308 cal 173gr FMJBT BC

[Airzoo Guy]

I can't find any information on this bullet in any of my reloading manuals. Does anyone know the BC for this bullet? And, does anyone know who used to make them...Sierra?

Thanks,

John

 

[rhantz]

Re: 308 cal 173gr FMJBT BC

Funny you should ask, I recently got a can of M118 match on a deal ($350)and I've been looking everywhere to find that info. None of the ballistic calculators that I have access to list it and the new Sierra reloading manual doesn't list it. Hope somebody chimes in.

 

[Here2Learn]

Re: 308 cal 173gr FMJBT BC

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Airzoo Guy</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I can't find any information on this bullet in any of my reloading manuals. Does anyone know the BC for this bullet? And, does anyone know who used to make them...Sierra?

Thanks,

John</div></div>

Are they from widener's?

 

[Redmanss]

Re: 308 cal 173gr FMJBT BC

0.490 G1, 0.251 G7, produced by Sierra.

Source: Applied Ballistics for Long Range Shooting by Bryan Litz

Great book and highly recommend it to any long range shooter. As for the ammo, having shot thousands of rounds of M118 until we got the M118LR, it's shit ammo and from our old M40A1s we were happy to pull off <1moa accuracy. Decent for training, not worth it for much else and I consider it one step above ball ammunition.

 

[Airzoo Guy]

Re: 308 cal 173gr FMJBT BC

Thanks!

 

[BryanLitz]

Re: 308 cal 173gr FMJBT BC

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Redmanss</div><div class="ubbcode-body">0.490 G1, 0.251 G7, produced by Sierra.

Source: Applied Ballistics for Long Range Shooting by Bryan Litz

Great book and highly recommend it to any long range shooter. As for the ammo, having shot thousands of rounds of M118 until we got the M118LR, it's shit ammo and from our old M40A1s we were happy to pull off <1moa accuracy. Decent for training, not worth it for much else and I consider it one step above ball ammunition. </div></div>

Thank you for the book recommendation.

However, it came to my attention that the 173 FMJ's were made by Lake City. I'm not sure if Sierra also made that bullet or not, but I'm pretty sure I mislabeled that bullet. They came to me loose in an unmarked box from a guy at the range one day who thought I might like to test them. Regardless who made them, the reported performance is accurate unless there are two versions (which I don't think there are).

-Bryan

 

[Airzoo Guy]

Re: 308 cal 173gr FMJBT BC

So was it shit because of the bullets, or poor quality control? I'm looking at handloads that were made with these bullets; if they shoot well in my rifle I can buy them cheap, which is why I wanted the BC. If they don't shoot well I don't have to buy them; nothing lost. I'm just wondering what to expect.

Thanks,

John

 

[Redmanss]

Re: 308 cal 173gr FMJBT BC

Thanks Bryan. It's been a while since I've been around that ammo, over a decade, so I went off your reference in the book to them being Sierra. Yes, it was LC ammunition but I'm not sure about the actual production of the projectile. IIRC even M118LR makes no reference on the boxes to Sierra either but it's also been a while since I've shot that; I'm civvie side now.

We always had a lot of problem with it beyond 900yds in the summer, and the winter we were happy to have it above trans-sonic AT 800yds. Decent enough performance inside 600yds but I always had better results from 168gr SMK in that distance.

Lot to lot performance varies considerably, and we had an entire lot we had to pull and replace on the ship prior to a deployment due to poor performance in accuracy and reliability. Don't be surprised if you have duds even with good primer strikes.