Favorite 308 Load

[Bull Shoals]

74406

[Lefty SRH]

Very nice, I recently found my sweet load for my Ruger Scout rifle.

[Dthunter]

My favorite so far is:

Win Neck sized brass
CCI Br2 primers
46.0 Grains of IMR 4831 Powder
200 Grain, Lyman #311299 bore rider style Boolet, sized to .310", Hornady Copper Gas Check
Lyman Super Moly Lube
Boolet Nose section lubed with Lee Liquid Allox (I feel it helps to hydraulically center the bullet in the bore).
Boolet is seated out to engrave lightly into the rifling lands.
Average Velocity of this load is 2375fps. (over at least 50 test rounds/ over 2-3 different days).
Boolet alloy: 18lbs wheel weight lead, plus 8 feet of 50/50 Lead/tin solder.
Air cooled

This load shoots very well indeed in my Rem 700, Varmint Laminate (.308Win).
this load stays close to MOA out to 350-400yards, and hovers around 1.5-2 MOA out to 800 yards.
at 900-1000 yards, this load has grouped I the neighbourhood of 14-18". Lots of fun!
Its hilarious to see the looks on the faces of some shooters at the range! Some don't say anything, others join in on the excitement!

All shooting is fun, it all depends on what you are trying to achieve with a particular load.

Hope this info helps. If anyone is interested, check out the thread I have been posting my results on.

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?201036-Shooting-the-200gr-Lyman-311299-at-longer-ranges-in-a-308

[Beecher Tool]

My current favorite is 168 grain Sierra Match King HPBT with 45 grains of Varget....which is a pretty hot load....here is the result of twenty rounds offhand standing at 100 yards out of a FNH SCAR 17 with an Elcan Specter DR2 1.5-6X on top. This one shocked the **** out of me.

74425

[Lefty SRH]

DtHunter, what length barrel is on that 700 Varmint?

[Dthunter]

DtHunter, what length barrel is on that 700 Varmint?

Hello Lefty!

This rifle has a 26" barrel.
This rifle has never seen a jacketed bullet.
the scope is a cheap Bushnell 3200, 5-15 power tactical. I works amazingly well!
I have used this scope on a variety of long range tactical rifles. I would mount it and use it until I saved up the money for a high end scope. Its been on 4-5 different rifles. It has a dependable tracking/adjustment system.

[Lefty SRH]

Dthunter, has that mold been modified in any way to
Better fit your rifle? What size does It drop? I'm interested in trying it in my Scout rifle.

[Dthunter]

Dthunter, has that mold been modified in any way to
Better fit your rifle? What size does It drop? I'm interested in trying it in my Scout rifle.

The mould has not been modified in any way.
The as cast diameter is .311"
The nose riding section casts as .300

I feel that using a slow Powder like this creates a much slower acceleration/pressure curve for the cast boolet. The challenge for shooting slow powders with cast is to get the powder to burn fully, and cleanly. If it doesnt burn fully, it creates inconsistant pressures/velocities. This in turn effects accuracy.
To counteract this tendency, I seat the boolets firmly into the rifling. This creates a higher initial ignition pressure curve.
The boolet is firmly seated into the rifling "&" the bore riding portion coated with liquid allox.
As I chamber the round, I encounter a slight resistance the last 1/8" of forward travel of my bolt. At this point, the liquid allox is forced to flow frome the tight tolerance areas to the low pressure areas. This fills/forms a hydraulically centered boolet nose. This hydraulic centering also in effect, supports nearly the entire length of the boolet in the bore (reduces G force acceleration, (and pressure) induced slump and "potential" boolet/bore missalignment. The slower applied pressure tends to preserve the boolet base, which is absolutely critical to accuracy/ gyroscopic stability.

In summary, I feel that creating a fully supported and aligned boolet (accelerated by a slower burning/gas producing powder)in this way creates the best opportunity for a boolet to be launched accuately, at higher velocities. With full diameter support, the boolet base cant be deformed as easily during pressure & G force changes.

Some shooters may worry about having this much lube on a boolet. I have heard some guys saying that too much lube may cause "Lube Purging" upon muzzle exit, causing erratic accuracy.
I have not found this so far. But I am not shooting benchrest either.
All I can say is this loading proceedure really shoots well for me. I have spent allot of time working with this, and had the help of many fellow shooters on this site.
MUCHLY APPRECIATED!!!

