6.5 Grendel fun with family on 4th of July

[LRRPF52]

Went out in the morning on the 4th of July to kick off the day the right way with some family.




Close range target at 450yds, one of my sprung steel poppers, 12" plate, painted blue.




A bit longer at 700yds, another one of my 12" poppers, painted white




Finally, an IPSC steel at 1065yds.





Rifle is one of the several 6.5 Grendels I have, 18" Lilja 318 Wasp barrel, JP SCS, Cerakote work done by me, Vortex Viper PST 2.5-10x32 MRAD FFP in a NightForce Unimount. It weighs 7lbs, 12oz with optics and mount. In the mid 8lbs range with a mag and ammo. 9lbs 12oz with the bipod. Recoil is very light.

I had my nephew connect 2nd round at 1065yds.

We were shooting the Alexander Arms 123gr Lapua Scenar factory load.

I haven't even checked where my zero is with it, just assumed it would POI the same as other 120-123gr loads, because that has been my experience with this rifle.

I've even shot 2 different loads at 200yds into the same groups to see what would happen, 10rd groups with 123gr SST and 120gr Scenar-L, and they were all within 2.5" at 200yds.

I was stacking the shots on each other on the blue 450yd steel plate, so I moved to the 700yd, got repeated hits, then moved to the 1065yd.

We had some pretty stout wind out there, so I decided to put on 2.5 mils of windage.

I could see the mirage running along the deck from left to right, with hardly any discernible rise.

[LRRPF52]

Here are some initial results on hogs with a 129gr Nosler Accubond Long Range hand load.

Shot through the chest at a front/oblique aspect. DRT

[caporider]

Outstanding!

Any plans to put a suppressor on your Grendel?

[signal4l]

Excellent build. Excellent shooting. Great way to spend the 4th

[maximus83]

OP, considering a Grendel upper as I've PM'd you a few weeks back.

Have you tested the max effective hunting range on deer/hogs with your 18" barrel? What are typical velocities at which your best hunting load will still offer reliable expansion?

[cdmiller]

LRRPF52,

Finally broke down and I'm now building an upper with the 16" AA light barrel. I have two questions for you:

1) How do you like that Vortex scope? It is one of the 3 scopes I am considering for the upper.
2) What load are you using for the 129gr ABLR?

Thanks,
Craig

[LRRPF52]

Outstanding!

Any plans to put a suppressor on your Grendel?

I'm looking at the Thunderbeast 5" Ultra. It is very quiet on 6.5 Grendel. We were shooting that set-up down at Steel Safari last month at JP's Ranch in New Mexico out to 1350yds.

You don't even feel the weight of the Ultra 5 since it's Titanium.

I just have this major problem with paying the ATF my money for some reason, otherwise I would have several of them by now.

OP, considering a Grendel upper as I've PM'd you a few weeks back.

Have you tested the max effective hunting range on deer/hogs with your 18" barrel? What are typical velocities at which your best hunting load will still offer reliable expansion?

We did a bunch of testing with various projectiles for Volume II of the 6.5 Grendel Reloading Handbooks.

Long-term terminal performance on game has been going on for years. The 123gr AMAX and 123gr SST will kill everything they're pointed with vital zone hits within 400yds from most barrel lengths.

Expansion with the SST stops after it hits 1800fps impact v0.

We're doing some collaborative testing with the 129gr Nosler Accubind Long Range right now, which is in the video above. Nosler claims expansion down to 1300fps, which is well past what most people are ever going to shoot an animal at distance-wise. Even from 10.5" barrels, it would have expansion out to 700yds at sea level, 800yds at 4500ft where I sit currently, and 900yds at 9000ft elevation where I hunt big game.

If you watch the video of the hog shot with the 129gr ABLR, it looks like someone threw a baseball through the top of its heart at high speed. What was left of the lungs was swimming in pools of blood.

The 100gr Barnes TTSX, 120gr TSX, 120gr TTSX, 127gr LRX, Hornady 129gr SST, 120gr Nosler Ballistic Tip, 125gr Nosler Partition, and several other of the vast selection of 6.5mm projectiles have been used successfully to harvest medium and large game with boringly regular results, 2/3 of the time resulting in DRT, another large % going down within 25yds, and the rest within 50yds. Terminal performance is like most other common center-fire hunting cartridges, but with half the recoil of a .308 Winchester, fits in the AR15.

LRRPF52,

Finally broke down and I'm now building an upper with the 16" AA light barrel. I have two questions for you:

1) How do you like that Vortex scope? It is one of the 3 scopes I am considering for the upper.
2) What load are you using for the 129gr ABLR?

Thanks,
Craig

I really love the Vortex Viper PSTs, especially the 2.5-10x32 FFP MRAD. If you hunt with it, you need to be very mindful of the target knobs not getting bumped off zero, which may be a serious consideration if you are going to ride a horse. For target shooting, it's a great lightweight optic that has done well for me out to beyond 1000yds, in dusty conditions here out West.

Return to zero has been excellent for me every time, and I crank a lot of elevation on it every time I shoot it, unless I'm just confirming zero or doing load development at closer ranges. It's a pretty boring system to make hits with even on 12" plates out to 500yds, with no real recoil to speak of.

I've put scrawny little kids on it and had them connecting on steel instantly out to 500yds, with no rifle experience before.

[snowdog650]

Here are some initial results on hogs with a 129gr Nosler Accubond Long Range hand load.

Shot through the chest at a front/oblique aspect. DRT

That is an excellent video. Well done. Nice rifle.

[cdmiller]

I really love the Vortex Viper PSTs, especially the 2.5-10x32 FFP MRAD. If you hunt with it, you need to be very mindful of the target knobs not getting bumped off zero, which may be a serious consideration if you are going to ride a horse. For target shooting, it's a great lightweight optic that has done well for me out to beyond 1000yds, in dusty conditions here out West.

Return to zero has been excellent for me every time, and I crank a lot of elevation on it every time I shoot it, unless I'm just confirming zero or doing load development at closer ranges.

Glad to hear it. Most of my use will be long range shooting on a static range but there will be some hunting of Texas Whitetail, Mule deer (maybe), and assorted other critters thrown in for variety. No horses involved, however. Slowly switching to Leupold VX-6/R FireDot CDS scopes on the bolt action hunting rifles but I want something with MRAD and exposed turrents for training purposes that is still reasonably light and compact for this rifle. This scope seems to be the best option. Especially since I can buy it through Promotive.

I look forward to more info on the 129gr ABLRs and, hopefully, some load data for same.

[LRRPF52]

I loaded those in Hornady 1x brass, full-length re-sized.

Rem 7.5 Small Rifle Primer

30.7gr of CFE223

129gr ABLR

2.260" COL

Sent them to the anthropologist for hog hunting. He usually hunts 2-3x per week at night with thermal over feeders. His daughter shot a hog with the 129gr ABLR right between the eyes, and he got a behind the ear shot on another. I was really interested to see what chest cavity shots would so, so we'll gather more data as time goes on.