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6.5 Grendel reloading
- Thread starter ScouT6a
- Start date
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Almost no one is forming Grendel brass these days. When the caliber first came out there was a very limited supply of brass, luckily, that is not the case now with Hornady, Federal, Lapua and several others involved. With factory loaded Hornady ammo being around $0.80, most people are just buying bulk then reusing the brass.
Go to powders are CFE223, IMR 8208 XBR, and AR Comp.
What upper did you purchase?
Go to powders are CFE223, IMR 8208 XBR, and AR Comp.
What upper did you purchase?
Just wondering why you went with 7.62 mags when they specifically make 6.5 mags? Also do the 5 round mags fit flush? I have the 10 round mags so I don't have to worry about dropping the other.
King31, from research, I knew the 7.62 mags would feed fine. When I walked in to my LGS, they had the 7.62 mags in stock for the same money.
Plus, I might buy a 7.62x39 upper in the near future.
The 5 rounders do not fit flush. Just enough sticking out to get a good hold on it.
Plus, I might buy a 7.62x39 upper in the near future.
The 5 rounders do not fit flush. Just enough sticking out to get a good hold on it.
Thanks for the info! About 2 minutes after I posted my reply, I wondered if you didn't already have an AR in 7.62x39. I can't wait to see what the 6.5G does on a deer this year. Hopefully I will get the opportunity to test it out.
I've got a couple boxes of Hornady 6.5 123gr AMAX bullets that I'm not going to use. Happy to sell them if anyone wants them.
Dtwentythree
Plinker
A novel idea is to pull the projectiles and powder from Wolf steel-cased ammo, then replace with new powder and projectiles.
I did this once when I first began loading for Grendel, and didn’t have any brass handy. Added CFE223 powder and 123gr ELDs with fairly good performance. Not really cost effective now that brass is relatively plentiful.
I did this once when I first began loading for Grendel, and didn’t have any brass handy. Added CFE223 powder and 123gr ELDs with fairly good performance. Not really cost effective now that brass is relatively plentiful.
7.62 brass will have more taper and reduced capacity until they are fire formed. Keep that in mind with your first loading. I had decent performance with 100 grain bullets and H335 but have moved on to CFE223 and 8208xbr, the favorite in my Grendel group is AR comp. 7.62x39 and 6.8 magazines will work, older mags often need some modification to feed reliably, the new C products mags are excellent and the best currently available. I hear good things about the eLander mags as well.
Managed to shoot my first loaded 6.5G round this morning. I am still waiting on a few things and need to get my crimp die figured out, but I successfully fired one round. This was my first loaded rifle round ever so I was a little nervous. Does anyone use a Dillon 550 powder drop to consistently load rifle rounds? I don't care to weigh each charge on my beam scale, but the Dillon would be very time friendly.
I'm a bit late to this party, but I just completed a 6.5 Grendel upper build and began down this same path. Thought I would share my experiences.
As for the Dillon powder drop, I've found them to be very consistent with most powders. I wouldn't hesitate unless you plan to do some benchrest shooting.
I have been playing with powders and loads for the past few weeks and finally had success last night. I'm using 7.62x39 brass, sized in a Hornady FL sizing die (NOT fire-formed), and was wanting a load that I could shoot and collect the fire-formed brass for future reloads. Everything I was trying would show excessive pressures and still not cycle the action. I tried Varget, H/IMR4895, IMR4198, just about every rifle powder I had on hand without success. I had an old box of Speer 87gr spitzer SP bullets as well as cast up some 120gr lead bullets (Lyman 266324) to work with since I didn't want to "waste" the good stuff on fire forming.
The cast bullets are a plain base version, so to generate enough pressure to fire-form the brass, I was pushing them too hard and getting a lot of lead left in the barrel. Keeping the velocities low enough, including some 2400 powder, would still not cycle the action, so I gave up on this venture and moved on to the 87 grain pills.
With the 87s, went back through the gauntlet of powders and still found excessive pressures and lack of cycling, so I started testing with a few powders that weren't traditionally Grendel. First I tried IMR4350 and found that even though it wouldn't cycle, I couldn't get enough powder in the case to cause pressure signs. Then I found a small stash of IMR4320 and was getting excellent case expansion, perfect cycling, and no pressure signs between 25.0gr and 26.0gr.
Next I'm going to be working with this powder to see if I can get an accurate load for my set-up, but thought this would be something useful for others to play around with to load up some ammo to shoot/practice while performing the fire-forming step.
I'm shooting a 20" build with a rifle gas system...
As for the Dillon powder drop, I've found them to be very consistent with most powders. I wouldn't hesitate unless you plan to do some benchrest shooting.
I have been playing with powders and loads for the past few weeks and finally had success last night. I'm using 7.62x39 brass, sized in a Hornady FL sizing die (NOT fire-formed), and was wanting a load that I could shoot and collect the fire-formed brass for future reloads. Everything I was trying would show excessive pressures and still not cycle the action. I tried Varget, H/IMR4895, IMR4198, just about every rifle powder I had on hand without success. I had an old box of Speer 87gr spitzer SP bullets as well as cast up some 120gr lead bullets (Lyman 266324) to work with since I didn't want to "waste" the good stuff on fire forming.
The cast bullets are a plain base version, so to generate enough pressure to fire-form the brass, I was pushing them too hard and getting a lot of lead left in the barrel. Keeping the velocities low enough, including some 2400 powder, would still not cycle the action, so I gave up on this venture and moved on to the 87 grain pills.
With the 87s, went back through the gauntlet of powders and still found excessive pressures and lack of cycling, so I started testing with a few powders that weren't traditionally Grendel. First I tried IMR4350 and found that even though it wouldn't cycle, I couldn't get enough powder in the case to cause pressure signs. Then I found a small stash of IMR4320 and was getting excellent case expansion, perfect cycling, and no pressure signs between 25.0gr and 26.0gr.
Next I'm going to be working with this powder to see if I can get an accurate load for my set-up, but thought this would be something useful for others to play around with to load up some ammo to shoot/practice while performing the fire-forming step.
I'm shooting a 20" build with a rifle gas system...
New to this site and this topic...I got a 6.5 Grendel upper from Brownells and planned to use 762x39 brass reformed for my rounds. found out a couple of things.....once fired brass formed better than new. I use a NOE 125 gr cast and powder paint coated, unsized bullet and a modest load of a ball powder that cycles semi-auto. Other than chasing the brass, this works great, the once fired boxer primed brass is cheap and using the cast bullet to fire form is super cheap. I enjoy the forming, casting etc so that is why I'm going this way. This is my first foray into 6.5, I like this round and look forward to playing more.