[madsenshooter]

Interesting thoughts on the hydraulic centering, someday I'm going to do something with these Eagan cherries. I've had similar thoughts in mind using them dipped in a thin lube that'll dry back, a mix of mineral spirits, Marvel Mystery oil and LLA that I've dubbed LLAMMO. There would then be room in the grooves for the lube to gather into and hydraulically center the piston of a boolit as it went down the bore. The boolit is tapered, 30G shown. I've had some good results with it conventionally lubed in the lower three grooves, but the powder I've been using (trying to get rid of) doesn't burn consistently enough. It's DP85 an Accurate surplus powder. Going to try some RL19 for a better burn. With the DP85 the bullet is shooting little cloverleafs, but they are scattered a bit.

[Dthunter]

Interesting thoughts on the hydraulic centering, someday I'm going to do something with these Eagan cherries. I've had similar thoughts in mind using them dipped in a thin lube that'll dry back, a mix of mineral spirits, Marvel Mystery oil and LLA that I've dubbed LLAMMO. There would then be room in the grooves for the lube to gather into and hydraulically center the piston of a boolit as it went down the bore. The boolit is tapered, 30G shown. I've had some good results with it conventionally lubed in the lower three grooves, but the powder I've been using (trying to get rid of) doesn't burn consistently enough. It's DP85 an Accurate surplus powder. Going to try some RL19 for a better burn. With the DP85 the bullet is shooting little cloverleafs, but they are scattered a bit.


Nice looking Boolet! What is the weight on those? They look like they would fly nice!!!

[madsenshooter]

Mine are coming out 196gr checked and lubed. I ran a calculator on the dimensions, BC came out to be .420, but I don't know if I did it right. Need a calculator with the G2 drag function.

[Dthunter]

those boolets should have a ballistic advantage over the 311299.
I have calculated the G2 BC for the 311299. At(.1772)

This figure translates into a G7 BC of (.182)
I have been able to track my trajectories at 10 different distances.
I adjusted the BC on the program, until the "calculated" impact points corresponded to the "real life" impact points.

Bear in mind that the BC is effected by subtle differences in form factor. I am guessing that the lube covered boolet noses has an effect of reducing the calculated BC found in the Lyman Cast Bullet Manual some what.

[madsenshooter]

Eagan's catalog with the dimensions is in castpics. Since it appears you know a bit more about those calculators than I do, maybe you'd be kind enough to figure the approx BCs of the MX3-30-G and MX3-30-US, in your spare time. What lube doesn't spin off the nose would certainly be a subtle difference. Fellow that made the mold for me didn't have the blocks square to the cherry, the nose cuts with a bit of a slant. I made a file trim die to fix them. I'll have to see if I can do better with a NOE blank. Mr. Eagan, who has left us, catered to the cast bullet benchrest shooters. One 90 something year old shooter, who was national champion a couple times, always tells me, "Don Eagan made the best molds".

My apologies for highjacking the thread.

[Dthunter]

Eagan's catalog with the dimensions is in castpics. Since it appears you know a bit more about those calculators than I do, maybe you'd be kind enough to figure the approx BCs of the MX3-30-G and MX3-30-US, in your spare time. What lube doesn't spin off the nose would certainly be a subtle difference. Fellow that made the mold for me didn't have the blocks square to the cherry, the nose cuts with a bit of a slant. I made a file trim die to fix them. I'll have to see if I can do better with a NOE blank. Mr. Eagan, who has left us, catered to the cast bullet benchrest shooters. One 90 something year old shooter, who was national champion a couple times, always tells me, "Don Eagan made the best molds".

My apologies for highjacking the thread.


No problem!
I am no mathmatical guru! Lol!
How I figure the BC of a bullet is:

Using a ballistics program.
I shoot a known, accurate, low Standard Deviation load over a chronygraph, at varying distances.
I usually like at least 7-8 different ranges or more.
Firstly, I make sure the rifle
Is sighted dead point of aim.
Then measure the drop at each subsequent range. I move away from my target at 100 yard intervals.
I measure the average drop at each range and record it.
After around 30+ rounds of trajectory measurements, I plug in a known
Ballistic coefficient of a similar design.
Then keep adjusting the BC value untill "ALL" of the calculated drop values correspond to the "real life drop values.
I then record this Temporary BC number, and retest it on at least three different outtings/days.
If the drop values are consistant from day to day (with adjusted daily conditons), the BC is in my eyes proven.

I have done this with many different bullets all the way out to 1760yds.


The thing to keep in mind, is that occasionally you "WILL" get the occasional drop value that doesnt jive. Simply, I retest the value & or retest it another day. Some days and shooting locations have variables that are hard to detect.
I dont allow these discrepancies discourage
Me in the least. Patience always pays off with an accurate value that will repeat itself.