.223 for bear, mountain goat, deer, elk, and moose.

[Ajsomp]

Finally got out to try my new 20" Tikka CTR in 223. It has been nothing but wind and rain for the last month so when it was calm just before dark I grabbed the rifle and went to a local block of BLM and got it on paper. Fired 1 shot at 50 after bore site and made a slight adjustment. This is shots 2 to 6 @ 100 yards with the Creedmoor Sports 223 77 SMK ammo I got on the sale from CMP. Looks like she might be a shooter. Ammo gave me 2669.7 fps out of the 20" barrel. Took 9 shots on steel @ 510 yards. It was pretty dark by the time I got steel set up and drove back to the firing position so I was glad I had put a flashlight shining on the target. First 3 shots were consistent off the left edge so I held a half MIL wind (0 wind at shooter and minimal at target when setting up) and put the last 6 into a 5 inch group.

Looking forward to shooting this thing a bunch!

Jay

View attachment 1083014

When that CMP/Creedmoor sports comes back in stock, buy as much as you can. The TMKs they loaded shoot lights out in my tikka

 

[The Guide]

When that CMP/Creedmoor sports comes back in stock, buy as much as you can. The TMKs they loaded shoot lights out in my tikka

I have/had 200 of the OTM and 200 of the TMK. Once I get a baseline, I have Black Hills, Bone Frog, Phantom Defense, ADI, and a few others to test. Hoping that something that is frequently in stock will shoot well enough to be my range ammo and I can keep the "specialty" ammo for hunting. I still have 500 +/- of the AAC 77 tmk ammo left for my Howa so I need to find some blaster ammo for it too.

Jay

 

[The Guide]

When that CMP/Creedmoor sports comes back in stock, buy as much as you can. The TMKs they loaded shoot lights out in my tikka

One thing I did notice was after shooting the ammo, it smelled funny. Like burnt popcorn maybe? Must be the powder/primer combo they used.

Jay

 

[Ajsomp]

I have/had 200 of the OTM and 200 of the TMK. Once I get a baseline, I have Black Hills, Bone Frog, Phantom Defense, ADI, and a few others to test. Hoping that something that is frequently in stock will shoot well enough to be my range ammo and I can keep the "specialty" ammo for hunting. I still have 500 +/- of the AAC 77 tmk ammo left for my Howa so I need to find some blaster ammo for it too.

Jay

I went through something similar. I have Bone frog, AAC, black hills, Creedmoor sports TMKs and was just trying to stay with something as close to my hunting ammo as I could. Then I realized I could just offset my zero for training days and not worry about it.

At this point - my training ammo purchases will be the cheapest available ammo that groups 1.5 MOA or better. Bone frog has some new “range” ammo set to match their 77 that might be a good ticket. ADI 55/69 shoots well, and seems pretty available.

But I have about 3k of 77s to shoot through before then.