223 Rem Bolt/Trainer Loads

I'm running a 26 inch Bartlein heavy palma 1:7 twist and 24.2 of Varget and a 75 ELD-M in starline brass with CCI400 primer. Just under 3k fps. No problem fitting into an MDT .223 metal mag.

23.1-23.8 of 8208xbr under any 75-77 gr bullet will do just fine. Lapua brass, others just cause headaches, It’s awesome. 75eld,77tmk,77rdf etc

I run a 26", 1:7 Krieger.

23.5 - 25.0gr Reloader 15 and the 69gr SMKs...or drop a grain on the powder charges and use the 77gr. I've had two barrels that shoot these well across a wide range of magazine-length seating depths.

For Varget, try 24.0 - 25.0 with the 69, and drop a grain again with the 77.

Be careful what brass you're using. Some stuff is pretty thick, and you'll get into pressure quickly. Those loads I listed are for LC/Lapua brass...not Starline etc...

You can also 'mine' the existing sticky thread on .223/5.56 loads by searching for specific terms mentioned here, like '75 ELD' or 'AICS'. Might take a bit of reading, but that never hurt anyone (too much)

FWIW, I'm in a similar boat: I recently picked up a second Origin action, so now I don't have to play hot-swap with barrels and bolt heads. I screwed on a 26" Krieger 7tw MTU barrel, and set it up in a KRG Bravo chassis and with an older scope I had laying around (Bushnell XRS 4.5-30x gen 1). Should be plenty for plinking, practice and a loaner. Last time I did load dev on it was sometime back in '21 or thereabouts, so I'm more or less starting from scratch. But, as mentioned... there is a wealth of info out there; ya just have to dig a little.

I am totally OVER buying Hodgdon powder for reloading because of the price. I've gone to Vihtavuori, N135 for .223 and N150 for 6BR. I still have a full jug of H4350 for 6.5CM (seldom shot anymore) for which I paid under $300...

While advice from @spife7980 is usually golden, I will disagree on "just get Lapua brass" for .223. I bought 1000 same-lot Starline cases when I started handloading .223 several years ago; it's on its 8th go-round and still gives accuracy as good as or better than Peterson (6.5CM) and Alpha (6BR). I measured case weight and H2O volume of 20 cases and, again, found remarkably consistent values. Now, whether the brass quality is as high as the premium brands I can't say - I just know that I've been happy with Starline (I have not yet run my .223 in a match, although it's certainly accurate enough to play in Tactical).

Right now my favorite .223 load is quite mild (2830fps out of 28" 1:7 Bartlein) but I shoot it to 1000 regularly:
- Hornady 75gr ELDM seated to 1.92" CBTO
- 22.8gr N135
- CCI 400
- Starline case (annealed after each firing)

I've used 23.1 IMR-8208XBR instead of N135 (all else the same) for 2940fps (This exceeds Hodgdon's max recommended .223 load). Over the past year, I've simply found that milder loads do not hold me back in any way and are often more accurate than spicier recipes. I cleaned my .223 today; with 2200+ rounds on the barrel, I was very pleasantly surprised at the VERY minor firecracking and how easy the tube came clean.

bbyars said:

Has anyone actually seen a difference in SD/ES in using BR primers vs Standard vs Mag in 223 across the same load once its been tuned? Ive tried this before with gas gun but it was minimal difference, figured it may be more exaggerated in a bolt.

Click to expand...

I've compared all three (CCI 400, 450, BR4). I am quite content with -400s for my .223 bolt rifles; even the spicier IMR-8208XBR loads didn't cause excessive primer flattening. ES/SD values simply did not justify the added expense at all.