What's the popular ammo now?

22 Long Rifle ammo is finicky. Tell us all about it here.
_Shorty
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Post by _Shorty »

It doesn't shoot as well as Tenex (or Match) is supposed to, in Eley's test rigs, that's why. This is compared to Eley's own specs, and your idea of good may vary from theirs. Or it simply fits your chamber better than it does Eley's test rigs' chambers. In any event, what matters to Eley is how it tested for themselves, then they sell it as they see fit. Every single gun on the planet is an animal all its own.
tbone49 wrote:Chick, you are absolutely right again. I got 5 cases of baby blue from Cathy. She explained it is Tenex downgraded 2 times ( for what reason who cares), but this stuff is way too good for silly. I only use it for prone and it groups as good as anything I've tried. Kevin
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BlauBear
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Post by BlauBear »

Even downgraded, Tenex is fabulous ammunition. In factory barrels, Federal 711B frequently shoots better for reasons unknown, but in custom barrels Eley has always shot better.
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_Shorty
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Post by _Shorty »

The Federal is probably just a better fit for the factory chambers. Even though the factory chamber is considered a match chamber, it's a very good bet that any custom barrel is going to have a chamber that's tighter than their factory chamber, and will thus be a better fit for the Eley. Eley's rounds with the EPS bullet seem to need a pretty tight chamber to perform well. Any ammo, made by anyone, needs to have a good fit in the chamber in order to do the best it can. It doesn't matter how consistent the ammo itself is if the fit in the chamber isn't very good. A poor fit in the chamber introduces problems that may not be overcome by the ammo's own consistency characteristics. If you have a copy of Steven Boelter's ammo book, turn to the chapter on chambers and see how various types of ammo did in four different chambers. You'll be surprised at how much of a difference the chamber makes, if you didn't already know. Excellent ammo can shoot worse than the worst ever lot of bulk stuff from Walley World if it doesn't start off in a chamber that fits it well.

Some examples of my own from a recent range visit, shot at 50 yards.

Anschutz 1712 w/ Lapua Super Club
Image

CZ 453 Varmint w/ Eley Target Rifle
Image

So you can see there that the CZ can shoot decent groups. But what happens if you feed it the same lot of Lapua Super Club that shoots pretty well in the Anschutz?
Image

That's right, the bottom falls out. In fact, it didn't even land on the paper with one of the shots. Why? The Lapua apparently doesn't fit the CZ's chamber very well. The Eley shoots fine in it because it fits the chamber in that gun much better than the Lapua. There's nothing wrong with the Lapua, or it would also shoot horribly in the Anschutz. But it doesn't, it shoots fine in the Anschutz. It just doesn't fit the CZ's chamber very well, and looks like it might be junk, were it not for the fact that it shoots fine in another gun. The CZ scatters shots like mad with that Lapua, dropping shots incredibly low very often. But switch back to the Eley Target Rifle and it'll behave all day long. If it's a good fit in the chamber, it's likely to shoot very well, unless there are other problems with the ammo that affect its consistency. A good fit in the chamber is a very big factor.
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sobrbiker883
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Post by sobrbiker883 »

_Shorty wrote:300 yards, for a while now.
http://www.oscinc.org/Buffalo_runners.html
GeoNLR wrote:...have started shooting matches at 200 yards...
SWEET!!
Usually shooting scores right in class, too bad its the class below my classification!

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Re: What's the popular ammo now?

Post by TOP PREDATOR »

sobrbiker883, didn't know you were into silhoutte, i usually read you on SH.

anyway i don't know if this is in the spirit of the post or not, however when it comes to the steel, (and although we all strive to maintain as much accuraccy as possible) i've found that using the 10.00+ a box stuff is a bit too much. kinda like horseshoes as long as your close, it's a hit. contrast to benchrest and such where a 1/16" difference is either 100 or 50 or 25 points, silhoutte is more forgiving. so is there really a need for the top shelf stuff?

this is a test i did with aguila golden eagle rifle match, which is half the price of sk and wolf, and is now my standard for all my shooting based on price and the good performance through a mkII :

Rather than using 2 types of ammo, Rem Subsonics @3.17 a box or .06 a rnd, which are good through the mkii at 50 yards not so good at 100, and using sk match @6.50 box or .13 a rnd which is outstanding at 50, 100, 200 for me I wanted to find an economical ammo that performs well enough to use for both practice and matches, if such a round exists.

A guy at the range gave me 10 rnds of Aguila Golden Eagle Rifle Match to shoot one day, had gotten good groups at 100 yards, so the search started for this ammo. Found some and ran a test on it, as posted below.

Aguila makes several types of Golden Eagle, 2 types in the black box. One is Rifle Match and the other Match. Rifle match is $1.00 + change more than Match. This test is rifle match 40 gr lead rn standard velocity. It was purchased for $31.39 a brick or .06 a round excluding shipping. This is the price I’ll use for comparison to other ammo tested in a previous post, linked later on in this thread.

1. At first glance they appeared to be very very lightly lubed (perhaps just residue left from manufacturing).
2. weight sorted – weighed a brick out, main weight range was between 50.4 grains and 51.1. 24 rounds were below 50.4 and 9 above 51.1.

