Hornady 178 grain ELD-X

andrewctillman · Sep 10, 2016

Is anyone loading this bullet in 308 winchester?

the Hornady manual shows only 2500 fps from a 24 inch barrel. Lapua and even Winchester brass lasts alot longer than the Hornady and I wonder if that is why the relatively low velocity?

Id like to try these at 1000 yards at Horse Ridge and be able to use my match ammo hunting. But Im getting 35-37 bMOA come ups at 1000 yards with 175 grain SMK and Barnes Match burners and would pass on the Hornadys if they really maxed out at 2500 fps.

PS I purchased a box of their pro hunter ammo which uses the 178 ELD-X to try at 1000. They claim 2600 fps on box and are usually reliable about claimed velocity.

Thanks!

FOTIS · Sep 11, 2016

Use this you're good!!! Varget rox

andrewctillman · Sep 11, 2016

That is encouraging. Thanks Fotis!

I will let you know how it does. (If I can dope the wind anyway).

PS I looked up how Varget did with the 175 grain Barnes Match Burners which I have been using at 1,000 yards. 41.5 grains gave me 2630 fps with WW brass and Federal primer. 43.5 grains was close to 2730 fps and my notes show 4 out of 5 had nice round primer radius.

Ive standardized on 2650 fps or so which matches Black Hills ammo loaded with the Sierra MK.

The Barnes is a VLD style bullet with a very streamlined ogive and it is alot longer than a SMK. It is over 2.9 OCL to touch rifling but I am limited to about 2.825 in my AI magazines.

The 178 Hornady appears to be a secant ogive so my Match Burners give me a starting place. Glad to know Varget is that much lower pressure than the other powders. Was that spreadsheet from the newer Hodgen manual?

andrewctillman · Sep 11, 2016

Found this.

http://m.hornady.com/assets/files/reloa ... grELDX.pdf

Looks like I need to proceed with caution.

andrewctillman · Sep 13, 2016

FOTIS.

See comments below I cut and pasted from Quick Load thread.

I pulled a Hornady ELD-X 178 grain bullet from a box of 308 Winchester Pro Hunter ammo. The bullet is a whopping 1.405 inches long.

Powder charge was 42.5 grains of a small extruded kernel that looks similar to Varget but who knows? I loaded the bullet back into case and it engaged riflilng around 2.917 or a bit longer. I was able to seat it to 2.86 in my Accuracy International steel magazine.

andrewctillman · Sep 16, 2016

G7 BC is very close to what is advertised.

I shot twenty of the precision hunter ammo yesterday at horse ridge and got reliable data points for come ups at 500, 600 and 800 yards. Ran out of ammo before I could get on at 1000 but this is what I found.

Average for 15 shots 2669 fps at 75-80 degrees F. 69 fps faster than ammo box said. And 120 fps faster than what on line reloading data says from Hornady. Curious. I pulloed one bullet tomeasure it and factory ammo had 42.5 grains of what looked alot like Varget. that was Hornadys max load in their on line data. I reseated bullet over 42.5 Varget and got 2620 fps at 2.68 OCL.

Come ups as follows.

500 yd 10.5 MOA
600 yd 14.25 MOA
800 yd 22.5 MOA
1000 (probably) 32.5 predicted by JBM software. I tried a six oclock hold with 34 moa and still shot over and to right of 24 inch gong. So sounds possible. I currently run Barnes Match Burners at 35 MOA so that is truly a flat shooting bullet if it does as well as predicted.

The Barnes Match burners which have a G7 of about .255 which is similar to the Berger 175 VLD and the SMK at .243 (as I recall). JBM shows the 178 ELD-X at .267 G7 and the come ups are within 1/4-1/2 moa of what I recorded.

andrewctillman · Nov 12, 2016

Part Two.

Hornady 178 grain ELD-X bullet.

The ELD-X does appear to be as streamlined as Hornady claims. Using a value of .268 G7 ballistic coefficient combined with the actual temperature, chronographed velocity, and altitude above sea level, the MOA elevation required at each range was closely correlated to that predicted by JBM ballistic software.

I obtained useful data points out to 800 yards on my first range session, and this time I confirmed or refined my point of impact at 600, 800, 900 and 1,000 yards. 14.5, 23.0, 28.0 and 33.25 MOA adjustments got me on target with well centered groups.

Precise groups were possible compared to my first range session due to a fairly benign and consistent wind and mirage. Still, at 1,000 yards, I was shooting about five feet right of the target without adjusting for windage. The ELD-X requires 2-4 MOA less elevation adjustment at 1,000 yards than the Sierra Match King or Barnes Match Burners I had been using.

