The 6.5 Creedmoor ~ A fabulous round, but beware of the misleading hype!

welcome back well you know it's been almost four years since i sat here and i talked about the uh three different 6.5 millimeter cartridges the old 1894 6.5 by 55 the 260 remington that came out in 1997 and the fairly recent 6.5 creedmoor now where a lot of water has gone over the dam since then and um back then uh i was able to say that i couldn't recommend the 6.5 creedmoor until i had a chance to see what history unfolded how how history treated it because you know in my in my uh in my life i've seen an awful lot of cartridges come on with a with a lot of fanfare and disappear just as quickly you know just as like a band going around the corner they just uh like a parade around going around the corner um that hasn't been the case with the 6.5 creedmoor steve hornady did an excellent job of marketing it it's had great acceptance by uh military marksmen um and uh it because of because of the internet uh you know it's it's rise has been meteoric i've had reports from people in canada that uh that it doesn't stay on the shelves up there either so uh you know all the all the regional voids that existed four years ago when i first did this video have since apparently filled in and it's become very very popular uniformly throughout the country and it's widely accepted and and for good reason it's a it's extremely has it has extremely good ballistics this is where i have to go off the reservation is ballistics are not better um i know you're going to be you're going to be probably thumbs down on me and and writing to me oh absolutely they are better they're better ballistic coefficients and better ballistic sectional densities and blah blah blah well i'm going to tell you right now that's absolutely not true that's how it has been promoted and numbers have been skewed i'm going to give you an example of of how that's been done you know comparing apples to oranges uh one doesn't do that uh you know one one does not one does not compare the performance of a big four-door sedan to uh the performance of of of a small compact car that's that's unfair but doesn't but one does not compare uh bullets that way and one does not compare ballistics that way either you have to compare them on a fair on a fair level playing field and i'll explain that it can be rightly said that the 6.5 has got extremely good ballistic coefficient and it has very high ballistic coefficient and it can be rightly said that it has the 6.5 diameter bullets have extremely good sectional density what cannot be said however is that they have better ballistic coefficients nor better sectional density i'll give you i'll give you frankly the summation of right here right right off the back page of this old uh pamphlet here from sierra these are these are the match king bullish and you can take a look at that it is a it is a lot of physics that as bullet diameters increase that ballistic coefficients can go up that's just the way it is ballistic coefficients uh they they top out at a certain level uh with smaller diameter bores and they and they get increasingly better as the board diameter goes up let me let me exemplify this these are their these are their latest and greatest i think they have a couple more that came out since then they've even they've even have uh they've even got some 270 bullets now in in mass kings which is that's a delight for me uh it's finally coming to its own but in 22 caliber a ballistic coefficient of 600 in six millimeters the next caliber up it goes up to 617 in 6.5 it goes up to 713 very handsome ballistic coefficient is it better than the seven millimeter that goes that goes up to 780 though certainly isn't 780 is a lot more than 713 and is it better than a 30 caliber bullet that goes up to 800 not by any means so please nobody can ever it's a lie for any for any writer who knows better to say that it has higher ballistic coefficients than other calibers it does not have higher it has it has very good capable ballistic coefficients but they're not higher neither are the sectional densities any greater sectional density is the sectional density of the measure of the weight of the bullet to its diameter squared that's that's the that's the way a sectional density is measured you can have high sectional density across all bullet calibers uh within within certain reason i mean it's very hard to achieve high sectional densities with a 22 caliber bullet because you end up with something that's akin to a short pencil and is very hard it becomes over bore but you know as bullet as bullet diameters go up sectional densities are pretty much equivalent across the board what i don't like to see and what gets my irish and scottish up is when i see somebody who really knows better this is this is i'm reading this as a quote right out of this book here the editor the editor should have picked this up the editor should have squawked about this and not allowed this to be printed in this in this fine manual this is a this is a terrific manual i've got all the different you know all the different manual publications um from