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Range Report 25 cal for comps

silhouette

silhouette

Grey man
Full Member
Minuteman
Mar 29, 2012
218
94
Anyone considered making a 25x47 or similar?
I know bullet selection is limited, but I've always thought the .25 as a bit under explored.
Wouldn't this calibre be a good compromise between 6mm and 6.5mm?
I am guilty of wanting to be different.
 
I shoot precision .257. Even if there were better bullet selection you will still be shooting with a handicap. Speed is not a problem. It's the BC limitations and lack of wind bucking ability. Nevertheless, getting hit with it is death incarnate. Oddly, I find the Speer 120 Spitzer BT the best. With the right load you can finish in the top 10% against 6 and 6.5 but it just can't compete. Thus, the handicap. The 90% that were beat by it have some work to do. :)
 
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It's a very formidable hunting caliber within normal distances for whitetail and predator control.

All I can recall my uncle ever having was a 25-06, fast and flat shooting but as others have stated its the lack of high BC bullets were it falls short same with the .277 caliber but another great caliber for hunting.
 
The other day I stumbled across a post where someone was talking about a new 25 cal bullet that was intended for long range. I'll see if I can find it.
 
I think cautericio made a 257 that was formidable but the caliber is obsolete because it is right in the middle of a small gap between 2 very good calibers
 
The JLK 108 vld is about the highest BC I know of for the caliber at .500 then there are the 110eldx and 115 Berger vld both around .460, good for hunting distances but lacking for long range comps.
Maybe someone makes a higher BC monolithic but the cost would be prohibitive for regular COMP use I would think when there are so many other good 6mm and 6.5mm high BC match bullets available.
 
Bergers 115gr VLD hunting is a little lacking:
G1: 0.483
G7: 0.247
 
That looks pretty good. If it takes off, maybe the other mfrs will start making bullets too
 
I'm asking Sierra to comer up with a 120 SMK as a result.
 
If you're asking, ask them to push it a little more than 120 grains. Modern shooters and reloaders are taking advantage of fast twist barrels and we have stuff now that will stabilize way more than a 1-10 twist will.
 
MarkLeupold said:
If you're asking, ask them to push it a little more than 120 grains. Modern shooters and reloaders are taking advantage of fast twist barrels and we have stuff now that will stabilize way more than a 1-10 twist will.
Click to expand...

They're aware of that. But slow to change. They have a 120 BTHP SGK. It wouldn't take much to create a SMK. They were not aware of this new nitch company or even the chatter going around before the announcement.
 
I've been shooting precision 25-06 for a long time. There is just not much demand for that. If somebody wants to expand and implement .257 choices than I'm all for it. I don't mind the current handicap between .243 and .264 but any improvement will be much appreciated. For hunting there is no handicap. For most game it reigns supreme at reasonable distances.
 
Yes, I see long-action cartridges being finnicky in load development a lot. And the .25 caliber has been underappreciated for some time. It was the same things we saw in the 6mm cartridges a while back. Factory rifles were designed with slow twist barrels and relatively light-loaded factory ammunition. As high-BC VLD style bullets were designed, barrel twists were made faster to stabilize them and factory barrels were slow to catch up on the trend. Now, you go buy a precision rifle in a .243 and a 6mm Creed and it's going to have a 1-7 twist barrel on it to stabilize the projectiles popular in competition and now available in factory loads. The same thing happened with the 6.5mm's. The .25 sat between the two and I think that's why it hasn't followed the same trend yet. People either fell one way or the other and .25 was nearly forgotten to much of the shooting crowd. Plus, the short action calibers in .25 are kind of lackluster and need an update.

Why this is interesting to me is that the .25 offers a good balance of a lot of things with correctly designed bullets. What I'm seeing is that it gives you the ability to run a high BC bullet very near 3000 fps with a modern short action cartridge with pretty low recoil. Running the ballistics, it's got less wind drift and more barrel life than the 6mm's and it's got less drop and recoil than the 6.5mm's. The .25 is the caliber that can balance case size with velocity and recoil while using true heavy-for-caliber bullets that optimize the BC that can be achieved.
 
steve123 said:
They, whoever they are, need to go all in. If a 110gr 6mm with .62 BC can be made and a 150gr 6.5 .71 BC can be made, then so can a 130gr .67BC be done.

1/4 bore = Merica.
Click to expand...
Exactly.
 
Culpeper said:
I'm asking Sierra to comer up with a 120 SMK as a result.
Click to expand...
MarkLeupold said:
If you're asking, ask them to push it a little more than 120 grains. Modern shooters and reloaders are taking advantage of fast twist barrels and we have stuff now that will stabilize way more than a 1-10 twist will.
Click to expand...

Just to clear up confusion, Sierra is producing the 131g high BC 25 cal. bullets for Blackjack Bullets. Which have been tested on a Oehler 88 system over repeated 10-12 shot strings with 1000y average G7 BC of .330 at 2,940 fps / .333 at 3,140 fps and great results on target. In testing they have run these up to 2,950 fps in a 25x47L with no pressure signs.
 
