Breaking in my new WOA Barrel and doing a little load development. Federal's .224 Valkyrie was designed to fit, feed, and fire in the popular AR-15 platform. My hopes were to  bring out more of the potential of the 224 Valkyrie (velocity), and to perhaps get better groups as well. I also like to try and show different things here on Ultimate Reloader, otherwise it’s just the same thing over and over. Use load data at your own risk. Ultimate Reloader is not responsible for errors in load data on this website. With the launch of 224 Valkyrie, handloaders across the country began experimenting with this new long-range cartridge. I like to read up and watch up (is that a term?) A thorough discussion of load development in its entirety is beyond the scope of this article and video. When working up a load, you always have some information- sometimes more, sometimes less. Joined Dec 21, 2010 Messages 156 Location Fort Worth, TX. So when it came time to find an optimal 70 grain load for the 224 Valkyrie AR-15 I just built, I thought I would try something different. Pistol; Rifle; Cowboy; GR. Thanks I found this load from a member on hide..i hope to tighten things up! .224 Valkyrie - Manufacturer Loading Data. I like this bullet because the COAL fits in a magazine without having to window the front of the mag. !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],p=/^http:/.test(d.location)? 76Highboy Reloading 992 views Bullet Type Primer. Given that the .224 Valkyrie is a very polite cartridge to reload, judicious handloading can just about create what factory loads are alleged to perform. So I loaded up 10 rounds of 23.6 grains Varget with the Hornady 88 grain ELD-M bullets, and here’s what happened: Not only are these groups looking good (I’ve read of a lot of trouble with 224 Valkyrie and heavy bullets) but the SD numbers look good as well: Hornady advertises 2675 FPS at the muzzle for their 224 Valkyrie 88 gr ELD Match factory ammunition, and I’m within about 25 FPS with my ammunition, and given the ambient (and ammunition) temperature of 31 F while shooting, it looks like I’ve pretty much matched the performance of their load. Sierra Bullets Load Data for .224 Valkyrie (Partial Sample) The new .224 Valkyrie was introduced late last year as a Hot Rod cartridge that will work in AR15s. Powder Bul Weight C.O.L. My .223 wylde AR upper was extremely friendly to load for - it basically shot everything into the same ~.85 inches, no real load development needed. What upper did you go with? AMG04 OP. The company's cryogenically-treated dies make them among the smoothest and most solid in the industry. Here's the .224 Valkyrie load data we found that works well with reloads. The idea is that you can identify loads that shoot well based on the particulars of your rifle. 224 Valkyrie - Load Development - Round 1. However, when I examined the three cloverleaf shots in group #4, I thought- I bet that group size increase was partly due to me: the shooter. Really good article. Run OCW tests based on speed nodes from 10-shot testing, Work up to 25.5 grains of Varget- the load that had worked so well in the Remington 700, Create four batches of ammunition, with 0.5 grains reduction in each group below the 25.5 grain load, Shoot OCW-style groups for each batch of ammunition, Record velocity information to see if small groups and low SD numbers would coincide. OP. Poll: What Reloading Components Can’t You Find? I’m excited about these results because with this load because I’m very confident I can really take this load out to 1000+ yards with my 224 Valkyrie rifles. Got a chance to shoot some quick ladder tests to establish max charges in my Valkyrie. Where can I find the build article on the AR-15 224? Precision-minded shooters tend to adopt their own “obsessive” or “religious” rituals when it comes to finding the perfect load for their rifles. So far the factory load results have been abysmal. Although continually evolving, my current approach to load development (and research) is as follows: The idea with 10 shot load development is to shoot different charge weights in order to find “speed nodes” which represent stable charge weight regions. Load development is a very personal and sometimes even a controversial thing. I've finished load development with Nosler 85RDF using Federal brass. Contact ultimate reloader by clicking here. Powders include Shooters World, Alliant, Accurate, Vihtavuori, Ramshot, Hodgdon, Alliant , … I just ordered a complete 24″ barreled Valkyrie upper after reading this. Poll: What Rifle Cartridge Do You Reload Most Often? Cowtown started having accurized AR matches with a focus on 223/5.56 and 224 Valkyrie. Sierra MKs under an inch at 100yds. Enter the Hornady 88 grain ELD-M bullet! Mission accomplished. 