10-18-2023, 10:21 AM
Welcome to the forum! My First recommendation is that you get the Grendel handbooks (2 vols) in the AR15 build box section of industry partners here on the forum. It has a wealth of info, as well as pages of Grendel loads. Effective ranges, gel tests, lots of bullet info. There isn't a book around that excels like these. Also has an effective MV conversion chart, so you can extrapolate your 16" barrel MV from other listed MVs, very helpful.
As for hunting rounds, every barrel has its likes and dislikes, the only way to find that is to try some. Same thing for powders. You have a lot of choices from say 100 gr to 123, even the 129 Ablr. Powders from H335, 8208 xbr, AR comp, H4895 (if you can find it lol!), Cfe223, leverevolution. These might be on your shelf already if you handload.
I've found loads for the 120 Nosler ballistic tip, 123 SST, 100 gr ttsx, 110 Maker (lead free) tipped (this guy makes grendel-specific lead-free's).
For rack grade, Faxon barrel is an ok barrel, should be fine for hunting and steel. Most guys (me included) will say that barrel, trigger, optics are your top three as far as accuracy goes, that's where to put your money.
Example load, for a nosler 120/SST 123, or similar 120 class bullet, AR comp somewhere 27.2-28.2 (depends on your lot#) would give you about 2415 ft/s from a 16" barrel. 100 gr ttsx, H335 or xbr- 2600+ ft/s somewhere close to their max grs.
As always you need to work up from lower.
Use a chrony, it is indispensible to find accuracy nodes.
Hodgdon has online loads, Hornady has them in their book, so does Nosler, but the Grendel handbooks will show you a lot of load data across several powder mfrs, and bullets.
I've found that faxon barrels can benefit from a 50-100 round break in, but not an absolute necessity.
1-3/8" for hornady factory loads is about par for the course, again, whatever trigger and optics you have, can improve that possibly. Esp if using a 4-5# mil-spec trigger, it's harder to get more accuracy than that, imo.
As for hunting rounds, every barrel has its likes and dislikes, the only way to find that is to try some. Same thing for powders. You have a lot of choices from say 100 gr to 123, even the 129 Ablr. Powders from H335, 8208 xbr, AR comp, H4895 (if you can find it lol!), Cfe223, leverevolution. These might be on your shelf already if you handload.
I've found loads for the 120 Nosler ballistic tip, 123 SST, 100 gr ttsx, 110 Maker (lead free) tipped (this guy makes grendel-specific lead-free's).
For rack grade, Faxon barrel is an ok barrel, should be fine for hunting and steel. Most guys (me included) will say that barrel, trigger, optics are your top three as far as accuracy goes, that's where to put your money.
Example load, for a nosler 120/SST 123, or similar 120 class bullet, AR comp somewhere 27.2-28.2 (depends on your lot#) would give you about 2415 ft/s from a 16" barrel. 100 gr ttsx, H335 or xbr- 2600+ ft/s somewhere close to their max grs.
As always you need to work up from lower.
Use a chrony, it is indispensible to find accuracy nodes.
Hodgdon has online loads, Hornady has them in their book, so does Nosler, but the Grendel handbooks will show you a lot of load data across several powder mfrs, and bullets.
I've found that faxon barrels can benefit from a 50-100 round break in, but not an absolute necessity.
1-3/8" for hornady factory loads is about par for the course, again, whatever trigger and optics you have, can improve that possibly. Esp if using a 4-5# mil-spec trigger, it's harder to get more accuracy than that, imo.
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