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If you were going to build a new F open rig, 600 yds only, a few questions for you. Thanks

Caliber
Action
Stock
Barrel
 
If you were going to build a new F open rig, 600 yds only, a few questions for you. Thanks

Caliber
Action
Stock
Barrel

6,5x47 or 7-270 WSM
Bat machine action
Mc Millan F-class stock
Krieger barrel 32" long
 
Been doing some research on the 6.5x47. Looks favorable.
Which BAT action, I see there are several?
Thanks
 
600 yards only, 6br or 6Dasher no question about it.
Look at what holds the 600 yard benchrest records
Easiest to find a load of anything you will see. Light recoil better ballistics than the 6.5-47 when using the 105 gr bullets
 
I'd go with the 6BR too. Easy to load & will hold the X ring out as far as 800yards when there aren't too many bumps in the road - and recoils like a sweetheart's caress.
 
Shoot a cartridge with more recoil

In F-Class there's a relative abundance of time to set up for the next shot compared to benchrest.

6 mm BR may be the darling of long range benchrest but I'd suggest shooting something with more recoil to take advantage of the better ballistics of the larger calibres.

The 6.5x47 will do well with 130-140 gr bullets.

180 gr bullets in 7 mm are popular and a 22 pound rifle won't beat you up to much.

Berger's 215 and 230 gr bullets in 30 cal have great BCs, but they're not as pleasant to shoot.

Even at 600 yards the improved ballistics of all of the above will keep you closer to the X ring.
 
Consider 6mm Competition Match

If you were going to build a new F open rig, 600 yds only, a few questions for you. Thanks

Caliber
Action
Stock
Barrel

I agree with all the suggestions about action, stock, and barrel. However, I would like to throw in a bit for 6mm Competition Match. It's a .243 Winchester wildcat, developed by Joe Hendricks, which uses a case that is fire-formed to move the shoulder up about 1/8" and squares it off a bit. Used with around 49 grains of H-1000 and David Tubb's 115 gr 6mm DTAC bullets, it works quite well out to 1,000 yds. It's considered to be competitive with 6.5x284 but does not have the barrel-burning problems. 6.5x284 tends to stop being competitive around 800-1,000 rnds. My 6mm CM is still doing pretty well at 3,000 rnds.

I'm too cheap to replace barrels that often and that's the bottom line for me.
 
600 yards only, 6br or 6Dasher no question about it.
Look at what holds the 600 yard benchrest records
Easiest to find a load of anything you will see. Light recoil better ballistics than the 6.5-47 when using the 105 gr bullets

That is an interesting statement. While I am a huge fan of the 6BR and the Dasher as well I can't but wonder were the better Ballastic's come with either of these two vs the 6.5x47L. It certainly is not the bullets as the 105's at least all that I have tried and tested have a BC of around .500 or so. With the 6.5x47L it is easy to get a BC bullet above .600. So these better Ballistic's must come from somewhere else. I am as always ready to learn so maybe you could enlighten me...

Roland
 
That is an interesting statement. While I am a huge fan of the 6BR and the Dasher as well I can't but wonder were the better Ballastic's come with either of these two vs the 6.5x47L. It certainly is not the bullets as the 105's at least all that I have tried and tested have a BC of around .500 or so. With the 6.5x47L it is easy to get a BC bullet above .600. So these better Ballistic's must come from somewhere else. I am as always ready to learn so maybe you could enlighten me...

Roland

The comparison was made between a 6.5-47 and a 6Dasher. Your are correct in that the 6.5mm 142gr bullet has a higher BC than the 6mm 105gr.
The issues is velocity they are fired at.
IF you can get 2800 fps out of the 6.5-47 with the 142gr. At 100 yard zero it drops 95 inches at 600 yards. 320 inches at 1000 yards

The 6Dasher at 3000 fps with the 105 gr at 100 yard zero drops 85 inches at 600 yards. 279 inches at 1000 yards. Much less recoil and IMO a more inherently accurate cartridge

Make sense ?

Tim
 
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Enlightned? Not by that comparision! While you may quote as many of those figures as you want, in the end we live in the real world. I that real world the 6.5x47L is far superior ( on some days ) when compared to the Dasher. F-Class is all about the wind, I am sure you know that as well as I do, the heavier 140 Grain bullets do better in the wind for me than the 105's. If the opposite were the case I would be shooting my dasher on those wind challenged days even at the Mid-Range distance. I own all three of the cartridges you mentioned 6.5x47L, 6mm Dasher and the 6mmBR all have there place no doubt about that, there are days also when each of them is just not up to the task. Is there any cartridge that is? Recoil is very mild in a 22 lb 6.5x47L it is almost laughable for that to even be a consideration, at least for F-Class.

I also disagree completely with your quote that the Dasher is more "inherently accurate cartridge". I certainly have never ever seen that to be the case. My 6.5x47L out of a 33" Kreiger is running the 140 at 2930fps or there abouts.

We all have an opinion, yours is the Dasher, I feel that this OP would be better served with a 6.5X47L at the mid-range distance. Nothing new there. Get 10 people in the same room and there is very little that they "ALL" would agree to. That's just the way the real world works.

Roland
 
Agreeing to disagree is just fine with me, wish more folks would or maybe could see things that way.