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Bear24 said:
Just to clear up confusion, Sierra is producing the 131g high BC 25 cal. bullets for Blackjack Bullets. Which have been tested on a Oehler 88 system over repeated 10-12 shot strings with 1000y average G7 BC of .330 at 2,940 fps / .333 at 3,140 fps and great results on target. In testing they have run these up to 2,950 fps in a 25x47L with no pressure signs.
Click to expand...

Will these be pointed like current SMK and DTAC, hope so?!
 
I'm thinking 25 Dasher. I want the BC and the extra barrel life.

I got to reading how low temp the burn characteristics are with N160 and 100V, they are about the same or lower than H1000, barring the temp stability thing, using these powders we could be looking at 4000 rounds barrel life??? I wouldn't mind adding or subtracting a few tenths of powder here and there to compensate for low or high temperatures to get great barrel life!

At the same time I found out Varget and H4895 burn near the hottest??? But they are pretty temp stable. Maybe why we don't see the fantastic barrel life we'd think 6 Dasher should be getting???

All this might be what I have been after all these years. Low recoil, low powder consumption, high BC at acceptable speeds and 25 cal!

It's my Dad's fault, he got me a darn 308 instead of that 25-06 I wanted when I was 16 years old, lol. Still haven't had a 25 yet.
 
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Bear24 said:
Just to clear up confusion, Sierra is producing the 131g high BC 25 cal. bullets for Blackjack Bullets. Which have been tested on a Oehler 88 system over repeated 10-12 shot strings with 1000y average G7 BC of .330 at 2,940 fps / .333 at 3,140 fps and great results on target. In testing they have run these up to 2,950 fps in a 25x47L with no pressure signs.
Click to expand...

So will we be seeing something similar out of Sierra?

Also, I'm hesitating to jump on this train just yet because of the low support for it at the moment. I want to see what availability is going to be like before I trust one company (and one bullet design) to keep me in bullets for my rifle. Is Sierra going to be able to make enough of these for Blackjack to keep them in a constant and good supply, or will we be seeing their own products take first priority? I wasn't so skeptical if Blackjack was doing their own thing because I figured they'd be concentrated on the .25 cal path for a while and that would be the singular thing they would do. Even with a small startup company, I would've figured high production numbers from them if they did just one or two bullet designs to start with.
 
MarkLeupold said:
So will we be seeing something similar out of Sierra?

Also, I'm hesitating to jump on this train just yet because of the low support for it at the moment. I want to see what availability is going to be like before I trust one company (and one bullet design) to keep me in bullets for my rifle. Is Sierra going to be able to make enough of these for Blackjack to keep them in a constant and good supply, or will we be seeing their own products take first priority? I wasn't so skeptical if Blackjack was doing their own thing because I figured they'd be concentrated on the .25 cal path for a while and that would be the singular thing they would do. Even with a small startup company, I would've figured high production numbers from them if they did just one or two bullet designs to start with.
Click to expand...

There will be plenty of bullets to go around - you can count on that. Also, there's plenty of support and excitement. As with any innovation things take time, and the majority of the market are middle to late adopters. The early adopters will get to enjoy the benefits in the meantime though. : )

We've done everything we can to bring this great option to the market and we will be bringing a second 257 bullet out at the end of the year.

Instead of continuing to petition the majors or wait in the hopes of the balanced performance of 25 Cal to come to market, we spent the time, energy and money to make it happen and to offer them affordably to competitors and shooters.

For some it's going to take some Match wins for them to feel comfortable - it won't be long before guys are out of excuses. Some heavy hitters will be running them soon.
 
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257 Blackjack,
When do you anticipate the bullets to be available? Or can they be per-ordered?
 
257 Blackjack said:
There will be plenty of bullets to go around - you can count on that. Also, there's plenty of support and excitement. As with any innovation things take time, and the majority of the market are middle to late adopters. The early adopters will get to enjoy the benefits in the meantime though. : )

We've done everything we can to bring this great option to the market and we will be bringing a second 257 bullet out at the end of the year.

Instead of continuing to petition the majors or wait in the hopes of the balanced performance of 25 Cal to come to market, we spent the time, energy and money to make it happen and to offer them affordably to competitors and shooters.

For some it's going to take some Match wins for them to feel comfortable - it won't be long before guys are out of excuses. Some heavy hitters will be running them soon.
Click to expand...

As a .25-06 shooter for the last 35 years, this has me really excited.
 
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MTETM said:
257 Blackjack,
When do you anticipate the bullets to be available? Or can they be per-ordered?
Click to expand...

Bullets will be available for pre-order in the next 48 hrs. They will arrive July 18-20th or maybe the week after that. I hesitate to put hard dates on it but it will be July!

