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+--- Thread: Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier (/showthread.php?tid=21001)
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - VASCAR2 - 06-09-2020
If your talking about the Hornady 123 grain BTHP sold as either Hornady Black or American Gunner 200 round box. The 123 grain BTHP Hornady ammo gets good reviews. I read no reports or product reviews on Hornady Frontier 6.5 Grendel Full Metal Jacket ammo. There have been numerous reports of problems with Hornady Frontier 223/5.56 ammo.
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - Happy2Shoot - 06-09-2020
DeanD Wrote:Hopefully I can get to the range this week and I will post results of: PPU 110, PPU 120, Hornady Black, Hornaday Frontier, Hornady American Gunner, and Wolf. Not looking for hair splitting accuracy but we will see how they all do for practical shooting.
@DeanD
Were you able to get the the range and shoot these?
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - mdram - 06-09-2020
VASCAR2 Wrote:If your talking about the Hornady 123 grain BTHP sold as either Hornady Black or American Gunner 200 round box. The 123 grain BTHP Hornady ammo gets good reviews. I read no reports or product reviews on Hornady Frontier 6.5 Grendel Full Metal Jacket ammo. There have been numerous reports of problems with Hornady Frontier 223/5.56 ammo.
yes, the frontier. i have read about it in the 5.56/223, and didnt know if i should even shoot it in the grendel
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - VASCAR2 - 06-09-2020
Id shoot them but very cautiously and inspecting the cases. Id watch the lot numbers and treat new lots with suspicion till they proved satisfactory.
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - mdram - 06-09-2020
VASCAR2 Wrote:Id shoot them but very cautiously and inspecting the cases. Id watch the lot numbers and treat new lots with suspicion till they proved satisfactory.
i only have 1 box, and dont plan on buying anymore
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - Aquila - 06-13-2020
Hey guys, I know this is a few days old but I wanted to follow up on this. I've shot 200 rounds of the American Gunner and 35 rounds of the Frontier. Strangely enough, and very unfortunately, I do not have any of my groups that I can show for it, but both rounds out of my rifle consistently shoots 3/4" @ 100 yards. My barrel is an 18" faxon heavy fluted match series and let it be known that at the moment I have a single stage trigger in that particular lower. I have shot for groups on a few occasions but I typically just use the AG for shooting steel out to 400 at my local range. I just ordered some reloading equipment that will arrive in a few days, as of now I don't have anything to work up load development and am restricted to factory ammo. I do not plan on shooting frontier beyond the two boxes I wanted to get a couple groups from.
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - gwtx - 06-13-2020
I finally got some of the BTHP's loaded. Used same load as I do for the SST and ELD....(2.250 over 28.0gr ArComp) and they shot the same 3/4 " group close enough I wouldn't have to change zero to shoot any of the three, but for my purposes, I think the SST's work the best for me. They seem to "kill" better.
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - VASCAR2 - 06-13-2020
I did some more searching and it appears to me Hornady had a couple of bad lots of 223/5.56 hit the market which created a lot of attention. From what Im reading the later lots of Hornady Frontier in 223/5.56 havent exhibited any problems in 223/5.56. The 6.5 Grendel Frontier FMJ is priced so close to the BTHP ammo Id probably buy the American Gunner 123 grain BTHP 6.5 Grendel ammo.
I think it would be interesting to do different comparisons between the three 6.5 Grendel FMJ ammo on the market. Im curious how the 100 grain Wolf/Barnual FMJ, 110 Grain PPU FMJ or 123 grain Hornady Frontier FMJ would perform in different test media and ballistically. The ballistic coefficient is pretty similar between the 100 grain bimetal jacket Wolf/Barnaul bullet and the PPU 110 grain FMJ. Im curious if the 123 grain FMJ will benefit from the greater sectional density in harder targets.
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - DeanD - 06-14-2020
50 yards, off a rest, 16" carbine, Leupold VX-III 3-10. Don't think I did as well as I should with the American Gunner. Will do that again, I think the ammo is better than this but I did do two 3-shot groups and got the same result.
![[Image: om3WeS1.jpg?1]](http://i.imgur.com/om3WeS1.jpg?1)
![[Image: lbJBgJd.jpg?1]](http://i.imgur.com/lbJBgJd.jpg?1)
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - Grendelshooter - 06-14-2020
Hornady ammo gives me pierced primers regularly. Eld and bthp.
Same in 223 and 5.56.
Accuracy isnt great either.
Hornady ammo just seems way, way too hot.
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - Happy2Shoot - 06-14-2020
DeanD Wrote:50 yards, off a rest, 16" carbine, Leupold VX-III 3-10. Don't think I did as well as I should with the American Gunner. Will do that again, I think the ammo is better than this but I did do two 3-shot groups and got the same result.
Thanks! Great comparison!
