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Tikka T3X CTR First Shots...WOW!

mikehill85

Sergeant of the Hide
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Sep 30, 2019
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Today I took out a new Tikka T3X CTR in 6.5 CM shooting for the first time and I have to say I'm really impressed. I was just using old hand loads (with varying powder charges working up in 0.3 grain increments) I had lying around for a different rifle. I labelled the groups in order. It seems the groups tightened up as I shot more. All groups are 5 shot groups at 100 yards. The average group size was 0.57 MOA and all groups were under 1 MOA. I can't wait to see how she shoots with a bit of load development.

The other cool thing is that the first group being low was a result of crudely boresighting the gun. I shot in the middle of 4 targets sheets to make sure I got on paper. Turns out, I was only 1 inch low on elevation (the point of aim was the red dot above the group) and dead on for windage. It doesn't get much better than that. It was probably pure luck, but I'll take it. :ROFLMAO:

Tikka CTR First Shots.jpg
 
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Curious what bullet powder primer you running? I have a new 65cm ctr at my ffl to pick up when I get off work.
 
Great shots, I have a T3X CTR in 308 (left hand) and I load 168gr hornady ELD-M in hornady brass. Shoots consistently half MOA, and admittedly even from bags, I'm not the greatest shot. First time shooting past 100 yards, I was hitting the 10 inch gong at 600 every shot. I have a cheap Nikon Black X1000 on it.
 
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Curious what bullet powder primer you running? I have a new 65cm ctr at my ffl to pick up when I get off work.
I am shooting 147 grain Hornady ELD-Ms. The powder is Winchester Staball 6.5. The primers are Remington No 9 1/2 primers. Brass is Lapua. The 6 groups I shot were from 41.8 to 43.3 grains, working up in 0.3 grain increments.
I have some 140 grain Hornady ELD-Ms being shipped to my house and will give those a try next.
 
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I am shooting 147 grain Hornady ELD-Ms. The powder is Winchester Staball 6.5. The primers are Remington No 9 1/2 primers. Brass is Lapua. The 6 groups I shot were from 41.8 to 43.3 grains, working up in 0.3 grain increments.
I have some 140 grain Hornady ELD-Ms being shipped to my house and will give those a try next.
I'm putting together the same rifle now. What weight of Staball 6.5 did you settle on with the 147 ELDM? Excellent shooting!
 
I'm putting together the same rifle now. What weight of Staball 6.5 did you settle on with the 147 ELDM? Excellent shooting!
I ended up using 43.3 grains of Staball with the 147 grain ELD-Ms. The gun shot so well across the entire range of powder weights, I just went with the top end.

I found the 140 grain Hornady ELD-Ms shoot ever so slightly better but that might have just been me on the day. For the 140 grain ELD-Ms I used 42.5 grains.

I tried the Nolser RDFs recently. Those don't shoot very well at all out of my rifle (at least with Staball). They average just under 1 MOA for 5-shot groups but that's pretty bad compared to the ELD-Ms.

147 Grain (average group size 0.56 MOA)
147grain.jpg


140 Grain (average group size 0.48 MOA)
140grain.jpg
 
I ended up using 43.3 grains of Staball with the 147 grain ELD-Ms. The gun shot so well across the entire range of powder weights, I just went with the top end.

I found the 140 grain Hornady ELD-Ms shoot ever so slightly better but that might have just been me on the day. For the 140 grain ELD-Ms I used 42.5 grains.

I tried the Nolser RDFs recently. Those don't shoot very well at all out of my rifle (at least with Staball). They average just under 1 MOA for 5-shot groups but that's pretty bad compared to the ELD-Ms.

147 Grain (average group size 0.56 MOA)
View attachment 8165367

140 Grain (average group size 0.48 MOA)
View attachment 8165368
Thanks very much! You've been very helpful. I hope to get the same results. We have a new hunter/sporter class in our local 600 yard match that requires the unloaded rifle with scope to be < 10.5 lbs. This should do nicely!
 
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Thanks very much! You've been very helpful. I hope to get the same results. We have a new hunter/sporter class in our local 600 yard match that requires the unloaded rifle with scope to be < 10.5 lbs. This should do nicely!
I just wanted to add that I have the stainless version of the CTR. I don't know if it makes any difference but just wanted to let you know.
 
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First shots fired last weekend with my new Tikka T3x CTR 6.5 Creedmoor. Mine is the 20" blue version. Everything shot sub MOA. I put together 50 rounds of this load for the 600 yard match next weekend. Thannks for the informative thread!

View attachment 8170478
That's moving pretty good from a 20" Tikka. My 24" shoots 140s really well at the same speed you're running there. 2620 or so. Nice shooting!
 
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First shots fired last weekend with my new Tikka T3x CTR 6.5 Creedmoor. Mine is the 20" blue version. Everything shot sub MOA. I put together 50 rounds of this load for the 600 yard match next weekend. Thannks for the informative thread!

View attachment 8170478
Great! Glad she’s shooting well for you! It seems very similar to my results. I guess the stainless barrel doesn’t make much difference when it comes to precision.
 
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I'd be interested in 143 gr ELDX load using 6.5 Staball. I have two buddies that loves that bullet and 6.5 Staball is easier to find than H4350. Nice shooting btw!
 
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I took my Tikka CTR Stainless in 6.5 Creedmoor out this past weekend. I was just trying to confirm the best setting on a barrel tuner I am using. I fired 7 3-shot groups and 1 5-shot group for a total of 26 shots. Anyway, the software I am using lets you aggregate the groups based on your point of aim. The aggregate 26-shot group was 2/3 MOA. I think that's amazing performance from a factory rifle.

For reference, my average 3-shot group size was 0.37 MOA and the 5-shot group I shot to confirm my tuner setting was 0.36 MOA.

Interestingly, the 26 shot group size is very close to what the expected group size would be based on the average 3-shot group. 25-shot groups are statistically supposed to be 93% larger than 3-shot groups. So we'd expect 0.37*1.93 = 0.71 MOA based on statistics. The actual aggregate group was 0.67 MOA.

image (3).png
 
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I'd be interested in 143 gr ELDX load using 6.5 Staball. I have two buddies that loves that bullet and 6.5 Staball is easier to find than H4350. Nice shooting btw!
I tried shooting the 143 gr ELD-X bullets today out of my 6.5 Creedmoor. I averaged 0.59 MOA for 6 5-shot groups moving up in 0.3 grain increments to a max charge of 43.5 grains of 6.5 StaBall. The best group of the day was the last group (max charge) at 0.38 MOA. The average mean radius for my 143 ELD-X groups is actually identical to my 140 gr ELD-M groups (0.2 MOA). So, it looks like they basically shoot just as well as 140 grain ELD-Ms do in my rifle.

Below is a 3-shot group that I shot at 100 yards with this ammo, testing the tuner settings on my Gen 2 EC Tuner.

Scan2024-02-10_1245152.jpg
 
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