sierra and hornady and you know nawaz were all and and brian's all but this sort of drivel should not appear listen to what he writes most hunters are already aware of the 6.5 millimeter bullets advantages chief among them are excellent ballistic coefficients and especially superior sectional densities bs this is what he does and i'll explain why this is a sin 130 grain 6.5 listen to this 130 130 grain 6.5 has a sectional density of 266 which best such popular hunting bullets as the 130 grain 270. you see the problem there if you don't see i'll explain what the problem is he's got two different bore diameters and he's using the same bullet weight that's a cardinal center in the ballistic business pal you don't ever ever do that this guy here is flat out lying he's he's and i'm saying he's lying this is not a mistake because he's the editor in chief of rifle shooter and handgun magazines anybody who has those credentials who's writing for for rifle magazines who's the editor-in-chief knows better than to take two different bore diameters and compare bullets of identical weight you don't do that then he he further compounds it by going up to he mentions that he mentions 140 grain uh seven millimeter bullet at 248 and 150 grain 308 bullet at a lowly 226. well of course 150 grain 308 bullet is a short squat dumpy little bullet that has no business being in the same category as these bullets of high ballistic coefficient 130 grain 270 bullet is a bullet which is up in the sectional density of the 240s and it's the 120 grain 6.5 bullet not the not the 130 grain 6.5 bullet which is in that same category in the 240s when you measure bullets across the board with different bore diameters you always always always measure them according to sectional densities that's how you compare that's how you compare the ballistic qualities as you can that's the sectional density is the penetrating capability of the bullet and that's very very closely aligned typically to this the ballistic coefficients not not because the the ballistic coefficient is the aerodynamic efficiency of the bullet that flies through the air but you know you when you go up in sectional density unless you have a bullet which has a rounded nose or some you know inefficient form typically as the sectional densities go up the ballistic coefficients that go going up with them but ballistic coefficient has much to do with the efficiency factor of uh you know plotting out on paper how a bullet will slice through the year these bullets should never be used for hunting because they're simply not expansion bullets policies bullets are designed simply for piercing a piece of paper at the end of the uh at the end of the trajectory and do not design for expansion these are designed for slicing simply through the air that's why if you notice they're extremely very very very long and slender some of these bullets are too long and slender to be even effectively uh spun with the typical rifling twist that you'll find in a hunting rifle because hunting rifles are made for shorter more efficient bullets in terms of expansion in hunting situations not for not for slicing through the year okay so what i'm saying is is that you always compare sectional densities of similar type across bore diameters you never compare you never compare bullet weights because doing that will always unfairly skew basically you're playing with the cards in the deck if you take what he did was here he took 130 grain 6.5 with a very high sectional density of 266 which it certainly has but it's not better than the 270 because the 270 if you pull out the sectional density that compares with that it'll have a higher ballistic coefficient too so these are all these are all skewed numbers and this is what a lot of these writers are doing these days in order to promote certain cartridges well no matter what it is they'll play with they'll play with these ballistic numbers to you know arrive at a certain at a certain figure that they want to uh get without without beating on this drum overly let me let me just explain here what we're what we're driving at going to take the um well let's take a let's take us the seven millimeter 08 cartridge for instance that's got that's got a similar size case capacity that's to say the same basic case capacity as the 260 remington which is a identical when you take the the 6.5 primor the 260 remington and the 6.5 swede uh have their virtually identical velocities i even i put together a spreadsheet here and i'll i'll go over those in a second but virtually identical velocities across all the bullet weights and i'll talk about the differences in case capacity and why uh even that levels out but 140 grain 7 millimeter 08 bullet which is 7 millimeter bullet has a sectional density of 248 the 120 grain 6.5 bullet has a sectional density of 246 246 and 248 they're identical that third digit as i explained in a video about sectional densities is meaningless it's the 240s anything that's in the 240s is a that's a deer bullet that's a medium to large size game bullet so 246 sectional densities if you're looking for a cartridge that