Load choices for AR SBRs

[1168]

I do know some Speer offering perform well as low as 1800fps, but have to find that rnd.

62gr Fusion/Gold Dot. Fusion MSR would probably give you the best chance of good performance with that bullet.

[WillBrink]

62gr Fusion/Gold Dot. Fusion MSR would probably give you the best chance of good performance with that bullet.

I read similar and have a few mags loaded with that now.

[Eurodriver]

I still have a bunch of the 64gr Gold Dots but it looks like those aren't made anymore.

I'm not sure why, but Speer won't make a 5.56mm version. That would be clutch.

I will probably run 69gr SMK handloads over max pressure once the GDs run out.

[WillBrink]

I still have a bunch of the 64gr Gold Dots but it looks like those aren't made anymore.

I'm not sure why, but Speer won't make a 5.56mm version. That would be clutch.

I will probably run 69gr SMK handloads over max pressure once the GDs run out.

Odd they would stop producing them. Did they replace them with something else?

[ST911]

I still have a bunch of the 64gr Gold Dots but it looks like those aren't made anymore. I'm not sure why, but Speer won't make a 5.56mm version. That would be clutch.

Odd they would stop producing them. Did they replace them with something else?

The 62 and 64 GDSPs coexisted for awhile, 62 was thought better* overall. There have been contract variants of the GDSPs that aren't commercially available and some of that info has been posted here and elsewhere. A 5.56 variant of the 62/64 would be beneficial to an SBR or pistol but less so in 14-20", the SBR need is thought to be met with the 75.

From a 16", the (.223) 62 #24445SP is ~2650. At that speed it's a very accurate load (~MOA) and does well in testing.

[WillBrink]

The 62 and 64 GDSPs coexisted for awhile, 62 was thought better* overall. There have been contract variants of the GDSPs that aren't commercially available and some of that info has been posted here and elsewhere. A 5.56 variant of the 62/64 would be beneficial to an SBR or pistol but less so in 14-20", the SBR need is thought to be met with the 75.

From a 16", the (.223) 62 #24445SP is ~2650. At that speed it's a very accurate load (~MOA) and does well in testing.

That seems surprisingly slow to me, although not the metric I'd get hung up on per se as the bullet designed to perform at those velocities is what matter most. Myself, interest is in performance at SD/HD distances, so terminal performance is what matters most to me and MOA accuracy a lesser concern/interest. Being able to make up to 100y shots accurately a plus no doubt.

[ST911]

That seems surprisingly slow to me, although not the metric I'd get hung up on per se as the bullet designed to perform at those velocities is what matter most. Myself, interest is in performance at SD/HD distances, so terminal performance is what matters most to me and MOA accuracy a lesser concern/interest. Being able to make up to 100y shots accurately a plus no doubt.

Agreed, right tool for the right job, and it is a little slow compared to some others in the weight class.

And whenever I can have terminal effectiveness and accuracy, I'll take it.

[MegademiC]

That seems surprisingly slow to me, although not the metric I'd get hung up on per se as the bullet designed to perform at those velocities is what matter most. Myself, interest is in performance at SD/HD distances, so terminal performance is what matters most to me and MOA accuracy a lesser concern/interest. Being able to make up to 100y shots accurately a plus no doubt.

Yeah, I have some reman stuff loaded with this bullet and Im getting 2800 out of a 14.5.

[okie]

What you would choose for a 10 inch SBR would be pretty different from what you would want from a PDW with a 5" barrel. Almost anything will work well with a 10" barrel, even the dreaded M855 green tip. About the only thing you want to avoid outright are the ballistic tip varmint bullets, as they fragment and fail to penetrate past a few inches. Pretty much any FMJ or bonded HP is going to get the job done. I think the Black Hills 77gr stuff is probably the gold standard, but Speer Gold Dot also seems to perform very well. That comes at a massive price premium, though, and at the end of the day it's probably unlikely to do anything in a human target that Lake City wouldn't do, as well. If you have a department that will foot the bill for anything you want, though, Black Hills is probably ideal.

Things change quite a bit with barrels under 10 inches. The best case scenario seems to be a solid copper bullet in the 40gr range. Very, very spendy, though. Surprisingly, the ballistic tip bullets start to kind of work from those barrel lengths because the velocity is starting to get low enough that they don't fragment on impact, and will penetrate pretty deep. Whether that's at all superior to 55gr M193 I have no idea. You might be just as well off with the cheaper M193 option. Suffice it to say, if you opt for something highly specialized like an AR PDW, you might just want to go into it expecting to pay out the nose for ammo.

[gaijin]

I run 64 or 75 gr. GD and 77 gr IMI m262 clone in my 11.5's for imagined SD.