25.7 gr of PP 2000MR powder running 2615 fps. Nosler will indicate which loads were most accurate for the. I’m just starting out with my Columbia River Arms 24in Valkyrie. Powder Thanks for sharing your work and findings! OCW testing is pretty straight forward- you load batches of ammunition where each batch increments the charge weight by a value you calculate based on the weight range you want to cover. Follow @UReloader While the Nosler 70 grain RDF bullet has shot GREAT out of both of the custom 224 Valkyrie rifles I’ve built, these bullets haven’t really brought out the full potential of 224 Valkyrie. Thread starter Austin_Michael; Start date Dec 31, 2019; Austin_Michael Well-Known Member. December 1, 2018 Gavin Reloading Blog 224 Valkyrie, AR-15, Benchmark Barrels, Reloading, Reloading Blog, Reloading Press, Reloading Videos, Starline, Ultimate Reloader. Hey Gavin, Whoops, please disregard my previous question and post…. Ultimate Reloader LLC is not responsible for errors in load data on this website. Your email address will not be published. While firearms manufacturers list 224 Valkyrie rifles with various barrel lengths, reports from serious experimenters indicate the 224 Valkyrie shoots all bullets best in a 24-inch barrel, and Hodgdon’s load and pressure data were developed in a test barrel of that length. Great load development detective work. Hodgdon, the Brand That’s True ®, is pleased to announce the launch of load data for the new 224 Valkyrie cartridge, now available on Hodgdon’s Reloading Data Center at www.HodgdonReloading.com.This data is available for 80 different loads featuring 50- to 90-grain bullet options (from Hornady, Nosler, Federal, Swift and Sierra) and powders from Hodgdon, IMR ® and … I just cloned the 77gr OTM military load and got consistent sub-MOA and the same velocities the data predicted. !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],p=/^http:/.test(d.location)? What does this mean? .224 Valkyrie Ballistics & Reloading by Steve Gash, Tue, November 13, 2018.224 Valkyrie Cartridge Information. 50 rounds in and what I can tell you is the 88gr ELD-M bullets stabilized just fine over a heavy BLC-2 load. What’s next? How much jump did you find the 88ELDMs prefer? A lot of recent cartridge and rifle development has been geared to “long-range shooting.” (Of course, what is considered “long range” means different things to different shooters). I also called Berger. I now know it’s possible to find a load that works well in both rifles, and I’m hoping that will be true for the Hornady 88 grain ELD-M bullets, as well as the Sierra 90 grain Match Kings. 224 Valkyrie Hybrid Load Development/Validation Load development is a very personal and sometimes even a controversial thing. 1/2 MOA accuracy is good, and 11-12 FPS SD is acceptable for velocity as well. This testing will not typically focus on velocity consistency (SD of FPS)- it’s really about what charge weights shoot well in your rifle at 100 or perhaps 200 yards. In this video I go over load development for the 224 Valkyrie with Hornady 80 gr ELD-Match bullets. Some or all of the processes I talk about below have to be repeated when other load factors are changed. Left to right; 224 Valkyrie, 223 Remington, 223 Ackley Improved, 6.5 Creedmoor, 308 Winchester, 300 Winchester Magnum. Contact ultimate reloader by clicking here. .224 Valkyrie (Load Development) reloading data with 60 loads. Your email address will not be published. Thanks for the recipe, I'm gonna copy this today and run it tomorrow, not having a great bit of success with 90 SMKs with any powder so far. The 224 Valkyrie case is based on a necked down 6.8 SPC. Demonstrating a solid commitment to a successful debut of the new cartridge, Federal introduced four different factory loads with the Nosler 60-grain Ballistic Tip, American Eagle 75-grain TMJ, Fusion 90-grain SoftPoint, and Sierra 90-grain MatchKing. I have been doing load development at 100 yards and I have found some consistent, repeatable loads that are grouping for me, and giving me the ballistics