Two rifles, One Caliber?

[smalls]

I am having a rifle built that will primarily be for my oldest daughters use, and the scenario will present itself that we will be using the same caliber rifles on the same hunts for the next couple of years (hopefully longer but college gets closer for her every day). My current rifle shoots well, but I have few doubts that p_ham's handiwork will have a much higher accuracy ceiling than my browning a-bolt. The question for you folks that have multiple sticks in the same chambering... do you reload specific recipes for each rifle or do you try to find an acceptable load that works in both rifles?

 

[Wild Bill]

My dad and I both shoot .308s and I have a 7MM-08 that I use to match my brother when I hunt with him.
We've been fortunate to be able to find a factory ammo for each match that shoots very well in both guns. Makes it easy enough to share if someone maybe forgets to bring enough ammo, or if perhaps things get real western and more ammo is needed on the fly.

 

[noharleyyet]

Rifle specific smalls...

 

[popeyoung12]

Has to be rifle specific imo.

 

[Treeshark]

I own two rifles, both .270 (A-Bolt and X-Bolt). Same ammo.

 

[VikingsGuy]

If you are reloading to save money (although it rarely works out to be cheaper) or to make sure you have a particular bullet that is hard to find in factory ammo (like Hammer), then you could reload one ammo for both rifles if you make a very generic load.

But typically folks handload to improve performance over factory in a particular rifle. To do this you would need to develop separate loads for each rifle.

FWIW - I would either develop two loads or stick to factory.

 

[wytex]

Spouse and I shoot the same caliber, 300wsm. He prefers 180 gr bonded bullets and loads for those. I shoot 165-168 gr bonded bullets and load for myself. We shoot different rifles as well, a Winchester and a Sako.
I have shot his rounds through my rifle to see how and where they impact just in case I had to use his reloads sometime, same for him and my ammo.
Load for each rifle.

 

[Don Fischer]

Tell ya what. I had two 243's at one time and loaded them both different. My bullet's get loaded just deep enough to set back just off the lands. Both also had their own reloading dies. Neck sized till case would no longer chamber then moved die down until case would chamber easily. At that point I locked the die down and never used it on the other rifle. What I found didn't surprise me much case's from one set of dies would chamber in both rifles and the other set would only chamber in it's rifle. I never took both rifles out at the same time! You could possibly run into the same problem and end up with two box's ammo that look exactly the same but only fit one rifle!

Another thing you could do is try to find factory ammo that shoot's acceptably in both rifles and don't worry about it. I think if your picky, I am, it won't work as one rifle may shoot quite a bit better than the other. Keep in mind with factory ammo, one size fits all!

 

[popeyoung12]

Factory ammo brands will group much different out of the same rifle. My new 6.5prc, 50 round break in. Then shot 4 different brands. 1 brand threw 10 inch groups@100 off a sled. The best brand, the holes were touching. And every rifle eats different brands way better.

 

[Salmonchaser]

My brother fills his tags almost every year. Good hunter, good shot, incredible condition and I think he’s taken one or two elk at over 300 yards. My reloads in his rifle shoot about 1 1/2 groups. They run 1/2 moa in my rifle. Nothing wrong with building loads for both rifles, hell I’d rather reload and shoot than play golf. You may find the daughter’s gun more accurate. Unless she’s going to be reaching way out there not sure I’d worry about it very much if your pet load shoots 1 1/2 or better in her rifle.

 

[Sask hunter]

I have 2 22-250’s and both shoot the exact same reload recipe which is nice

 

[elkfanatic]

I would set an accuracy goal for both rifles and if one load meets that goal in both rifles, great. If not it's two different loads. I've got three 223s shooting the same load less than moa. Two 300 win mags shooting same load, one right at moa ,other just under half moa. Over the years I have found with my handloads that if extreme spread and standard deviation are good ,then generally it will give acceptable results in a lot of different rifles unless I'm loading to the lands.

 

[Carl]

I am having a rifle built that will primarily be for my oldest daughters use, and the scenario will present itself that we will be using the same caliber rifles on the same hunts for the next couple of years (hopefully longer but college gets closer for her every day). My current rifle shoots well, but I have few doubts that p_ham's handiwork will have a much higher accuracy ceiling than my browning a-bolt. The question for you folks that have multiple sticks in the same chambering... do you reload specific recipes for each rifle or do you try to find an acceptable load that works in both rifles?