I tested some hand loads of the ELD-X bullet using once fired Hornady Pro Hunter cases, Federal 210M primers, Varget powder, and an OCL of 2.865 which was as long as I can load them in my Accuracy International magazine. This put the bullets ogive about 0.050 off the lands. 42.0 grains produced 2,700 fps from my 20 inch stainless Remington 40X barrel and was a maximum or close to it loaded with these components. 42.5 grains averaged 2,730 fps and flat primers. Between 41.0 and 41.5 grains is likely to duplicate factory velocity.

For the money the standard Hornady 178 grain OTM bullet offers virtually identical performance for much less money. the ELD-X might be useful for hunting and/or tactical use. But, it is so expensive and time consuming to establish exact DOPE for a bullet that having one load for one rifle is appealing to me.

77 Grain Sierra Tipped Match King.

I was also able to validate the BC of the 223 caliber 77 grain TMK loaded by Creedmoor Ammunition. This is advertised at 2,750 fps from a 20 inch barrel. My rifle has a Lothar Walther 20 inch barrel with 1:8 twist and Wylde chamber. Average velocity for the day was 2,757 fps.

The TMK is a very long bullet and the canelure is actually engraved on the beginning of the bullets ogive. Even using minimum brass length the bullet appears to be pushed down slightly past the case mouth. I don’t know how this will effect long term storage of the ammunition or it’s water proofness but it certainly did not hamper its accuracy. I was able to go from a quick 100 yard zero to 600, 900 and 1,000 yards with just fifteen rounds of ammunition, including a five round group at 1,000 yards that measured just 8 inches vertical x 5 inches horizontal dispersion. (But I blew the windage call by 20 inches). JBM has not determined the G7 for the TMK, so I used the default G1 setting that ranged from .380 to .420 BC depending on velocity.

I recorded elevation adjustments of 14.75, 30.0, and 37.5 MOA to center punch the steel gongs at 600, 900 and 1,000 yards. That was 0.3, 0.6 and 1.5 inches more elevation than predicted. It is unusual for a verified G7 BC to diverge more than ¼ or ½ MOA from what the JBM ballistics calculator predicts. I went back to 200 yards to verify my zero and how the scope was tracking and I may have had a ½ MOA or less range bias but that is still a lot more variation in advertised versus actual BC than I am used to. Bryan Litz found the 69 grain TMK had 3% better BC than what Sierra advertised but he is only testing velocity loss out to 300 yards. 37.5 MOA elevation for a 1,000 yard zero is still very flat shooting for a 223 pressure cartridge. The NATO pressure 77 grain CBC Magtech which is loaded with the standard Sierra Match King (not tipped) bullet requires 37 MOA but it has a MV of 2,870 fps, nearly 130 fps faster than the TMK.

The TMK does not appear to have nearly as high a BC as claimed but it is equal to or greater than the OTM bullet, and as loaded by Creedmoor, it is exceptionally accurate. It is likely to expand out to 500 yards, has the same point of impact as my CBC 77 grain OTM ammo, and appears to have similar gas port pressure. (It locks the bolt back on the same gas port setting as my CBC ammo). At $37.50 per box of 50 it is about $5 a box more than CBC but substantially less than Black Hills TMK loading which is usually over a dollar apiece. Creedmoor uses new LC brass.

And remember, when testing different brands of ammunition or powder, always clean your bore between brands. It takes one or two shots to foul the bore with the new powder and not doing so will have a noticeable impact on your dispersion.

PS

I refined the JBM data and my MV for specific ranges and it looks like the TMK has a G7 of 0.192.

The Bryan Litz verified G7 of the SMK is 0.190, so barely different.

the TMK becomes subsonic at 1,000 with 2767 fps MV but it is spinning so fast I doubt that has alot to do with the sudden increase in elevation between 900 and 1000. It may be that the plastic tip is deforming or it is susceptible to transonic buffeting. (Or my zero was off).

Next range day I will refine my zero and 1,000 yard hold.

FWIW, I shot better with the AR yesterday than the bolt gun. With the semi auto I spent more time checking windage and that paid off. I have been way underestimating my hold off for wind beyond 600 yards with the .308. Ive got a long way to go to corral those 6-9 inch groups. I really do not know how the X and 10 ringers do it.

Big picture is the 77 TMK is very accurate at long range and the AR makes hitting the 24 inch square gong at 1000 surprisingly easy.

freestylmx · Jan 2, 2017

That was a very good write up and very usable info. thanks for writing down your test results as Im interested in loading both the 178 ELD-X and the 77gr TMK.
Ill be testing loads in a CZ 550 Varmint rifle with 25.5" barrel and the 77gr TMK out of a M16A2 replica rifle with a 20" 1-7 twist FN USGI barrel