6.5 Grendel TC Contender

[fanofflyn]

I also have one of those barrels, and, being a Barnes affectionado I looked for a load that would work in my 16, 18, 20, and 24 inch rifles as well. The 120 grainers didn't work well in the handgun, couldn't get much over 2100 or 2200 fps. I decided to work with the 100gr TTSX. There wasn't enough velocity with 2520 or with leverevolution (which worked well with the heavier bullets in the longer barrels), so I had to go with a faster powder. Currently I worked up a load that worked well with H335, using 31 grains. This looked a little flatter on the headstamp (I mean a trace) with the gas piston rifles, so I backed it up a couple of tenths of grains to 30.8 with new Lapua brass. It shot very accurately in all the guns. The T/C shot nice groups (the best I can do with a handgun anyway) and chronographed at 2600fps, with a very small sd out of the 14 inch handgun, and with the shorter barrel pressure wasn't an issue at all. I cannot tell you what this may do in your gun. I use the old style white box WSR primers ( the silver harder kind, at least until I run out of the next ten thousand), so a different primer could drive up your pressures. I'd start a couple of grains lower and slowly increase to a comfortable level. I load to 2.260 coal so that it will work in the magazines, but did not use the chamber seating coal gauge for the SSK barrel. Barnes says to back off .050 from the lands anyway, and the Weatherby people tell us this gives us more velocity with less pressure. In the Barnes bullets, it improves accuracy also, as I've shot tons of guilding metal from Barnes in calibers up to .500 Jeffery. I'm doing a charity handgun hunt with the Handgun Hunters chapter of SCI next week, and I'll shoot some big things to see how well it does. Last year I shot a scimitar horned oryx with a 110gr Barnes TTSX 6.8 spc II from a 14 inch barrel at 140 yards, and it went through the shoulder, both sides of the rib cage, and heart, and was imbedded in the off side. They didn't save the bullet for me like they promised, but that was a slightly slower load, so I bet the penetration will be good with the Grendel for most NA game at pistol ranges.

BTW, this round does function in all my Grendel rifles too.