On a lighter note, 2+2 should equal 4 you are sure right about that, but even as something as common as math it doesn't always seem to work that way. I pulled targets for a guy last year who had two shots very high in the 6 ring, and then two complete miss's. He had no X's that I could remember and he did shoot more than a couple of 8's in that one relay There was never a call for a verification on any of those shots, and a week later when the results of the match were e-mailed out and you can only imagine my amazement when I saw that this shooter ( A local Police Officer) had won the match with a three relay agg of 588 22x. So you see 2+2 just may not be the right question as to what equals 4.

Roland
 
The question posed was...... as between the 6.5x47L or the 7x270WSM.... interesting question. I shoot a 7WSM for both F-Class long range (1,000 yard), and have been doing so for close to 7 years. I shoot the same thing at 600 yard because it is easier to do so.

If I were picking between the two stated cartridges I would ask myself two questions.. what is my recoil tolerence and how frequently do I want to swap barrels. Shooting a 7x270WSM 70-75 times in a day is not for the faint of heart (its not that bad really, but if you are not used to it ... it will leave a mark on your shoulder as a reminder to you of how you spent your day). If you max out the allowed rifle weight it's really not too bad for some folks. The growing numbers of 7mm on the firing line say that loud and clear.

If recoil is an issue, then you don't want a big 7mm. The same holds of the question of barrel replacement. The 7mm will consume a barrel much faster than the 6.5x47L. Personally, I can tolerate the recoil of the 7mm, and I view barrels the same as brass or bullets - they are consumables and will need to be replaced when they are worn out.

all that having been said, I agree with the statement that F-Class is mostly about the wind and your ability to read the wind. F-Class is not about pure accuracy (granted you need a rifle that shoot well). You will have someone pull your target and you'll wait at least 5 to 20 seconds before the target appears from the pits. The wind is the enemy; it changes during the course of a 15-20 round relay. The current 7mm heavies (berger 180, Sierra 180, Cauterucio 189, Matrix 190) are the best BC projectiles on the market. Run them at 2,900+ fps and there is nothing (very little anyway) that can shoot inside them in the wind. To me, that is margin for error if you misjudge the wind a bit. But, that wind-cheating capability comes with a price... recoil and barrel life.

Even though the 7mm is king kong in BC, the marginal difference @ 600 yards is just that . . . marginal. I am currently building a dedicated 600 yard F-Class rig... and its a 6mm. Why, because the 6mm can run very close to the 7mm in wind drift (within 1/4 to 1/2 MOA), but do so a ton more efficiently and cost effectively. Meaning 1/2 to 2/3 of the gun powder each time you pull the trigger - plus the bullets are significantly less expensive on a per piece basis.

Jeffvn
 
I am currently looking at 3 different 6mm cartridges (based upon the 6.5x47L and .243 brass in my garage). 6/6.5x47L, 6SLR, 6CM

6x46Lapua - I already have and shoot the 6x47Lapua (6.5x47L necked down to 6mm) in a 12lb. tactical rig (26" barrel). I would build one out as a F-Class rifle 29-30" barrel, weighing somewhere around 15-18 lbs total (this cartridge has nominal recoil with 115 DTACs). would run @ 2,900+ fps node w/ 115 DTAC.

6 SLR - Improved .243 case (more capacity than 6x47L or .243, different shoulder angle, body taper, and a longer neck than .243). 2,900+ fps nominal velocity; potentially hitting 3,000 fps node (not sure if it gets there in the Vegas desert because of temps). Eats H4831SC reported to get 2,500-3,000 competition rounds out of a barrel. Two of the HighPower guys (one a High Master the other a Master) at my home range are running this cartridge (both are using the 2,900+ velocity node w/ DTACs) (say H1000 is a touch too slow for the available case capacity)

6CM (Competition Match) - Improved .243 case (more case capacity than 6SLR, different shoulder angle, body taper, shorter neck length than 6SLR). 3,000+ fps nominal velocity w/ DTACs; can run harder if you want. Eats H1000 reported to get 4,000 competition rounds out of a barrel.

I have nothing against the 6BR, 6BRX, Dasher, etc. They are very good cartridges, and their BR results speak for themselves. I shoot with two guys who run 6BRs (on is a Dasher the other a true 6BR) for 600 F-Class. Interesting side note the guy shooting the 6 Dasher shoots it in the desert at distances beyond 1,900 yards with great effect... the DTACs transition to subsonic extremely accurately....

My 3 choices above are driven by the brass that I already have in my garage. Finding components these days will make you want to pull your hair out. The nodes discussed above are the ones that I know people run here in the desert. Temps here can be a deciding factor on how hard you run a rig and on what powders you can run (that is a completely different discussion)

Jeffvn
 
I have never seen a reamer print for the 6 CM either. From what I can tell they are pretty closely controlled. I've seen it said that only 3 smiths (Chad Dixon, Kevin Cram, Dave Bruno) are cleared by the developer (through PTG - who says its a proprietary reamer) to own and use the reamers (meaning Dive Kiff isn't going to sell you or me one if we call and ask him to sell us one).

Jeffvn
 
The first thing we need to know is what are the usual wind conditions like where you will be shooting? If you think you will be shooting somewhere like my local range, which is usually calm and consistent, then a 6BR or Dasher would be a good start. If you will usually be shooting in tricky conditions, then more horsepower like a 284 (or 6.5x47) would be good.
Though I don't have one (I have a cartridge which is a ballistic twin), I think a 6.5x47 would be one of the best balanced 600yd cartridges out there.
 
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