03-26-2014, 07:36 PM
LRRPF52 Wrote:I've had 2 rifles built by GAP, both AR10's, and I was asked each time which bullet I would be shooting. With the .308 Winchester, I told them the 155gr Scenar, and they cut the throat to that bullet. With my .260 Remington, I told them the 139gr Scenar, 142gr SMK, and 140gr VLD. They cut each throat to the specific bullet ogive shapes I was planning to shoot, and both of those rifles shoot those bullets amazingly well. They are custom rifles with custom throats optimized for gas gun magzine-fed COL.
The Grendel SAAMI chamber is not a custom chamber. It's meant to address various bullet shapes at lower operating pressures, where you can't rely on 60,000psi to slam a VLD into the lands quickly like the .260 Remington does, with corresponding barrel life and weapon weight considerations.
The Grendel chamber really does handle a wide variety of projectile shapes well in extensive testing, as well as the customer pool. No matter what I load in mine, it shoots them consistently into ~ 1 MOA. Some are .79 MOA, while others 1.2 MOA like the 129gr SST, which is known to not shoot well in a lot of different chambers, whereas the new 123gr SST shoots amazingly well after Hornady upgraded their bullet-making equipment and reduced the jacket variance significantly, starting with the A-MAX line.
A lot of this is about egos getting in the way of providing a superior product to the customer in my opinion. Different makers can't check their egos at the door when they go to work, so the customer pays the price for it. Little do they know that they are just recreating chambers that didn't work well with a wide variety of projectile shapes when the Grendel was being tested.
For anyone to claim that their chamber will shoot better than the Grendel indicates that they have done more testing than the company that brought it to market, after a very strenuous testing regimen before releasing it to the customer. From that point, credibility goes downhill quickly.
If you look at the comparison that rick0shay posted above, a 2.350" COL can't be loaded in magazines anyway, so a single-loaded projectile that already fits well within the SAAMI Grendel will give you 30-50fps more MV if you single load it to 2.350". Just another attempt by the detractors of the Grendel to try to drag it down. They have found useful idiots who will believe their negativity, and wallow around in the mud together-relationships built on goals of ruining a fine product, and pull in totally new people to the AR15/hunting market who don't know the background.
What I would say to those who don't know the characters involved and the chips they bear on their shoulders against the Grendel is this:
Just enjoy the cartridge. If you have a variant chamber, there will be several of the over 100 projectiles available for 6.5mm that you will find that shoot well in your rifle when hand-loaded. Several of the factory loads should shoot well also. Just demand that factory ammo will feed and function safely in your chamber if you plan to shoot factory ammunition, which is something the Grendel was meant to do from the start.
A lot of this has to do with the frustration people feel when not able to shoot in the winter, and that is changing now for many with Spring coming. I feel for those of you who have been screwed over out of the performance I have personally enjoyed with my Grendel since 2009, which included reliability and accuracy-no issues or complaints. That's what is hard for me to see going on, when I know the potential of the system.
so the gap rifles you mentioned you still call them 308 and 260 but the throats are specific to the bullets you shoot are they not still 308 and 260 chamberings?? I am not defending liberty barrels in fact I returned my barrel for a shilen. The problem centered around not being able to chamber factory ammo and that is a valid problem.