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - VASCAR2 - 06-14-2020
Grendelshooter Wrote:Hornady ammo gives me pierced primers regularly. Eld and bthp.
Same in 223 and 5.56.
Accuracy isnt great either.
Hornady ammo just seems way, way too hot.
If your getting pierced primers on factory ammo it sounds like you might have an out of spec bolt or firing pin. You can also get tolerance stacking where the firing pin protrusion is to deep. You could have an out of spec chamber where the bullet in jammed into the lands of the barrel causing excess pressure. Odin works and a couple of other manufacturers used a 6.5 Grendel bolt with shorter overall length but a full length mil spec AR-15 firing pin.
When AA introduced the 6.5 Grendel they opted to use a .136 bolt face depth whereas 5.56/223 uses a .125 bolt face depth. AA lengthened the bolt by .01 (2.810) to permit the use of standard length firing pins. A couple manufacturers use the standard AR-15 bolt length of 2.800 with a .136 bolt face depth. This combination needs a shorter firing pin to keep from having excessive firing pin protrusion. The minimum spec firing pin protrusion is .028 maximum is .036. The maximum in spec length for an AR-15 firing pin is 3.279 with a tolerance up to -.009. If you have a 2.800 length bolt your firing pin needs to be shorter 3.269 or less in length.
I suggest anyone who gets pierced primers with factory 6.5 Grendel factory ammunition in AR-15s to measure your bolt and firing pin.
There have been a couple instances where forum members had a bolt that was a couple thousands longer than 2.810 and a shorter firing pin length and were getting unreliable ignition and failure to fire. This type of tolerance stacking has been pretty rare with 6.5 Grendel AR-15s. It is not a wise to swap AR-15 bolts and firing pins without measuring the bolt and firing pin length. It is even more important with the 6.5 Grendel AR-15.
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - DeanD - 06-17-2020
I agree, shouldn't be getting pierced primers with Hornady ammo, nothing different there from other brands. Thanks for the info Vascar2! Good stuff.
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - trdjohn - 07-03-2020
realize this thread is sort of dormant, but are the frontier 6.5 grendel primer pockets crimped? I know all the boxes of 556 and 223 frontier I've bought had crimped primers
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - wreckster84 - 07-03-2020
I bought the 200 rd deal from TargetSports @ $149 last week. Looks like theyre sold out now.
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - bcamp83 - 07-04-2020
Brass looks exactly the same except the Frontier is stamped Frontier and the Am Gun has a typical head stamp.
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - bcamp83 - 07-04-2020
[ATTACH=CONFIG]16403[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]16404[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]16405[/ATTACH]
Here are the two Grendel loads side by side. I routinely shot American Gunner in my 6.5 Creedmoor and it was very similar to the Hornady Black. Both had BTHP bullets. I think it's the same for 6.5 Grendel. It's a shame they don't sell a 123 gr BTHP bullet for reloading (I think that was discussed in another thread). So I have some chronograph data out of a 16" Odin Works barrel. Both Frontier and American Gunner were very close. I'd say they both average near 2400 fps. American Gunner had SD 15.6, ES 40, Avg 2423; Frontier had SD 12.3, ES 24, Avg 2418. I've had higher and lower ES and SD numbers for both but these are average. For another comparison, the Hornady Black with ELD-M was: SD 18.5, ES 51, avg 2398. Again these are all out of a 16" Odin Works barrel
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - gwtx - 07-04-2020
Quote: " It's a shame they don't sell a 123 gr BTHP bullet for reloading (I think that was discussed in another thread"
I bought some(123gr BTHP) from MidSouth back in april. Don't know if they still have them. I've only shot a few that I loaded the same as I do the sst and eld-m, and they shoot very close to the same POI. All three of those run an average of 2525 to 2555 fps on a magnetospeed. I only shoot hogs and varmints, so I haven't tried to get tiny groups. They all shoot 1 inch or less, depending on my part. I haven't shot a hog with the BTHP's yet, so I don'know how they perform on "meat".
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - sundowner - 07-05-2020
gwtx Wrote:Quote: " It's a shame they don't sell a 123 gr BTHP bullet for reloading (I think that was discussed in another thread"They do MidSouth has them in 250 bullet bags .
I bought some(123gr BTHP) from MidSouth back in april. Don't know if they still have them. I've only shot a few that I loaded the same as I do the sst and eld-m, and they shoot very close to the same POI. All three of those run an average of 2525 to 2555 fps on a magnetospeed. I only shoot hogs and varmints, so I haven't tried to get tiny groups. They all shoot 1 inch or less, depending on my part. I haven't shot a hog with the BTHP's yet, so I don'know how they perform on "meat".
Hornaday American Gunner vs. Frontier - trdjohn - 07-05-2020
@bcamp83 thanks for the pics