6.5x55 Swed. And 129 Grain Bullets.

[CSANSO]

Hey guys I was wondering how much luck you guys have had with the 129 gr. hornady bullets in the 6.5x55 swed. I have shot almost 100 rounds of hand rolled shells w/ the 129 gr bullet and can not get them to go in to groups any better than about 2 in. I was thinking these might be a little on the light side for the twist of the swed. or maybe I should say they might be a little short for the twist seeing that I think it has more to do with bearing surface and velocity than wieght. Anywho I can't get them to shoot. might be the long throat or maybe I am not making the rounds long enough. I don't think they can reach the lands with the bullet in this rifle. Going to buy the 140 or 160 gr bullets and try them I heard from a few people they are tack drivers when feed the right loads. Tanks for your thoughts. MS8mm

[DigginDave]

I have the most luck with 139 gr to 140 grain rounds. Factory ammo I can clover leaf at 150 yds. Usually. Laugh. I just picked up some 95 gr custom Hornady V-max bullets yesterday. Can't wait to try them. I'll keep you posted on them. Mabey I could help shine some light on the whole "to lite" issue. I found so far though that my 2 swedes love long bullets. Good luck.

[Spiris]

I too have had poor luck loading the 100 & 129 gr. hornady slugs for my m38 swede. Different powders and charges as well as seating depths made little difference in the overall groups, or in some cases patterns, that I was able to get. I have some vintage Norma loads in 156 gr RN that will cloverleaf consistently at 100 yds. so I know the rifle will shoot. I have loaded some remington 140 gr. corelokt slugs but have not tried them yet. I have recently put together a vz24 and an A&B f54 contour barrel in 6.5x55, but have not stocked it yet. I'm hoping to try that combo in the near future. It's 1in9 twist ought to shoot the lighter bullets well.

 

Spiris

[Critter183]

My M96 LOVED 140gr SBTs with 44gr of IMR4350. OAL= 3.065"

[richp41]

My Twede shot 129 gr Hornadys very well with 45 grs of IMR 4350 and seated 3.110" for MY rifle. Five shots stayed in 2.0" with 4 of those 5 in 1.25"--- with iron sights. I suspect that the 6.5 Swede may have to be pushed fairly fast -- like a .270 Win. -- to get the most out of it. I don't know if that load is reasonable for a Swede action because my Twede is built on the Turk 98 action. Rich P

[Horsefly]

If your action was a K.KALE,I wouldn't think you'd have any worries about pressures from a 6.5x55.Jerry

[Doble Troble]

My Tweede is my most accurate rifle, but it does like the 140s better than the 129 Hornadies.

 

With that said, the 129 gr Hornady does shoot into 1 " at 100 yds, just not all into the same hole like the 140s.

 

I did have to do quite a bit of work-up to find this load, and its well over book max (Hornady's data gathered using an 1896 Swede). Maybe it makes sense that the short bullets don't group out of a slow twist until they're pushed pretty fast. My load is 46.1 gr AA4350 with the bullet seated well out from the cannulature. If memory serves this load does a bit more than 2800 fps out of a 22" bbl. QuickLoad estimates this load to be a bit over 50K psi.