Mixing Powders

[Coach]

After reading through the recent 6.5 creedmore vs. 7mm-08 thread, I found myself in pretty much the same predicament. I was looking at the Tikka T3X superlight in one of these chamberings. One of the more compelling arguments I found in favor of the 7mm-08 over the 6.5 Creedmoore was the attached youtube vid.

It's not particularly exiting, as the two rounds turn out to be very similar with the conclusion that 7mm-08 tended to have more retained energy at longer ranges. Not a surprising stat.

What did turn out to be interesting is, the conclusion that if you are deciding between the two and you reload, the 7mm-08 comes out on top, mostly because the best loads for the 6.5CM were factory loads by Hornady using a proprietary mix of powders that the author of the video couldn't reproduce with normal hand loads.

Our resident expert, Lance had pretty much the exact opposite conclusion, that hand loading for the 6.5 CM provides better results than 7mm-08, and I'd take his word over anything I see on youtube. He's forgotten more about hand loading than I'll probably ever know.

So, that got me to thinking. Of all the hand loading I've done and all the research, I can't recall one time where someone recommended blending powders for an ultimate load. 

The question is, who out there have tried mixing different powders to get the ultimate hand load, and how did it turn out?

  

 

[10Turkeys]

There are quite a few bench rest shooters that mix powders, but nobody else that I know of.

[muledeerarea33?]

I’m not that smart

[5guyshunting]

Mine gets mixed up sometimes if I've had too many beers. Anyone want to buy some re-loads? 😄

[452b264]

I believe the first clue was YOU TUBE. 

[rossislider]

I do a lot of reloading, but don't think I would ever mix the powders. I would probably end up blowing half of my face off. Besides, there are so many options in powders these days, you would really have to be doing something wrong to not find one that works.

To your point of the 7-08 vs the 6.5. I Have a  Tikka T3 lite in 7-08 and a 6.5 Ruger Precision. The 7-08 has definitely been the more finicky of of the two for me and has taken substantially more work to get a load dialed in. 

[PRDATR]

I don't yet own a 6.5 but when I was shooting a lot of 7-08 I always just shot one type of powder in the case at a time. Like Sean says, there really isn't much need for the average person to mix powders. Now my experiences with the 7-08 was pretty painless with a factory 700 varminter. I loaded 100, 120, 140, 162 and 168's and other than some 140 PMC bullets they all grouped well under 1/2 @ 100 yards with a few loads going .3 with W748, W760, IMR 4064 and Scot 4065. The PMC bullets were grouping close to 1.5-2" so I shelved them which was a drag as at the time they were cheap, like $7 a hundred. A couple of years later I loaded some of them up in 7Rem Mag and low and behold they grouped just under an inch. They just needed to get pushed faster.

[lancetkenyon]

With approximately 85 different rifle powders and burn rates, from Hodgdon Lil' Gun to VV20N29, if you can't find the perfect powder in there, you are doing something wrong.

Personally, I would worry about consistency of mixing powders, unless you did it one cartridge at a time to.make sure you got exactly the same amount of each in the case over and over. 

In other words, not worth the time and effort for me.  I doubt you could ever tell the difference between two different powder blends on the burn chart.  

[AZAV8ER]

I have shot 6.5C Hornady factory loaded 140 Am Gunner, 140 Match and 143 ELD X Precision Hunter out of two different rifles and get at least 1/2 inch groups all the way around. I have never come across anything saying the powders in the Hornady loads are a blend of powders, is this correct? Now only my impression, from talking to others at the range and at shoots and reading,  but I think hand loading the 6.5C would give me better velocity and groups than Hornady loaded ammo, is this others experience ?

[10Turkeys]

59 minutes ago, AZAV8ER said:

I have shot 6.5C Hornady factory loaded 140 Am Gunner, 140 Match and 143 ELD X Precision Hunter out of two different rifles and get at least 1/2 inch groups all the way around. I have never come across anything saying the powders in the Hornady loads are a blend of powders, is this correct? Now only my impression, from talking to others at the range and at shoots and reading,  but I think hand loading the 6.5C would give me better velocity and groups than Hornady loaded ammo, is this others experience ?

You are correct about getting slightly better accuracy from handloads, at least that has been my experience with the Hornady 143 ELD-X in a 6.5 Creedmoor, with my gun anyway. It depends on what you want to do with it also, if you need the most accuracy go with handloads, for something like silhouette, it wouldn't really matter. 

[STOMP442]

Mixing or blending powders is just asking for trouble in my opinion. Like Lance said there are plenty of powders available to fine tune anything you want. If you are wanting to duplicate factory loads I have seen multiple reloading articles that talk about doing just that with production powders available to the hand loader. I am not sure why anyone would want to duplicate a factory load though, just go buy it. 

[PRDATR]

5 hours ago, AZAV8ER said:

I have shot 6.5C Hornady factory loaded 140 Am Gunner, 140 Match and 143 ELD X Precision Hunter out of two different rifles and get at least 1/2 inch groups all the way around. I have never come across anything saying the powders in the Hornady loads are a blend of powders, is this correct? Now only my impression, from talking to others at the range and at shoots and reading,  but I think hand loading the 6.5C would give me better velocity and groups than Hornady loaded ammo, is this others experience ?

Hornady was blending powders about  5 or more years ago. I'm not sure for how long they did it though.

[L Cazador]

I've been shooting benchrest since 1975 and I've been blending powders for most of that tenure. It's nothing that I would recommend to the average reloader. You need to know your burn rates and then you need to do a lot of experimenting to arrive at a safe load. With that said there isn't a 6.5 Creedmoor that will outshoot a 7/08 or a 260. When you consider the far superior powder capacity of the 7/08 and 260 it's a no-brainer. Are there some drawbacks like brass stretching etc., yes but that doesn't make the 6.5 CM superior. Hornady designed the 6.5 CM to sell ammo not reloading components. If I wanted more velocity and superior ballistics to shoot at a grand, I would be shooting my 6.5/284 Shehane instead of trying to blend powders for a 6.5 cartridge based on my old 300 Savage case! Next wives' tale is the 6.5 PRC. It's going to launch a 142gr. bullet to the moon. LOL!!

[Coach]

Good to see all the replies here. Personally, trying to come up with a blended powder isn't something I'd ever want to try. I just found it interesting that the guy in the video I posted determined that hand loads for 6.5CM were not going to be able to match Hornady's factory loads.

For what it's worth, I ended up getting the Tikka in  6.5CM over the 7MM-08 just out of practicality. My son has a 6.5CM he bought for a steal and I was already planning to hand-load for his. I also already have a 6.5x284 Norma that I love, and recently got a 6.5x55 Swedish handed down, so I'll have lots of bullets to reload.

The other factors were the 7MM-08 in this rifle only came with a 22 inch barrel where the CM came in 24 and I generally prefer longer barrels. Along that while researching this topic some people found the 7-08 more finicky. Many found it to be super easy to reload for, but I opted to not take the chance. Given my luck I'd end up with one of the few that needed extra attention. With so many 6.5's to load for I figured this was probably the best way to go for me. 

Again, thanks for all the insight and experience.

[AZAV8ER]

I have had a a 7-08 or two and liked them ok. I have one with a Broughton barrel from when the old man was making them and I had a hard time getting it to shoot sub MOA. Also with 140 SGK was able to get them going about 2850 fps. I think hand loading the 6.5C you can get 140's to 2800 and change. So for my perspective its 6's. Now take a 270 WIN spitting out a 150 at around 2900 and I know what I prefer.