have all electronic targets now so a subsonic boolit won’t register.

[mace2364]

Are you going to shoot Lubed & GC'd cast, PC'd cast or PP'd cast bullets?

Probably lubed and GCd. I haven’t yet gotten into PC or paper patching. I intend to try both at some point, just haven’t gotten to it yet.

I have a few molds:8mm Karabiner, 8mm Maximum, 329-205-1r, 309-180-1r, 6.5 Swedish, 7mm soup can, 312-160-2r, 311672, 457-405-F, and probably a couple others I’m not remembering off the top of my head.

[Adam Helmer]

mace,

From my hayfield across the valley to my friendly neighbor's hayfield is a lasered 600 yards mid field. Using my favorite M1 Garand and the Lee .312 185rn gc boolit and IMR 4895, from my shooting bench, I ding the white 5 gallon bucket constantly.
Before long, I will need to replace the bucket.

Adam

[mace2364]

What kind of alloy do you use? And what do you size the bullets to?

I have a Springfield and a 1917 that would work well.

[TD1886]

mace,

From my hayfield across the valley to my friendly neighbor's hayfield is a lasered 600 yards mid field. Using my favorite M1 Garand and the Lee .312 185rn gc boolit and IMR 4895, from my shooting bench, I ding the white 5 gallon bucket constantly.
Before long, I will need to replace the bucket.

Adam

That's pretty damn good and with issue iron sights none the less.

[Thumbcocker]

mace,

From my hayfield across the valley to my friendly neighbor's hayfield is a lasered 600 yards mid field. Using my favorite M1 Garand and the Lee .312 185rn gc boolit and IMR 4895, from my shooting bench, I ding the white 5 gallon bucket constantly.
Before long, I will need to replace the bucket.

Adam

Living the dream.

[dverna]

mace,

From my hayfield across the valley to my friendly neighbor's hayfield is a lasered 600 yards mid field. Using my favorite M1 Garand and the Lee .312 185rn gc boolit and IMR 4895, from my shooting bench, I ding the white 5 gallon bucket constantly.
Before long, I will need to replace the bucket.

Adam

That is impressive. IIRC the 10 ring on the MR-1 600 yard target is 12"....about the width of a 5 gal. bucket.

[garrisonjoe]

try the Lyman 311299 200 grain
and the NOE 30 Hunter 188 grain bullets

which are both wonderful from my original barrelled 1903 and 1903A3 Springfields. (Like, 1 MOA)

These I have shot out to 300 yards with good results.

Lyman 311291 and IMR 4895 at 2050 FPS in a M1 Garand - Took a 200 yard MilSurps competition a couple of weeks ago with that load, other fellers shooting jacketed.

Can be done. Be ready for a lot of range and press work tuning the load to your rifle and verifying the load stays accurate out past 300 yards.

[TD1886]

You know the Lyman 323471 is a spitzer Loverin. It has the highest BC of any cast bullet I've seen so far and it's an old number. It's over .400 BC. Look it up in your Lyman books. That exceeds a lot of jacketed bullets. Now my question is why didn't Ideal or Lyman make a similar 30 caliber bullet? Yes I know a longer bullet would be heavier, but the 30-06 for example was originally designed for a 220 grain bullet. Maybe we should talk to NOE into making a mould for one. There is an easy way to find the BC of your cast bullet, jacketed too, if you have a Lab-Radar Chronograph, it tells you the BC at all distances! I think then long range shooting with the 30-06 would improve much.

[Larry Gibson]

As TD1886 mentions, the 323471 is an excellent bullet. It is the only cast bullet I have ever gotten consistently good accuracy at 600 yards with out of 10" twist milsurp rifles. This has been with 8x57 M98 Mausers having excellent to new condition milspec barrels with a .325/.326 long throat. With theGC seated to the base of the case neck, the front drive band of a .325 sized 323471 is at or very near the leade. Thus a perfect fit.

The 323471 has a long bearing surface with an excellent designed nose giving it an excellent BC. The milspec barrels also will have grooves .005+ deep along with the bullet design and fit in the throat which allow the RPM threshold to be pushed up. Of course a slow burning powder should be used. The bullets need be cast of an appropriate alloy, properly weight sorted and properly loaded. Doing so, the velocity can be pushed up to 2100 +/- fps and maintain linear group expansion at longer ranges.

With such I have consistently held 10 shots inside 2 moa at 600 yards with my VZ24 and a couple other M98 8x57s.

[wilecoyote]

...Sir, thank you very much about VZ24 & other 98s