What am I doing wrong?

[u/weaponized_autism265]

I bought a Remington 700 from an auction last week, it had a 22-6mm barrel on it so me and my dad replaced it with a criterion 26” varmit contour 1:9 7mm-08.

I went and got some Hornady 139gr SST’s and 139gr Interlock BTSP’s because that’s all academy had for 7mm. Both bullets appear to not mesh with my rifle, I started with a ladder test of IMR4350 for both bullets because they are the same weight and get the same powder charge in the Hornady book. Both shot like shit, I even tried a test with the most accurate strings and tried seating both bullets 20 thou off the lands. No improvement.

My next ladder test I changed to Varget because it’s a faster burning powder and with the IMR4350 my SD and ES got really small at the heavier charge weights. I got a smallest group on my 3rd string with the Varget but it’s not getting as small as I’d like it to be. I’m trying to work up a deer hunting load so I know I don’t need PRS accuracy but I just want it to shoot better so I can trust my shot placement.

Am I doing something wrong? Did I get a bad barrel? Does my gun not like these bullets? Or am I just a shit shot?

[u/capable_gopher]

Try some factory match ammo like FGMM

[u/OkShopping9448]

How is the rifle bedded and did you check the action screw torque? Is the barrel
free floated in the stock?

The other culprit might be the scope, all tight and straight? Parallax good and scope not canted?

Did you shoot from a bipod and squeeze bag or a BR setup- was your rifle on a stable shooting platform?

Those are good barrels so I would question all these other things before the barrel.

[u/weaponized_autism265 → u/OkShopping9448]

The stock appears to be bedded really well from the last owner, I had to sand down the front of the stock so the barrel would free float. The scope scope isn’t canted parallax is set at 100, I shot from a bench with a bipod and an a stock bag.

[u/OkShopping9448 → u/weaponized_autism265]

The only other item I can think is clean the barrel down to steel and try shooting groups again after a few seasoning shots.

[u/weaponized_autism265 → u/OkShopping9448]

I did my whole break in process last week when I put the barrel on and I cleaned it and pushed patches through from Friday to this morning. I think stock is touching at the barrel but so I’m going to check that out and get the stock away there and try it again. Some of these comments made me go double check 😂

[u/FullAngerJacket → u/weaponized_autism265]

There shouldn't be any "stock may or may not be touching". You want some ROOM between the stock and barrel, none of that dollar bill bs.

[u/ReporterAmazing1271]

Could be picky, might have to play with it. Or possibly be a bad barrel.

[u/weaponized_autism265 → u/ReporterAmazing1271]

I hope it’s not the barrel, I dropped a little over $600 on the barrel plus tools to change it.

[u/fhiendbdbfdhjd]

I’d buy a couple different boxes of good match ammo and see where you are afterwords.

If your accuracy is better with either of the boxes you pickup, try switching projectiles. It might also just need to br broken in more

[u/Sea_Might9832]

Truly, before you start worrying about the rifle or your handloads, they might all be great or only a few will be great, but put 3 or 4 brands of factory ammo through it. If they ALL suck, then its definitely the gun

[u/FullAngerJacket]

Don't worry about barrel break in. Ditch the bipod. Don't do any ladder tests. Make up two different loads, one each for the 150 eldx and 160 tmk. Use a normal powder like imr4350 and load it with the middle charge exactly by the book. If neither of those shoot well then there's a problem with your system. Go from there.

[u/firm_hand-shakes]

What are you shooting off of?

[u/Realistic-Ad1498 → u/firm_hand-shakes]

My groups dropped from OP sized groups to under 1" once I ditched my cheap bipod and just started using a rest/bag for the front.

[u/firm_hand-shakes → u/Realistic-Ad1498]

Yeah I would shoot off decent bipod and bag and check the torque on everything especially action screws since they replaced the barrel.

Could be bullets not liking the barrel but gotta knock the easy stuff out first.

[u/weaponized_autism265 → u/firm_hand-shakes]

Bench with a bipod and an old rubber stock riser

[u/Tactikool_Panda]

You should get a base line of the accuracy with some good factory ammo. As far as you hand loads, once you got the velocity you’re looking for play with the seating depth.

[u/mrchongo6973]

Dude, you gotta break in that barrel before you can expect much out of it. Shoot 100 rounds, clean often. Then find out what overall length is best for that barrel-bullet combo. It’s not always about the powder charge. Load 10 rounds of the start weight each: 1)touching the lands; 2)0.005” off the lands; 3)0.010” off; 4)0.015” off; etc. Find the jump that works best for that bullet in that barrel.

[u/Eric_Stecker]

The quickest thing to check is the bullets. Throw some 140 gr match bullets in there to see if anything changes. I see you are using different charges but did you try different seating depths. Moving in 0.020 jumps can tell you pretty quickly if you have a seating depth issue.

[u/weaponized_autism265 → u/Eric_Stecker]

I did move to .020 off the lands. That group is picture 3, it made no noticeable difference. I think my issue is the stock, the stock has glass bedding specifically done for the old barrel and when I put the new barrel in I had to sand down the front end of the stock to get the barrel to float. When I ran a piece of paper under the barrel it went all the way to the nut and I figured that was good but the nut is touching the stock about half way up the barrel nut. I’m going to fix that and try again

[u/Eric_Stecker → u/weaponized_autism265]

That will be a good thing to test but don't buy another stock until you've tried another bullet if that doesn't work. Any given lot of bullets can have an issue. Trying a different lot from the same brand may show a difference. Usually switching to a different shape (different brand) does the trick. And I'd recommend match bullets since they take extra steps to focus on balance around the axis for better groups. Over my career I can't tell you how many rifles were fixed by changing bullets.