I dislike load development, and am unconvinced small changes make much difference for field rifles (unless you're tweaking seating depth in and out of the lands).

Anymore, when I get a new barrel in a caliber I already load for, I start by trying the last barrels load (after checking the throat location for comparison). If that shoots sufficiently well, and at a similar velocity, I just make a batch to confirm and I'm probably done.

 

[Don Fischer]

I have 2 22-250’s and both shoot the exact same reload recipe which is nice

Ya know, come to think of it my 6.5x06 I'd set up hoping to try Nosler 140gr partitions. never had much luck with partitions but though maybe this time. Well got it done and to break in I used 140gr Hornady interlocks. Boy did they shoot! Ran about 1/2" at 100 maybe just a bit over. Well switched to Noslers and started with the load for Hornadys, good grain under max. Nosler's shot to the same point of aim and same group size. Never had that happen before or since! Wouldn't ya know it, came hunting season and no Noslers loaded up so had a few Hornadys left and took them. One deer and one elk in two shots total! Never know what you'll have till ya try it! Yea I stuck with the Hornadys, they cost a lot less! When I had two 243's in the Remington H-414 was a super powder. Got the second, Mossberg patriot, and it wanted nothing to do with H-414. Only way you'll find out what shoots is to shoot it!

 

[Boarmaster]

I dont reload but at one time I used two 30-06 rifles as primary and back up.
A Browning A bolt and a Ruger tanger. The ABolt shot Hornadys best and the Ruger shot Remington Green box the best. Both rifles shot considerably better with their respective types. So I carried two different types of ammo for the same caliber.
If they had both shot the same ammo pretty much the same then I certainly would have just carried one type.

 

[brocksw]

@smalls you can build "clones" that are essentially the same rifle in terms of chamber dimensions. The owner of applied ballistics has done projects like this that he's talked about, and I believe some of the high end competition shooters do similar things. The problem for us regular folks using factory actions is components.
For example, I'm doing the same thing you're talking about for my mom and my sister. 2 tikka actions, with the same brand/groove stainless barrels, in 22 creedmoors for lightweight, point and shoot rifles out to about 350 yards. My smith is going to do everything he can to create "clones". But the Tikka actions are likely not exact matches down to the thousandth. So there is likely going to be some variability in internal chamber dimensions. It may not make a huge difference in terms of both rifles accurately shooting the same exact load, but it might. Only one way to find out.

Going a full custom route (action an all) over a donor action would likely do exactly what I want. But I don't want to spend that much for a couple working rifles.

Hope that helps.

 

[howl]

Which cartridge?

 

[OntarioHunter]

I started hunting in 1964 with a WWII Springfield 30-06 Dad dolled up two years earlier. He had just finished another for himself. And my brother was hunting with the 30-06 Rem 760 Papa gave Dad the week after I was born in 1952. I helped Dad load up our ammo every hunting season. We all pulled our shells from the same box. But none of us ever shot anything further than 200 yards with most animals taken closer than 100 yards. Minute of deer at those ranges is about pie plate diameter. No need to be silly about ~0.5 MOA. Has anything changed since 1964? Not really. But the gun writers and their income source gun/ammo manufacturers may feel inclined to convince us otherwise. $$$

 

[Mallardsx2]

I loaded up a bunch of .308 ammo last year and made sure it shot acceptable groups in 3 different rifles. Turned out all of the rifles liked max loads with the 168 grain pills.

 

[smalls]

Which cartridge?

7mm-HT. For the record, I've been shoot the -08 for far longer than it's been the belle of this online ball. The first rifle I ever purchased was a shiny BDL chambered in 7-08 back in about 1995 or 96. Outside of a few hunts I took my fathers 257 roberts on, its the only cartridge I've hunted with in 30 years.

I'll end up developing a load specifically for the new platform, silly to put something like that together not to. It is going to be a slightly shorter barrel so I won't be surprised if I have to make a powder change (I developed a load with ramshot big game when it was the only thing I could get a couple of years ago), but the 140 gr accubonds will continue to be my pill of choice. As much as like to try some hammer's, the AB's have given me zero reason to consider a change.

Others referenced it earlier in their responses, but buying a separate die set makes sense. I'm a functional reloader that likes to keep things as simple as possible, adjusting a die every time seems like monkey business.

Appreciate the thoughts... even the existential ones that aren't entirely germane.