Don't know what the specific problem is with the AE is but I was out of 5.56 reloads for my AR and had a tactical match coming up. I wanted some factory ammo to tied me over AND be able to shoot through my .223 bolt gun too. So I picked up 5 brands of inexpensive .223 and test fired through both guns. Surprisingly Wolf Gold .223 was best and averaged 1" 5 shot groups through the bolt and 1.5" through the AR. Promptly went online and bought 1000 rds @ $ .25 / rd. The others shot anywhere from 1.5" to over 3.5".
Rifle wont hold zero with factory ammo but reloads work?
- Thread starter TheDomFather
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Just a thought...
Is the AE ammo crooked? My personal experience is that seating pointed FMJ bullets are difficult to get straight. You can roll across a flat table & look for "tip wobble".
Is the AE ammo crooked? My personal experience is that seating pointed FMJ bullets are difficult to get straight. You can roll across a flat table & look for "tip wobble".
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TheDomFather
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I took a quick gander and it didnt appear to be crooked, I will take another look this week.
coloradokevin
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This sounds like a simple ammo related problem. If your rifle is shooting fine and accurate with your handloads, and all over the map with factory loads, clearly the rifle isn't at fault.
When I take a new rifle out for the first time I almost always run a box of factory ammo just in case something goes wrong (I'd rather not have it blamed on my handloads). I did this same procedure when I first got my Accuracy International AX260. That's a very high-end rifle, and a very accurate rifle. I started out with a box of factory Remington Core Lokt ammunition, and was dismayed at how inaccurate this stuff was in my new fancy rifle. I want to say that it was grouped around 2-2.5 inches, but I'd have to grab my logbook to check for sure.
Anyway, after about twelve rounds I gave up and moved over to my handloads. Even using test ammo that didn't end up being my final selection for this rifle, my handloads started putting the shots right on top of each other... what followed was a single hole group of ten rounds (a bit smaller than a dime).
My point? Some rifles just don't like some ammo!
When I take a new rifle out for the first time I almost always run a box of factory ammo just in case something goes wrong (I'd rather not have it blamed on my handloads). I did this same procedure when I first got my Accuracy International AX260. That's a very high-end rifle, and a very accurate rifle. I started out with a box of factory Remington Core Lokt ammunition, and was dismayed at how inaccurate this stuff was in my new fancy rifle. I want to say that it was grouped around 2-2.5 inches, but I'd have to grab my logbook to check for sure.
Anyway, after about twelve rounds I gave up and moved over to my handloads. Even using test ammo that didn't end up being my final selection for this rifle, my handloads started putting the shots right on top of each other... what followed was a single hole group of ten rounds (a bit smaller than a dime).
My point? Some rifles just don't like some ammo!
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TheDomFather
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PMC bronze that I had got on a deal from Palmetto State Armory with 10 Magpul PMAGs gave me ****ty results as well. Go figure. I can make my own ammo for less than the PMC or AE and it performs better than the stuff I paid over $1 per round for!
Hello Dom
I just took apart a round of PMC and a round of AE .223 55 grain ammo. I noticed on both that the only thing holding the bullet in the neck is factory neck tension. There is NO crimp. Not even what felt like you would get with a taper crimp die if you were re-loading your ammo at home. The PMC had 24.5 grains of something that looked like H335 and the AE had 26.3 grains of something that looked like Winchester 748. I know that the max load of H335 is 25.3 grains so I'm pretty sure the powder in the AE is NOT H335 but it could be in the PMC. 26.3 is the listed book load for the 748 as per the Hodgden/IMR/Winchester web site.
I wonder if a person put a crimp on the AE and the PMC it would perform better ??
kwg
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TheDomFather
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By any chance did you weigh the projectiles? I think the root cause of this is bad projectiles. I crimp sometimes and sometimes i dont crimp my reloads and I dont particularly notice a difference in accuracy.
Vern Humphrey
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He was obviously right.
I did not weigh the projectiles. There might be some deviation but I find it more than 2 maybe 3 grains from one to another. I find that hard to believe it would cause me that much difference with the point of impact (POI) at 50 yards.
I did buy some more PMC and I crimped the bullets into the case with a Lee crimp die. I plan on going to my range later this week and I will see if there is a difference in performance. If there is a lot of deviation, I will weigh the bullets.
kwg
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TheDomFather
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Thanks my man. I have been using the Lee factory crimp die when I crimp as well
I shot some of the PMC yesterday that I crimped. I got just a slight improvement in accuracy. I also weighed the bullets and I found the largest variation is right at I grain. 55.8 grains for the heaviest and 54.8 for the lightest. About 1/3 of the 40 bullets I weighed were right at 55 grains. The other 2/3's were either heavy or light. I shot just 3 rounds of AE. They matched the POI of the PMC. It was almost a 4 inch spread at 50 yards from a skinny barrel Mini 14.
kwg
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Did you happen to check bullet diameter? Im curious if perhaps the bullets are undersized, or oval instead of round. I had some noname fmjs from midway that were all kindsa wierd, might be same bullets. Still tho even pmc bronze has shot ok for me from my ars and mini, the AE fmjs were pretty bad tho.
I did not check bullet diameter. I did roll a few across the top of my table saw and at slow speeds there was just a little wobble like they were heavier on one side but they had to roll really slow before they showed this. Without taking apart a larger number of bullets to check powder weights I'm going to chalk it up to a number of issues such as substandard (cheap) bullets, different bullet weights, different powder weights and lack of crimp to create the total lack of accuracy issue. After all, to make this ammo "affordable" the makers have to cut corners somewhere. The brass for both brands did seem to be good brass. Although it was NOT annealed, if that makes a difference to it's accuracy.
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