223 Rem - 40gr Nosler Ballistic Tip with RL7 & Benchmark

alright folks welcome back today I want to step outside of my comfort zone in 223 reloading for the ar-15 I generally keep it within that 55 grain up to 77 grain area I generally favor those heavier weights but today I want to go light I want to shoot to 40 grain Nosler ballistic tip varmint I get a lot of people ask him about the lighter bullets and I've just never tested them so let's learn together I think my 1 & 8 twist White Oak armament barrel should work just fine with some 40 grain errs but only one way to find out now for load data on this guy that's the wrong one there's one so the Naza website or a Nosler manual they've got plenty of powder options for this board and the ones I've picked are reloader 7 we've shot this powder quite a bit in 300 blackout this was one of my grandfather's favorite 223 powders he you know he was a big groundhog hunter he'd like to shoot these light sort of bullets and this was one of the powders he always seemed to be shooting and the other is Hodgson benchmark and both of these powders Nasser has got load data forum with reloader 7 they show a charge range of 21.5 up to 20 3.5 I want to go ahead and shoot up to the the maximum they show will shoot three tenths of a grain increments so that'll be twenty two point three up to twenty three point five three tenths of grain increments and with benchmark they showed 26 to 28 as being the range so once again I want to shoot up to the max will do three tenths of a grain increments which will have us starting at twenty six point eight grains now with the with the ballistic tip they show a recommended or a tested overall length of two point two six zero which is just perfect for us that'll fit in the magazine nicely I was looking at that seating depth a little bit ago it looks pretty good alright these are little bullets so they're not exactly down into the case as much as we might be used to but should be plenty these guys are pretty cool-looking they've got that classic Nosler ballistic tip in orange and they got a little boat tail pretty cool little bullets now for primers I'm gonna go ahead and stick with you know what we generally shoot which is the ci number 41 primer and brass is going to be Lake City so I'm not sure if you can see this gigantic tower of brass I've got back here and then I've got another tray actually for this video over the last couple days I've been going through and just trying to get myself a really big batch of Lake City brass prepped and ready to go and I've got about 300 pieces that are in good shape I've had a little frustration with my Lake City brass I bought a bad batch of once fired Lake City brass that ended up having a bunch of loose primer pockets and two different viewers contacted me and wanted to send me some more so now I'm covered in once fired Lake City brass I've got tons of it now so I was able to sit down and get all of these guys cleaned up and sized and trimmed I got the crimps removed from the primer pockets and I actually went ahead and primed the entire batch so these guys are ready it's just powder and bullet is all we need in these guys so we're going to be skipping a whole bunch of reloading steps here in this video and actually four or several videos I've got five videos planned here that I want to put together here immediately with this big batch and they're kind of some bullets that I've been meaning to shoot for a long time this 40-grain ballistic tip is one of them got a 50 grain vmax I've got a 62 grain boat tail hollow point from Hornady I've got a 70 grain Naser RDF I've got some 75 grain Hornady boat tail hollow points so I've got several videos planned here to get rid of this this new found brass stockpile that I've got prepped and ready to go so back to today's video it's the 40 grain ballistic tip and I'd need to go ahead and just start weighing powder and that's super boring so I'll probably just see you guys over at the bullet seed I tell you what we got a nice full case with with benchmark maybe want to pull the manual back out again good thing about the nozzle load data is they do include include load density like the last column here is a percentage that's the amount of case that's full of powder you can see here are 28 grains of benchmark 104 percent so definitely a nice full case another thing I had noticed earlier whenever I will is picking out our load data like I said Nasser goes to 28 grains but right here on the benchmark bottle there is data for the 40 grain nos or ballistic tip they shoot an overall length of two point two eight zero 20 thousands longer than we're shooting and they show a max charge of twenty seven point three so seven tenths of a grain lighter than the max charge we're shooting so I don't know what to keep our keep our eye open right we'll keep our eye on the brass make sure we don't run into pressure problems but hopefully well hopefully we'll be okay so what do we say two point two six zero so let's get this bullet seeing dye dial in all right I think we got it here these nozzles or ballistic tips generally have pretty consistent overall lengths and you know uniform plastic tips two point two five seven two point two five eight two point two five nine two point two five nine so close enough and that's what the rounds look like at that overall length looking pretty good to me man now we don't have any any Cana lure and I'm imagining that a varmint bullet like this probably has a very thin jacket so we're not gonna mess around with any crimp I don't want to screw up the bullet or anything like that so no crimp we're gonna shoot him just like this we jump forward to our max charge of benchmark and see just how crunchy this guy is yeah it doesn't feel bad at all I didn't really hear any rice krispies sort of sounds coming out of there two point two five eight view point two five eight two point two five seven so good I don't think we are quite as compressed as the Nosler manual predicted because well for one we're using Lake City brass and I suspect they were probably using something a little thicker that maybe had a little bit less case capacity so instead of the hundred and four percent load density that they predicted I bet we're a little bit less than that or at least that's my guess so that's really it nothing nothing exciting here with the loading pretty straightforward stuff so let's go ahead and just get out to the range all right folks our test gun has got an 18 inch barrel with a one-in-eight twist that might be just a touch faster than what would be perfect