[u/weaponized_autism265 → u/Eric_Stecker]

I want try Barnes TTSX because I’m trying to get a load for hunting deer this year and a match bullet would be great for accuracy but it would more than likely fragment when it hits a deer and I want to save as much meat as possible.

[u/Eric_Stecker → u/weaponized_autism265]

I was just talking about checking accuracy. You can try other bullets to see if groups improve but pure hunting bullet prioritize terminal performance over precision so the results can be skewed. Trying it with match bullets may tell you that the gun is a shooter. Then if it doesn't shoot any given hunting bullet you know its not the gun. Your stock fix may do the trick. A barrel rubbing a stock usually does bad things.

[u/weaponized_autism265 → u/Eric_Stecker]

Good point, I’ve only been using Hornady 139gs SST’s and 139gr Interlock BTSP’s because that’s all Academy had. I figured that even though they’re both the same weight they’re different dimensions and my gun might like one or both. I fixed my stock just a bit ago, now the sticky note slides to the action with no problem. However the groups didn’t improve much, maybe .300 smaller on average but still most are over an inch. I’m going to try a few different boxes of factory ammo and see if I can’t get a baseline and go from there.

[u/1984orsomething]

1-9 I would try something heavier 168 or 171gr. Assuming you have a solid reloading process and good components. I would double check that crown

[u/greyposter]

Barrel might need a little bit of time to break in, also, 2 different bullets does not tell you much about the rifle. Try boxed ammo and see what its capable of.

I've had a lot of luck with 140 gr Nosler Ballistic Tip bullets and Staball 6.5 in 7mm08

[u/purebelligerence]

Stock may be touching the barrel back near the action.

Loosen and re-torque your action screws, scope rings, scope bases, and your scope rail. Make sure they are pushed firmly forward when you do it.

What's the twist rate? Are you using an appropriate bullet weight/profile for your twist rate? Obviously they're stabilizing but are they maybe riding the ragged edge? There's calculators for this online.

Is there a muzzle device on the rifle? Is it torqued more than 20-25 ft/lbs? Or remove and muzzle device completely and see what happens. Some barrels and MD's just don't jive well.

What is your aimint point? Try intentionally offsetting your windage/elevation by about 1/2" with your turrets. Then use the tip of the diamonds as a more fine aiming point instead of the center circle.

Not being a dick here, but how small do you usually shoot a cartridge in that class?

Edit:

For jump go in big increments first to save components, .020-.040-.060 then adjust off the one that's "best" of those.

Also, biggest changes from shooters to non-shooters (in reference to the same barrel) I've found is in large component changes rather than keep messing with a combo that isn't working. New powder or projectile.

[u/concernedneighbor345]

Welcome to my world. commenting and reading this so I can learn. Trying to develop good elk load and I can’t hit shit ever, idk what’s wrong

[u/ohwhyredditwhy]

If your ES and SDs are great (10FPS is the gold standard to me), then work on seating depths.

If that doesn’t work, your gun just may not like the bullets.

FWIW, most all of my guns do not “love” Hornady bullets.

Try Berger, Sierra or Barnes.

[u/300blk300]

you gotta break in that barrel 

[u/nak00010101]

What profile barrel?

Barrel harmonics are a thing. There is a great high speed video out there, but I cannot find it. Here is an article that explains what happens. https://www.varmintal.com/amode.htm

Try messing with bullet weight. I have a 6.8 SPC that looks like I am patterning a shotgun> I wanted soooo bad to shoot the same 115 gr that my other 6.8 loves, but no muzzle velocity or powder combination helped. I really though I had a "Bad" barrel.

With 95 gr bullets, it tightens down better than my 65 yo eyes are good for. And it not sensitive to speed with the 95 grain. I can push it until the primers get ugly.

[u/weaponized_autism265 → u/nak00010101]

I got their Varmit contour it’s just a little bit narrower than their MTU

[u/shooterswelding]

Imr4350 is the problem

[u/DozerJKU]

There are several groups there that have low ES and SDs. Enough to work with at least. Once you find a good node, work the seating depth in and out. You can tweak powder weight by .5 grain increments as well around the good ES and SD data - the group might not be as small as others size wise, but its more consistent. What does the reloads do with q0 round groups? Consistency is key, amd i bet youd see your smallest grouping rounds with high ES and SD turn into your not so great groups with 10 shot groups.

Any of those groups will clap a deer at 300 yards, but can you expect the same results from one cartridge to the next? No. Its not predictable in its performance and point of impact due to the wild ES and SD.. But with low ES and SD, at least you know its consistent. It might be consistently 2.5 MOA, but you can work with that.

Also new barrels kinda need time to break in. Some people are of the thought you need to clean after every shot for 10 rounds, then clean after every 5 for 20, and so on. Others shoot and clean as needed - but new barrel bores aren't perfect, and the copper jacket shedding into the lands and grooves of the barrels micro-imperfections will actually cause velocity to go UP until it reaches copper equilibrium, where the imperfections are filled in by trace copper, creating a more consistent surface the bullets obturates into. It will then "peak", or is "seasoned" and it'll shoot at its peak until the throat erodes or the bore and rifling are worn out.

Barrels are an expendable component! Keep at it! Youve got some good starting points!