Quote Originally Posted by 72Camaro View Post
Finally did this yesterday and found a couple loads to try a bit more on as I do prelims with 3 shot groups and then go to 5 to confirm. Found a couple of 5/8" groups at 200yds and 1 group 1/2" at 200yds. That is enough for error on my part so I'll do all three, narrow it down to one load and then do velocity checking to get the BDC correct in the scope. I'm actually adding a forth that is between the 2 at 5/8's since they were only .2 grains apart and most likely the best is between them.

That being said, I was doing some loads with 2 different barrels and one barrel is incredibly more accurate than the other. Sometimes you get what you pay for as one is a 700.00 upper and the other is 219.00 upper. If you can swing it get a White Oak Armament varmint barrel in 1:12 and 24". It is rare for anything to shoot over 1MOA. Yesterday on 10 loads all were under with Benchmark. The other barrel all were over but two with CFE223 and it is a 20" 1:8 barrel and not a WOA barrel but I did find one load that did go 9/16" at 200yds and one just squeaked in at 1MOA.

I've also tried the velocity way to find the node for loading and have not had much success and went back to the old full ladder of 3 each.

I normally shoot only 40 grain loads with my 24" barrel but all this talk about the 50's, had to try them and glad I did. Can always use another load that will shoot around 1/2" at 200yds if I do my part and hopefully buck the wind a little better. That is my nemesis.
We have a Stag Varminter (#6) with 1:8 that performs like that with the 50Zs/TAC. Heavy, stiff, quality barrels get the job done. And in 2017 I shared a ridge on an Eastern MT ranch with a guy shooting his favorite prairie dog rifle and taking pot shots at 500+ yards with it. The wind was kicking his butt and the rancher told me later the guy had been an Olympic contending shooter. Winds never exceeded 15mph, but weren't steady so NObody could predict them. And we were firing across a depression and into a hillside, vegetation changing color 3x in 500yds. (We didn't have a chance.) Worst case, we'd have winds blowing on our right cheek and bending the grass the opposite direction on the opposite hillside. Crap shoot. We were lucky to kick dirt in their faces.

72Camaro sounds familiar and Graham is fairly close...were you an SGN guy? WaGuns.ORG?