for these little 40-grain bullets but I'm hoping you know a one and eight is still going to perform pretty well I don't know we're gonna learn together here as I said this is an 18 inch white oak armament barrel shooting with a Silencerco omega suppressor a Magneto speed chronograph a 6 to 24 power vortex scope and we're shooting off a bipod and a rear bag so let's get started let's see if these guys will shoot okay our first test charge is twenty two point three grains of reloader seven let's see how they're going to shoot all right so that's not a terrible start as the first group of the day not quite settled in yet but no pressure signs looking halfway decent so you know get the heart rate down get settled in a little bit get the bag a little bit more stable hopefully this next group twenty two point six grains is going to be better let's find out yep that last shot always screws us up doesn't it you know the group shows it but I've I felt a whole lot better I felt a whole lot more steady and stable and felt like I was doing a better job there during that group one thing I'm glad to see and I wasn't sure about is the brass is ejecting to right about the same point that I'm used to seeing with my heavy bullets and slower powders I've never really pushed the boundaries with 223 to find out okay just how fast burning of a powder can you use before you start having function problems in an ar-15 this is clearly not even close to it because we're getting great function the bolts hold and open so that might be a fun a fun thing to explore maybe in the future is seeing just how fast a powder we could use before we run into function problems and our brass is looking great no problems at all so next up is 22.9 grains all right nice there's nothing better than that pressure of when you're shooting loads that you know man if you can just do your part they're all going to go through the same hole and you finally pull it off I love shooting small groups okay twenty-three point two grains is next all right another awesome group no pressure signs at all on the brass I'll tell you what at this point it's looking like we might have a new favorite nozzle bullet these groups are outstanding so one last charge wait here with reload or seven it's twenty three point five grains you guys think I should try and shoot that fly oh I want to shoot him so bad man that is awesome these are some of the absolute best groups we've ever shot out of this barrel just fantastic so the brass still looks perfectly fine I'll tell you what man I wish I could go back and have that first group over again sometimes you know walking down to the target and getting the target and the camera setup and then getting back here and getting the the bench and the camera setup and everything like that first group sometimes I'm just not settled right I haven't taken my time to settle down and make that first group count and I kind of wish I could go back and do that let me do that one over again but that's okay we got four pretty darn impressive groups to hang our hat on so one bad one didn't go to kill us I expect the good groups to continue here because we're moving on to Hodgdon benchmark which is another outstanding accuracy powder and I think our velocities here with benchmark RG are going to get silly this is going to be a little bit crazy so we're starting off at twenty six point eight grains let's see how it does okay so that group opened up just a touch on us but still not not a bad start for benchmark the brass looks good no pressure signs at all so moving on 27.1 grains so these groups definitely aren't terrible or anything but it's just hard to be happy about them after shooting those three groups with reloader seven I don't know man but the good news is that the brass looks just fine so we're moving on twenty-seven point four grains is next there we go there's a nice group for benchmark all right let's see if we can back that up with another good one the brass still looks great twenty seven point seven grains is next so for the first time maybe just some light pressure signs just a little bit of an ejector mark here and there but it's not terrible definitely not terrible so we're going to go ahead and finish it off and move on to 28.0 our group there with 27.7 was still pretty good maybe not quite as good as that last one but still pretty good so here we go last up 28.0 grains all right that's a pretty darn good looking target if you ask me kind of proud of this one and really happy that maybe we finally found an asura bullet we can like so let's get back to the bench and talk it out all right let's start with a look at the brass here our first five rows here are from this video which means here's our max charge of reloader seven on the reload or seven side of things I didn't spot any pressure signs whatsoever out there primers are still pretty nice and rounded no ejector marks and everything looks just yeah 100% okay with reloader seven and here are a couple of benchmark pieces I think yeah like up there my camera is kind of losing its mind a little bit here today yeah looks like ran right in that area there's a little ejector mark on that piece but you know definitely nothing bad primers are still nice and rounded no major problems at all but you could just tell that these guys were you know were a little bit hotter than the reloader seven loads since I started seeing just an occasional little ejector spot so all in all no problems with brass today alright folks let's look at some groups and some velocities actually can we just spend like an hour looking at these groups cuz this is beautiful this is some of the best shooting we've ever done here on my channel now we've shot some better groups here and there but I don't remember ever putting together back-to-back-to-back point four-inch groups like this and low point 4 inches like this was just outstanding stuff you know like I mentioned on the range that first group I kind of called that one before we had even moved on right right after I shot that group is like ah man not quite settled in yet didn't feel like I had done my best there so I'd love to try that one again but it doesn't matter because man the next four groups are just amazing the velocities are not too bad if we go back to the Nosler manual and look at what they were predicting for this bullet so with reloader 7 they show their max velocity as 36 14 out of a 24 inch barrel so you know we're an 18 inch barrel you're giving up a lot between a 24 and an 18 inch barrel and in this case it was about 300 feet per second and