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Has Anyone Loaded Berger 130gr Hybrid With 6.5 Sta-Ball?

RLinNH

Sergeant of the Hide
Full Member
Minuteman
Mar 23, 2019
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Well, I have exhausted my stock of 139gr Lapua Scenar L's. I do love that bullet, but I am not paying the commanding price that they are fetching right now. So, time to start development on another cartridge. I am sitting on 700 Berger 130gr bullets and would like to work up a load. I have previous data with H4350, and will be developing a load for that. But I have kind of fallen in love since then with the Winchester 6.5 Sta-Ball. I love the stuff. Just wondering if anyone here has worked up a load for their 6.5 Creedmoor using the Berger 130gr. Hybrid along with the Sta-Ball. Looking for a starting point. Kind of excited to work up a load for this bullet as it was quite accurate with the old suppressor. My new 6.5 suppressor has closed up my groups considerably...
 
It's not the Berger but it is a 130gr projo.... Hodgdon's reload center shows a range of 39.9gr to 44.3gr. Should be able to set a start point and work from there if no one chimes in. I have Sta-ball that I'll be working with so I'm tagging in for data collection too.
 
It's not the Berger but it is a 130gr projo.... Hodgdon's reload center shows a range of 39.9gr to 44.3gr. Should be able to set a start point and work from there if no one chimes in. I have Sta-ball that I'll be working with so I'm tagging in for data collection too.
Thank you for the reminder to CHECK THE MANUFACTURERS SITE!!! D'OH!!! Now I have a starting point.
 
Here's what my ladder test will look like. With the H4350, I'll go from 41.1grs to 43.2grs. With the Sta-Ball I'll go from 40.0grs to 44.4grs. Load these Friday night, shooting on Sunday morning.
 
Thank you for the reminder to CHECK THE MANUFACTURERS SITE!!! D'OH!!! Now I have a starting point.
You're welcome and look forward to your data. I'm sitting on a bunch of 140s and up. I hope I can find one load and call it good forever heheh. Which would be unlike the rest of my reloading career... multiple loads, projos, brass. My only constant is I primarily use CCI primers. I do like working this stuff up though, part of my problem.
 
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You're welcome and look forward to your data. I'm sitting on a bunch of 140s and up. I hope I can find one load and call it good forever heheh. Which would be unlike the rest of my reloading career... multiple loads, projos, brass. My only constant is I primarily use CCI primers. I do like working this stuff up though, part of my problem.
That's part of my issue as well. I really do like working up these loads. More time at the bench, but when it comes down to factory vs. Handloads, there really is no comparing the two.
 
400 yards last weekend with the Lapua 139gr Scenario Al’s on top of 43.6 grains of Sta-Ball. Yup. I’m proud of that. First time shooting at distance with this weapon system…
 

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I bought a used Tikka CTR that had a load developed with the 130gr OTMs.

I think it was 41.9gr of H4350 and was doing 2920fps.
The barrel seems to be pretty slow on that rifle so you might get better velocity.
 
Not Bergers, but I settled on 44gr STB under 130gr TGK @ 2.85" for a bambi thumping load. In my 18", I saw decent velocities with the combo:

44gr - 2,745 fps
44.4gr - 2,775 fps
44.8gr - 2,810 fps

Accuracy was good with 44 and 44.8, but the latter wound up being a bit warm for my Peterson brass... Might work in better or higher capacity brass.
 
Dredging up a semi-old thread since H4350 is unobtanium

Found a few pounds of sta-ball 6.5 and decided to try it out along side my Accurate 4350

Naively, I thought Accurate 4350 would be close to H4350. Seems it isn't. Chalk it up to being a n00b

M
 
Dredging up a semi-old thread since H4350 is unobtanium

Found a few pounds of sta-ball 6.5 and decided to try it out along side my Accurate 4350

Naively, I thought Accurate 4350 would be close to H4350. Seems it isn't. Chalk it up to being a n00b

M
4350 is available direct from Hodgdon’s website at this moment.
 
It is an unfortunate situation that forces us to have to spend effort to learn to use third party search services to jump on availability.

Not the way I wanted to spend time, but it turns out that for an unpredictable amount of time this is how things are going to be with reloading.

I suggest you try something like ShootingBot to be able to pounce when 8 pound jugs come available.

You have to be ready to roll when you get a notice since the window for highly sought after items is just minutes.
 
Shipping etc is FIFTY BUCKS

Ugh

I think I may wait till my local Cabela's gets some in stock

M
It was also available at Powder Valley earlier yesterday. I’m seeing it come in stock and stay in stock hours to days, where two years ago it was seconds.