that will take down deer and have good good trajectory go always go with the 240s because you maximize your trajectory and you get very very good penetration on on large deer i mean up to 350 pounders 400 pounds there's no trouble at all in fact even with some of the bullets being made now with heavy with heavy bullet construction solid bullet construction a-frames and stuff you can certainly use you know bullets in the 240s even for for larger game like elf although i prefer to go up in bullet weight i i still i'm a traditionalist i like to go up and bullet weight and and not fool around with the lighter stuff so so there's a there's a two bullets of equal sectional densities they're they're ballistic coefficients these writers claim that the creedmoor has better ballistic coefficient well the ballistic coefficient of uh of that 120 grain bullet if you get a ballistic tip it's 458 and if you get the e-tip which is a copper you know non-lead bullet that's 497. that compares to uh very favorably with the seven millimeter 08 uh cartridge which has a seven millimeter bullet at 485 485 489 it actually is better than 458 so it's it runs it runs virtually identical in terms of ballistic coefficient it's not better it's you know you're just simply talking about a different cartridge with a different a different case capacity a different bore diameter and it has perhaps then you start comparing velocities so you compare your frontal area you compare your velocities but do it on a level playing field and compare bullets of the same sectional densities not of the same bullet weight that's that's absolutely asinine so if you go up to 130 grain if you go up to 130 grain 6.5 creedmoor does that have a comparison he was using the 130 grain he was comparing 130 grain 6.5 creedmoor which he took it was a sectional density of 266 and he was comparing it ridiculously to 130 grain 270 bullet well that's the the appropriate bullet to compare it to is not the 130 grain bullet it's the one that has the same sectional density 266 compares to 261 of the 277 bullet the ballistic coefficients there favor the 270. the ballistic coefficients they go up to 496 456 432 is against you know the 488 so you can certainly get similar if not better ballistic coefficients out of the 270. so i don't want anybody to think that i'm i'm dismissing the advantages of the 6.5 creedmoor they're excellent they're wonderful but they're not better than other cartridges and i wish i stopped seeing that being printed by people who want to know better shame on them for putting any of that crap in the in the magazine covers that suggest that the 6.5 has better ballistic coefficient and better sectional densities that is a flat out bald-faced lie coming from anybody who is writing in those pages they need to go back to school so it is what it is um it's it's it's ballistics are excellent um what you have to do is compare what you have to do is compare what you want for uh for room bullet speed and as i mentioned in that video about uh sectional densities you you can't have too high a sectional density so that doesn't make any difference sometimes sectional density you can go up in sectional density to increase the bullet weight which keeps your velocity down to a manageable level and what i mean by that is what i've said before is that when you have when you have a striking velocity when you have an impact velocity that's higher than 2900 feet per second you've got extraordinary wasteful meat damage uh you know so you have meat destruction which is totally unnecessary that's terminal terminal striking velocity that's why the 270 is not is not too high a velocity when it's out there where most 270s are doing business you know they're out there at 250 225 yards or something like that striking a mule by the time they get there they're no longer doing 3140 so you know the the striking velocity is certainly at a reasonable level but if you're hunting in the woods you know you don't take it you don't take a 270 with 140 grain bullet into the woods when you're going to be shooting it deer 30 yards away you've got the easiest way to do it if you're not a hand loader and you can't load it down you simply you simply buy the old traditional 150 grain load that gets it down into you know more reasonable like 2750 or so that's ideal so that's how things are done but you know examine the two examine the uh the 6.5 creedmoor for the advantages that it is it um it it was designed it was purpose built to have a 6.5 bullet shot out of a ar 10 rifle that was you know and and for target rifles where it could be handily fed into a medium-sized uh i should say a short action length i think sometimes in terms of seiko actions which have various lengths you know they they cover they cover the gamut from very very short actions uh all the way up to the extended extra long actions but anyway the the 6.5 is a very very well designed i would say perfectly designed and engineered cartridge that makes the rings the best possible use out of a ar10 size magazine length and the reason it does that is because uh it has an advantage over the 260. the 260 