ultimate long range coyote, medium range white tail, long range comp rig finished!

[pondskipper]

Well, it started out as a bit of a hairbrained idea to build a rifle that would do well on coyotes to 1000 or more, whitetail to about 650-700 yrds that would be easy on the shoulder, accurate enough for the occasionl competition use that would mag feed from AI mags, have good barrel life, (2500 or more) and far better ballistics than the old .308 winchester. Not asking much right? Well, after about 8 months I finally managed to land on the 6XC, the 7mm/08 came in a VERY close second! After I finally got that settled I called Broughton rifle barrels and ordered a #8 contour 1:8" twist stinless 5R barrel for a 28" finished length, called XLR Industries and placed an order for a remington 700 S/A right hand action Carbon chassis and 5 round AI mag, a Tubb precision ground recoil lug for Remington actions, a Vortex razor hd 5-20X50 scope with 1/10th mill adjustments with 10 mills per revolution and EBR-2B reticle, IOR Valdada 35mm rings and 20 moa steel base, jumped in the truck and headed to Academy of all places and picked up a remington 700 adl in 243 winchester for 379.00 which is cheaper mind you than you can pick up just an action from Brownells, (dont ask me why) and completely took it apart without having ever shot it as a 243 adl lol, most of my co-workers called me nuts for that one! once everything arived I took it all to my gunsmith and good friend Parish Davis of Great Southern Gunworks and told him to get busy! and this is the finished product...

 

[pondskipper]

Re: ultimate long range coyote, medium range white tail, long range comp rig finished

Will have a range report in about 2-3 weeks so stay tuned!!! gun)

 

[pondskipper]

Re: ultimate long range coyote, medium range white tail, long range comp rig finished

By the way, I'll be using berger 105 gr match bullets and swampworks 105gr bullets to start off with, the only powder I could come across was rl 17. I'll be using Norma brass and cci br2 primers, anyone got a solid idea of where I should start charge wise? I'm thinking 38 gr??

 

[tt35]

Re: ultimate long range coyote, medium range white tail, long range comp rig finished

Came out great! Looking forward to your range reports. Do you have any feel for the jacket of the Swampworks bullet? I'd like to find a bullet with a lighter jacket than the 105 VLD Hunting bullet from Berger for my .243AI. Having crawl offs with it at LR 'chucks. (A-maxes have not done well in my gun.)

 

[pondskipper]

Re: ultimate long range coyote, medium range white tail, long range comp rig finished

Haven't shot any yet, this will be my first 6mm of any kind, I'm still waiting on the swampworks bullets to show up, and my brass and dies from David tubb. It's absolutely killing me! But when I do find out I'll be sure and let you know, the swampworks bullets look promising for long range work in regards to the B.C. Anyway.

 

[pondskipper]

Re: ultimate long range coyote, medium range white tail, long range comp rig finished

What twist barrel do you have, average velocity, and range you are having crawl offs if you don't mind me asking?

 

[tt35]

Re: ultimate long range coyote, medium range white tail, long range comp rig finished

I'm shooting them at 3160 fps and ranges past 1000 out of an eight twist 27 1/2" barrel. The Bergers pretty well pencil through that far away. I've asked Walt Berger for a 105 Varmint every year but they have too many other irons in the fire. My son has been shooting the 105 A-maxes and they open up very well. I had my gun throated for the 105 A-max but it didn't care for them. Go figure.

 

[pondskipper]

Re: ultimate long range coyote, medium range white tail, long range comp rig finished

I would suggest trying the 115gr dtac bullets in it which are actually made by Sierra, I know everyone will tell you that they won't work in a 8 twist barrel but they do without any problems as long as the fps remain above 3000 fps, if it drops below that at muzzle velocity they won't have enough rpm to stabalize or remain stable for very long. Another thing to watch for is that if you find a bullet that's got a jacket that's too thin and you push it really hard it will come out of the barrel in pieces so a strong jacket is still needed, on the other end of that same spectrum using those same bullets that you already know work very well in your rifle but seem to be lacking in expansion at extended ranges suggests that you could likely push them a bit harder than what you are, I read an article on another site that claims you can get 3300 fps from a 6xc which has much less boiler room as compared to a 243 much less an ackley improved version, so that again would hit with obviously more velocity and ftlbs causing more expantion. Even at that though we have to remember were still only talking about a bullet that's only .019 thousands bigger in diameter than a 223 remington. There's not going to be a pile of damage done at distances past about 8-900 yards so shot placement becomes seriously critical! Never the less I'll pm you the link I was refering to to see if it helps down range.

 

[tt35]

Re: ultimate long range coyote, medium range white tail, long range comp rig finished

Thanks, Pondskipper. I haven't tried to push them much past this velocity and have primarily loaded for accuracy. There seems to be a sweet spot in the 3100 to 3150 range. The expansion doesn't seem to matter a lot as to range (and therefore velocity) with the 105 Bergers. They are designed for hunting medium sized big game and I realize that fact. So, they are actually acting like they were designed. It just doesn't coincide that great with varmint-sized animals. As to bullet placement, I'm happy to place them anywhere on a football-sized target at 1000 yards!

 

[HarryN]

Re: ultimate long range coyote, medium range white tail, long range comp rig finished

Well, it is certainly a beautiful gun and the cartridge heritage is hard to argue with.

I fully understand the low recoil desire, but I wonder, with that barrel mass, is a brake even noticeable ?

I ask, as a guy with a rebuilt shoulder, not criticizing the goal.

 

[pondskipper]

Re: ultimate long range coyote, medium range white tail, long range comp rig finished

I won't know till I get a chance to shoot it, called David tubb this past Friday to check on my order and it's supposed to be shipping out by the end of this week, still had to finish modifying the dies. The reason I chose to put a break on is because I'm only 5'10 155 pounds and wanted to know for sure that for each shot I would be able to stay on scope without any problems no matter if it was at 100 or 1000 yards, with the way I have it there shouldn't be any problem in doing just that. Will likely be something close to a heavy barrel .22lr in recoil lol

 

[tt35]

Re: ultimate long range coyote, medium range white tail, long range comp rig finished

Using brakes to call your own shots is legit. I put a Holland brake on a .22-250 for that reason. I'm a wuss but even I can handle a .22-250!

 

[pondskipper]

Re: ultimate long range coyote, medium range white tail, long range comp rig finished

The other reason I did it is because it was going to cost the same amount to get the barrel threaded and have a thread protector made for it for a can later (perk of being friends with your smith) so I went ahead and had him make a brake instead of the thread protector.

 

[Viper6]

Re: ultimate long range coyote, medium range white tail, long range comp rig finished

Nice looking rifle. Time to get out and develop some loads.