Berger vld

[athanasios23]

Was looking for some advice on VLD bullets. I really want to try them out and it seems people love them. My only concern is running into the bullets being to long for magazines. I want to reload them in 260 rem and 223 rem. Will I run into issues, since berger states they perform better when you play with the seating depth of the vld. Im using AI mags. I don't think I'll need to worry about the 223 or will I?

Also will seating the bullets at different lengths make a large difference? I assume you can find the best load and then tweak the lengths to tighten up your groups?

 

[KWilson]

Was looking for some advice on VLD bullets. I really want to try them out and it seems people love them. My only concern is running into the bullets being to long for magazines. I want to reload them in 260 rem and 223 rem. Will I run into issues, since berger states they perform better when you play with the seating depth of the vld. Im using AI mags. I don't think I'll need to worry about the 223 or will I?

Also will seating the bullets at different lengths make a large difference? I assume you can find the best load and then tweak the lengths to tighten up your groups?

My advice, and others may differ is to first find a powder charge/node to work with. Secondly, play around with seating depth. I run VLDs in F-class and love them, I just jam them 10 thou and they always pretty much just shoot. For magazine feeding though, I'd follow the Berger website advice and load up a number of rounds to determine the best seating depth. Work from a 10 thou jam to a .120 jump. You should find a seating depth with minimal vertical/horizontal that works in that range.

 

[athanasios23]

Thanks for your advice. I just received the berger book and it's loaded with info. Im carefully reading it as I am very new to reloading.

 

[demolitionman]

Might I add also, everyone loves bagging on VLD's like they are hard to tune, or tough to get to shoot, or a pita to deal with blah blah. I've shot alot of VLD's both 130's, 140's, hunting and target, and they all have shot exceptionally well with a minium of load work up. For magazine fed, I've pretty much always just loaded as long as the mag lets me(obviously check your ogive to lands first) and do the rest of the tuning with powder. Maybe I've been lucky. I stopped shooting them in the last few years simply because they were twice the price of the ELD'ms but man, it seems like the 130VLD's were lazers for me. I have no experience with them in 223.