is based on the 308 case and the 308 case was purpose built around the 260 the t65 cartridge back in the 50s which was to be put into a uh into a m14 rifle and so and into that length magazine and for that purpose it works just well for you know for 308 weight bullets 150 grain bullets especially you know it seats perfectly into the uh the case neck without intruding into the powder chamber the problem is when you reduce the case neck down to 264 which is what a 260 remington is when you reduce the case diameter down to 264 in a in a longer bullet form when you're using 120 grain bullets is not too bad but when you get up to 140 grain bullets uh the the magazine box is not long enough to uh seat it way out long so you're driving that bullet deeply into the powder chamber and that's been the that was the that was the flaw with the 260 remington that couldn't be overcome the the problem was is that when you're using bullets of high ballistic coefficient for long-range target shooting uh the bullets couldn't be seated far enough out without intruding into powder capacity so the 6.5 achieves that by by shortening the length of the case and by allowing the overall length to be the same but with much more bullet protruding out the front rather than down inside the case so that was the favorable uh condition so despite the fact that the two the 260 has a slightly larger case capacity and despite the fact that with some factory loads it achieves you know somewhere around 100 feet per second or so velocity the 6.5 is the way to go if the 6.5 creedmoor is the way to go if you're a target shooter and you're you're purposely looking to be able to use the longer bullets for a longer down range long downrange performance now what about the 6.5 suite well it's it's probably it's probably a moot point because in this country it just has not it hasn't seen much service in this country there are some aficionados of the 6.5 sweden rightfully so it has it has the same exact ballistics as a 6.5 creed more in the 260 remington it's a very long long-range cartridge with very light recoil [Music] it has very good penetration very good ballistic coefficient it also has the largest case capacity of the three in fact i i have it written down here i took this from lee's manual the useful case capacity of the suite is 3.68 cc's as opposed to 3.32 for the remington and 3.12 for the creedmoor so it looks like it has considerably larger case capacity than uh than the other two more modern cartridges and it can be said you know it can be reasonably assumed that because uh pressures are held down to uh lower levels it's held down to around 51 000 psi whereas the other cartridges can be you can find loads that go up to 63 000 psi um you know it has it has some room in modern rifles for probably some you know some boosting uh and that i say that with a great degree of caution because you know you can't assume that just because it's a modern rifle and because pressure pressure levels in that rifle can accept more that necessarily you can you can achieve uh notably higher velocities you might be able to get a little bit more power and and that that often is true but that might not necessarily be true depending on the individual rifle so you always have to approach that with just the same amount of caution as i explained in my reloading videos in other words follow the follow the powder manufacturer and the loading manual recommendations that you go up incrementally cautiously and observing for any signs of pressure any signs of pressure means you back off immediately because signs of prey you don't go up to the point where your bolt sticks that's way way too high that's a dangerous level and now fourth spoiler in the group now you may not have heard about this from people who are in the people who are in the know who are um you know in in the in the shooting game they've certainly heard about this the 6.5 by 47 lapwa as soon as you hear that name lapwar you know you got to stand up and and listen because these people know what they're doing i mean these these are these are bullet and cartridge engineers extraordinaire they they make the best they make the best uh with the exception of possibly seiko they make the best cartridge cases going um and they make they make some of the finest most accurate target bullets going to but they engineered a case which is virtually a you know it's it's a virtual twin to the creedmoor now that doesn't mean they can be interchanged please don't you you cannot interchange them into different cartridges they have almost identical case capacity they list the case capacity as 3.11 cc's whereas the creedmoor is defined by measured by this this book here lee's modern reloading uh is listed as 3.12 for the creedmoor so you know a tenth of a cc difference between the two accordingly but that that can vary from you know one one batch of cases to another two uh one one batch might be a little heavier and therefore not hold as much that's k that's useful case capacity the 6.5 swede has got 3.68 it's way up there but this 6.5 by 47 lap work distinguishes itself itself by having