200gr Accubonds / RL25 / M70

I took the day off from work today and spent the morning at the range with a good friend of mine who I have not had the chance to shoot with for awhile. Not the best day to shoot with a stout cross wind. We had to tape the targets completely on each side, even then they were still getting ripped off by the wind. But timing the shots between gusts helped.

Anyway I came across some recommendations for using RL25 with 200gr bullets in the magnums especially in longer barrels. Well the my new M70 fits that. The picture of the 3 horizontal shots was 74gr or RL25 and the pic that shows two holes is 74.2gr. The latter is actually 3 shots, the last shot went through the upper hole nearly perfectly, just slightly enlarging it.

I measured the max OAL for this rifle which is 3.55". Max length I can build to and still get rounds into the magazine is 3.39". So I seated the AB's to give a OAL of 3.38". The usual word of caution if you give RL25 a try, start somewhere perhaps around 72-73gr and work up. I don't think 74gr is pushing it, Swift lists 75gr as max for their 200gr A-Frames. But Nosler does not have a RL25 load listed in their manual.

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That must have been a stiff right to left cross wind to push them over that far.

What distance?

Originally Posted by BRICKBURN

That must have been a stiff right to left cross wind to push them over that far.

What distance?

100 yards. Wind was steady at 15mph with strong gusts. Scope isn't set to zero yet. I'm in load development mode for the new rifle and just get shots relatively close to the bullseye. Once I settle on a final load, I then set the zero. While it was a right to left wind, I don't think that explains all of the shift.

300 Win mag???

Originally Posted by sestoppelman

300 Win mag???

Yup, sorry for leaving that out.

Did you chony them? That would give you a ballpark idea of pressure.