We will send out a certain number of boxes early in the run so in effect the early birds will get first chance to run them. After we send those out we will probably spend our energies finishing the project and making sure all costs and other business things are taken care of before Full Launch. We will be 100% ready to go when production is finished.
 
257 Blackjack said:
There will be plenty of bullets to go around - you can count on that. Also, there's plenty of support and excitement. As with any innovation things take time, and the majority of the market are middle to late adopters. The early adopters will get to enjoy the benefits in the meantime though. : )

We've done everything we can to bring this great option to the market and we will be bringing a second 257 bullet out at the end of the year.

Instead of continuing to petition the majors or wait in the hopes of the balanced performance of 25 Cal to come to market, we spent the time, energy and money to make it happen and to offer them affordably to competitors and shooters.

For some it's going to take some Match wins for them to feel comfortable - it won't be long before guys are out of excuses. Some heavy hitters will be running them soon.
Click to expand...
What twist is required for these?
 
silhouette said:
What twist is required for these?
Click to expand...
Geno C. said:
1-7.25 is what they are going to have in the website
Click to expand...

For standard 308 boltface type cartridges we recommend 1:7-1:7.5 up to 3200 fps. After 3200 fps 1:7.75-1:8" is good. If you're building some super-magnum like a few guys wanting to do 25 Nosler, revive a 25 STW, or other things like 25 Blackjack PRO (pictured below) or any of Kirby Allen's Super Magnums please order a 1:8.

We are going to sell out of these 1:7.25" barrels and then make an order for magnum guys of 1:8's with more sporter type contours than the heavily tactical/match contours we stocked up on for high volume shooters.

131 Pit Boss.png
 
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I ordered a Remage 1:7 25-06 varmint contour barrel from X-caliber. Good timing as I'm running out of lands to reach on my 1:10 Bartlien. 25-06 is a wicked over-bore. I have about 1500 rounds down the barrel but had stability problems with 115-120 grain bullets at 500 meters from the get-go.
 
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Culpeper said:
I ordered a Remage 1:7 25-06 varmint contour barrel from X-caliber. Good timing as I'm running out of lands to reach on my 1:10 Bartlien. 25-06 is a wicked over-bore. I have about 1500 rounds down the barrel but had stability problems with 115-120 grain bullets at 500 meters from the get-go.
Click to expand...

That's awesome glad to hear it. Bullets are available to pre-order on the website now, and we will ship them out in sequence of orders if you'd like to be an early bird. The bullets will all be done in late July but we will be sending out a number of boxes from the front-end of production to early birds.
 
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For Remage or Savage prefits X-Caliber does not do custom throating. Their freebore for 25-06 is .105 inches. You may want to go with Shillen or the likes that use your dummy cartridges as a gauge. I found this out after I ordered the barrel from X-Caliber so we'll see.
 
257 Blackjack said:
For standard 308 boltface type cartridges we recommend 1:7-1:7.5 up to 3200 fps. After 3200 fps 1:7.75-1:8" is good. If you're building some super-magnum like a few guys wanting to do 25 Nosler, revive a 25 STW, or other things like 25 Blackjack PRO (pictured below) or any of Kirby Allen's Super Magnums please order a 1:8.

We are going to sell out of these 1:7.25" barrels and then make an order for magnum guys of 1:8's with more sporter type contours than the heavily tactical/match contours we stocked up on for high volume shooters.

View attachment 6917458
Click to expand...

I can't read the head stamp, what is this wildcat based off of?
 
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willicd76 said:
Pointless. It offers nothing over the 6mm or 6.5mm.
Click to expand...

So why does it offer nothing over 6 or 6.5? I see a .330 G7 BC (with a BlackJack 131gr ACE) that can be run up to 2900 fps out of standard face, short action cartridges. I see higher barrel life and higher energy on target than 6mm's, I see that it'll outrun a 6.5 Creed anytime, anywhere, I see transonic at 1300 yards (at sea level). Overall, I think the 25 caliber is pretty high performance.

Now, if this was comparing other 25 cal bullets (110gr ELD-X, 115gr Berger Classic Hunter) to the 6 or 6.5, then I would tend to agree with you. They don't offer anything new.

If this was for hunting, dead is dead. Make a good shot, it doesn't kill anything deader than any other caliber.

But to say it offers nothing over the 6mm or 6.5mm is blatant trolling.
 
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The fact that it's a quarter bore gives tons of cool factor. .330 at 2900 with h4350.....thats a fat girl that needs love.
 
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reubenski said:
How are you figuring longer barrel life? Just because 25 is larger than 24? Kind of a stretch
Click to expand...

Okay, yeah. If you've got a 6BR, you're probably not going to beat the barrel life. Compared to similar case sizes (6x47, 6 Creed, 243 Win.) I'm sure barrel life will be a little better. I think you'd probably beat a 6BR performance-wise, though. Everything's a trade off in one way or another.
 
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