The ammo was shot through a Savage MKII, from a bench with a Harris bipod and rear bag. A Simmons 6-24x scope is mounted on the rifle, with a 20 moa base. I had left the barrel dirty and unswabbed for this test. 85 deg. F was the air temp, sunny, could only guess humidty may have been between 45 – 55% and a 2:00 to 5:00 less than 3mph wind, gusts to 5mph. shot 5rounds of each weight at 50 and 100 yards (getting too close to dark to do 200 yards). Each weight was cronographed at 10 feet from muzzle. The group sizes, flyers and avg. fps and the amount of rounds per brick are noted for each weight. Any shots that I knew that I pulled, I reshot the whole group again to confirm it was a pull and not a flyer.

50 yards / 1” dot

50.4 +1” / 1.25” w 1 flyer 1025fps, 14 rnds in brick
50.5 +.75” / 0 flyer 1033 fps 60 rnds in brick
50.6 -.75” / 0 flyer 1035 fps 65 rnds in brick
50.7 -.75” / 0 flyer 1033 fps 68 rnds in brick
50.8 -.75” / 0 flyer 1034 fps 78 rnds in brick
50.9 .75” / +1” w 1 flyer 1047 fps 77 rnds in brick ( the one flyer was cronied at 1067)
51.0 .5” / -1” w 1 flyer 1044 fps 67 rnds in brick
51.1 -.75” / -1.5” w 1 flyer 1049 fps 38 rnds in brick
51.2 and above only 9 rnds in brick, used for foulers, sighters, etc.

50 YARD COMMENTS: .25” lower and right POI than SK Match and Rem. Subsonics at 50. Just ever so slightly behind the SK groups at 50, but half the price can live with an 1/8” difference. Seemed that as a whole, 50.6 through 50.9 produced the most consistant groups and fps; as a “weight lot” 50.6 thru 50.9 = 20 rounds with .75” groups or less with 1 flyer just 1” (that flyer cronied at 1067). Avg fps of 1037. The most rounds in the brick belonged to this “weight lot”also. Most of the “flyers” were only .25” or less away from the main group could have been shooter error, and possibly close enough not to call them flyers at all, but I called them flyers anyway.

100 yards / 1.5” dot

50.4 no data - ran out of this weight
50.5 1.5” / 2.25” 2flyers
50.6 -.75”/ 1.5” 1 flyer (2nd most accurate / consistant)
50.7 1.25”/ 0 flyers (most accurate / consistant)
50.8 -1.25”/ 0 flyers (3rd accurate / consistant)
50.9 1” / -1.5” 1 flyer (4th most accurate / consistant)
51.0 1.5” / 2” 1 flyer
51.1 +1.5” / 2” 2 flyers

100 YARD COMMENTS: .5” lower and right POI than SK match, 8.3” drop from 50 yards (same as SK Match), MUCH, MUCH, better than Rem. Subsonics for the same price as the sub sonics. Once again, weights 50.6 thru 50.9 produced the most consistant groups at 100, as they did at 50. As a “weight lot” 50.6 thru 50.9 = 20 rounds with 1.25” or less groups with 2 flyers that opened it to 1.5”.

200 yards / 1.5” dot NO DATA YET, starting to get dark.

OVERALL COMMENTS: leaves a clumpy residue in barrel, outperformed rem subsonics (my practice cheap ammo) at 50 and 100, weights 50.6 thru 50.9 appears to be the “sweet spot” in the manufacturing with 50.7 being the most consistant at 50 and 100. 120 rounds were fired, NO misfires, NO misfeeds, NO ejection problems, NO problems occurred.

Lubed an additional 20 rounds (see post on lubing… ) of 50.6 thru 50.9, all groups at 100 where under 1.75” including flyers.

Simply put, the Aguila Match Rifle for the most part outperformed everything else (20-25 brands / styles tested recently) at 50 and 100 at the price paid $.06 a round. When superimposing the targets on the TQ4 I used for the August rimfire match, all groups where within the 9 and 10 ring.

Out of a 30 round tq4 100 yd match, the score would be 288-9x’s (6shots in 9 ring, 24 shots being in the 10).
a match I shot with SK at prone and not bench scored 295-10x’s (5 shots in 9ring, 25 shots being in the 10).

I believe the SK Match is slightly better, by .25” at 100 yards. But the difference is SO SLIGHT, and at more than half the price, I’ll fill my ammo can with the Aguila Rifle Match, at least for 50 and 100 yards. I’m going to definitely replace the Rem Subsonics with the Aguila, and most likely the SK depending on 200 yard performance. A future report coming for 200 yards if you guys want it.

3 bricks of SK Match @6.50 a box = $195 + 3 bricks of Rem. Subsonics @ 3.17 a box $95.10 = $290.10
6 bricks of Aguila Rifle Match @ 3.14 a box = $188.00, a $102.10 difference with no readjusting optics!
If you practice with what you shoot for matches, 6 bricks of SK = $390, a $202.00 difference.

So I can compare oranges to oranges, I’ll see how Aguila fits into an “ammo test thru a MKII” posted awhile back (see post…..) once a clean bore test is done, which will give me a clean bore rating (CBR), value rating (VR), consistantcy rating (CR), and overall rating (OAR), and a multiyard rating (MYR). Will edit post when done, however if weight sorted I belive the Aguila will perform and place better in the test.

I’ll use the 50.6 thru 50.9 for paper and the over / unders for practice and silhouette shooting as the 1/8” to .25” difference is less of a concern.

i'm not saying this is the most popular ammo, that will probably go to wolf, sk, eley. just saying that at half the price, it may pay not to be "popular"
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