with benchmark it was just about the same we're lagging behind the manual velocity by about 300 feet per second with our 18 inch barrel still pretty impressive stuff to me man 3,300 feet per second that's nothing to sneeze at so I think this is one of those magical times where we just landed on the perfect powder and bullet combination maybe you bet your butt we're gonna be shooting some more reload or seven with some other stuff like it's got me wondering like I wonder if we could try reload or seven with the 55 grain full metal jackets over in that series it's awfully fast like it's fast burning for that application bump it up to like reload or 10x might be the better choice but if it's going to give exceptional accuracy you know it burns so fast that the charge weights are very low so maybe those of you who are into the super economical loads with you know the lightest charge weights possible this might be a good a good choice I don't know all I know is that into you for this video it seems like it was the perfect powder it really was the standard deviations were not good right our best standard deviation was thirteen point eight and then the worst was twenty nine point zero those are not excellent numbers but it's hard to argue with groups like this so as much as I hate to do it let's move on here are the benchmark groups and you know what we've got some good ones here with benchmark as well it didn't start off all that well right we were two point nine oh eight inches at the first group and then up to a one point zero five zero inch group but then it really seemed to settle down for that third and fourth that was our so the middle group there twenty seven point four grains was our best group of the day that was a point three six six inch group really good stuff and then the next was a point four three eight it's kind of funny how the point of impact was moving around a decent amount right the first group in the second group were kind of right up there at the top of the orange and then it went lower and then it went a little bit higher and then the last group it was all the way down near the bottom of the orange so this was kind of walking around a little bit if we were gonna hone this into a really good load with this combination that might be an important thing to consider right finding a charge weight range where the point of impact was nice and calm and wasn't moving around so the velocities were about 200 feet per second faster than they were with reloader seven we made it all the way up to thirty five hundred and forty five feet per second pretty smoking fast and like I mentioned we were still lagging about three hundred feet per second behind what the manual you know said 424 inch barrel so if you've got a twenty four I mean you can 2800 feet per second is certainly doable with this bullet pretty wide range of standard deviation numbers here nine point zero there in the fourth group and then right after it was the worst at thirty point six feet per second so a lot a lot of variation here in standard deviation so this was this was a pretty good combo as well right benchmark was another good choice I felt like you know we made good powder choices today these are appropriate powders for this bullet weight and it paid off with some sweet groups man I'll tell you what let's go back let's look at the real odor seven groups again just for the heck of it don't you just want to look at them find it's so rewarding to shoot good groups like this out of an ar-15 so many moving parts in that action and just so much going on that man when it all comes together and the groups are tight it is a pretty rewarding experience I am really happy with these two okay enough of that enough of staring at groups so I've still got fifty of these bullets left we'll have to try some other powders and see like I said maybe we just you know happen to get really lucky and hit the golden combination with reloader seven that would shoot really well but yeah we've we've still got some more and I'm interested in in testing a bit more you know both of these are they're easy powders to work with I'll tell you what I'll put up a picture with reloader seven on the Left benchmark in the middle and Hodge stem var get on the right I think a lot of you guys if maybe you're not familiar with these powders you're probably at least familiar with Varga and what size it is and just look at the you know they're all extruded powders but if you look at the powder granules you'll see both of these powders are much smaller so these are much easier to use with a powder measure they flow a little bit better out of your trickler right they're just they're there they're easy powders to work with you don't want hold on one second yeah so I just looked on the Alliant website and they've got load data with reloader seven up to fifty two grain bullets so that seems reasonable that we can go ahead and maybe stretch it and shoot this with some 50 fives like I mentioned I'm curious how it would perform over in that 55 grain Full Metal Jacket series we've had some luck with IMR 3031 which is you know trends toward the faster side of things I think Rita litter 7 is a bit faster than 30 31 I'm also curious you know our bullets get heavier our charges are going to get smaller I'm wondering if I think like I had mentioned when we were out on the range I'm curious how far you can push it would we start having function issues just not enough gas to run the AR action I don't know these are things I'm curious about and I think I think we'll explore it because I keep a lot of reloader 7 around like I mentioned I've used that quite a bit in 300 blackout so we've got it we might as well test it and you know maybe it would make decent dual-use powder for those of you guys who are looking to load for blackout in 223 there's not there's not a lot of crossover powders for those two cartridges but maybe this is a viable option it certainly is for the lighter bullets as we saw today so I think that's where we'll leave it tomorrow's video is going to be the 50 grain Hornet easy max so this video is probably to go up in the evening the zmax video should go up tomorrow morning hopefully so I hope you'll join me for that one as well if you'd like to help support my channel you can come to patreon.com/scishow to and I will see you guys next time

Channel: Johnny's Reloading Bench

Views: 64,213

Rating: 4.942122 out of 5

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Id: CqsQVRDSogM

Length: 23min 46sec (1426 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 19 2018