a small rifle primer now for any of you who are in bench bench rest uh fraternity know that the small rifle primaries u was used by ferris and pindell when they designed their ppc cartridges their six point they're the six millimeter ppc and the 22 ppc where they took a 22 russian case and they use a small rifle primer in order to reduce the amount of um upsetting of the bullet within the chamber before it started down the bore [Music] they wanted to reduce that explosive that explosive burst of the primer flash uh which they felt would uh up upset the stability of the the positioning of the bullet before it had a chance to take off the theory uh dr panama sano's theory was that the uh the powder burning would give it a more gradual increase in velocity going down the board rather than that jolt with the primer throwing the bullet into the uh into the rifling before the powder had a chance to burn now this all happens in such you know microseconds um and uh you know it would only be theoretical if in fact it didn't turn out to be a pretty darn good couple of cartridges um this the six the six millimeter ppc and the 22 ppc have won i mean world records hand in hand and hand one after another um through the through the decades it's been over 40 years now since uh those cartridges came out and they've they've basically been the biggest most reliable success stories on the bench rest circuit ever it ever was but now we get this 6.5 by 47 lockwood that also shares that same technology of using the small rifle primer and i would have to say that might give it a leg up when it comes if if you're really interested in squeezing out the greatest accuracy i would say that maybe i'd want to give that a try it's not something you know that to be quite an investment because you'd probably have to have at least in this country you'd have to have the rifle made you got to get a barrel chambered net in that uh exotic chamber but um you know it it would it would certainly it would certainly uh pique my interest if i was in the 6.5 game looking for the absolute tops in accuracy this is this is not it has nothing to do with hunting as we're talking about shaving off perhaps thousands of an inch down range at the 100 yard or you know 200 of 1000 yard mark of whatever we're talking about shaving off maybe 10th of an inch to win a match uh over the other guy so that's where you know the money's all on the part when you're playing that game so that's that's another cartridge that is now in the mix and there's probably going to be more you know as as 6.5 becomes more popular that that more diameter becomes more popular now throughout the country and around the world there's going to be a lot of wildcatters playing with it now that it's gaining popularity so there's more to come and i'm sure there will be and um but i wish to i wish to thank you for watching um benny's doing great he was down here just a little while ago looking around the corner to see what i was doing but uh he's going upstairs to be with mom but um let me reiterate the 6.5 creedmoor is a wonderful cartridge um it it probably if if i were if i were looking for if i were looking for a short action length cartridge right now uh you know if i was younger uh it probably i'd probably pick that over the uh seven millimeter weight that i had years ago uh for so many years because it's certainly it's it's more than it's more than enough for deer the seven millimeter 08 was a great deer cartridge but you don't need to have a seven millimeter bullet to bring down a deer you certainly don't need a 30 caliber bullet to bring down a deer 6.5 is more than is necessary more than i ever needed with the 257 rubbers the 257 roberts are the smaller diameter bullet than the 6.5 so there you have it uh it it's it's nestled between two bookmarks uh between between the uh we know that the 243 works very well and the six six millimeter remington works very well on deer environments and we know that the we know that the uh the seven millimeter bores work absolutely well we certainly know the 270 winchester works very well so it's nestled in that same uh fabulous group of uh ballistics so be not afraid if you uh if if you're attracted to it uh you get a deal on a 6.5 pre-more uh don't be shy and certainly uh there'll be there'll be a lot of brass available for it you know you know four years ago i would i recommended that i would go with the 260 because it has the 308 size case which is so widely available and if you can't get 308 cases you can get cases you can get seven millimeter away cases so you know it had that advantage well i'm not sure whether that advantage really is uh is is applicable anymore because now the 6.5 creemore is a case unto itself and uh the the shelves are generally well typically they're loaded with 6.5 creedmoors right now we don't find the shelves loaded with much of anything but um pray for our country we need that we need prayers for our country but thanks for watching don't forget to subscribe god bless

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Length: 31min 12sec (1872 seconds)

Published: Fri Oct 30 2020