that I am looking for. Use load data at your own risk. The 22-inch, stainless steel barrel includes a medium-contour, 1:7 twist, full-length flutes and is threaded to hold a muzzle brake or suppressor. Trying to find hands on results before investing in brass and load development. ALL 50 gr 53 gr 55 gr 60 gr 62 gr 65 gr 69 gr 70 gr 72 gr 75 gr 77 gr 80 gr 82 gr 85.5 gr 88 gr 90 gr. I expect both to tighten up when I peform more controlled reloading (this was with new brass). First up was to shoot a 10 shot load development string- with each charge weight weighed on a digital scale (throw + trickle) down to 0.1 grain accuracy. So in the end, this was really a “load validation” rather than a true from-scratch load development exercise. For 224 Valkyrie, I started working with a mid-weight bullets (Nosler 70 grain RDF), and have been working my way up in weight- and hope to top out at about 95 grains. Same deal with a 100 yard zero and 10 mph full value wind. Make sure you’re subscribed to find out what happens next. I decided to do the following: Here’s the load that I started with from the Remington 700 barrel break-in: Use load data at your own risk. Determine which brass, primer, powder and bullet will be used. Do you have 224 Valkyrie reloading or general load development insights you’d like to share? From a story I published on “Expanded 10-shot load development”, the following graph shows the relationship between speed nodes and velocity stability (expressed as SD of velocity): Once I’ve identified “speed nodes” – I move on to Optimal Charge Weight testing…. The latest QuickLOAD data update contains 224 Valkyrie. I’ll also do some brass longevity testing to see how many reloads the Starline 224 Valkyrie brass can withstand at this [max] load. Your email address will not be published. The entire point is to shoot 80-95 Grain bullets in an AR15 platform because a 223 or 5.56 CANNOT SHOOT THAT (in normal magazine, like P-MAGS) because of magazine length, and OAL, Ogive, etc. I will go through these loads, and show some targets that I have shot with them. AMG04. Poll: What Rifle Cartridge Do You Reload Most Often? My ARP 22" barrel has the long free bore chamber. 224 Valkyrie RIFLE RELOADING DATA 7 224 Valkyrie RIFLE RELOADING DATA 8 INDICATES MAXIMUM LOAD - USE CAUTION LOADS LESS THAN MINIMUM CHARGES SHOWN ARE NOT RECOMMENDED. aka – what dies did you use? Yes, AR. Follow @UReloader There aren’t many affordable 1/6.5″ barrels available. Use load data at your own risk. On the topic of brass longevity, do you have, or have you thought about annealing to help get longer case life and hopefully more consistent neck tension. This could be starting at min load and working up to max load, or could involve a more narrow charge weight range. Your email address will not be published. And I did! Shooting these rounds over a chronograph produced the following: You can see right away the “speed node” (stable velocity region) between 23.2 and 23.4 grains- so I loaded 15 rounds at 23.3 (right in the middle of the speed node) and shot for groups with the Magnetospeed V3 Chronograph recording velocities. Poll: What’s your number one reason for reloading? Fabulous work! This is the same projectile that Hornady uses in their 224 Valkyrie factory ammunition, which is very popular. This load prints 1" 10 shot groups for me. So the 4 star is due to I have only just begun my load development and yet to see the true potential of this barrel. Bridging of powder in 22 caliber drop funnels (Hornady Lock-N-Load bench measure, RCBS Uniflow powder measure), Excessive load compression near and at max load causing bullets to stick in seating stems (that’s a first for me). Hey Gavin Required fields are marked *. The .224 Valkyrie has a lot of potential and an interesting background. Here are a few lessons one SI contributor learned through this process. for your time, effort and great videos. Hodgdon® Releases 224 Valkyrie Data Hodgdon, the Brand That’s True ®, is pleased to announce the launch of load data for the new 224 Valkyrie cartridge, now available on Hodgdon’s Reloading Data Center at www.HodgdonReloading.com. So I decided to shoot some groups with the #4 load (25.5 grains of Varget, the same load that worked well in the Remington 700) to see if I could tighten things up. Required fields are marked *. The 6.5 Guys have put together a series on load development, and here’s one of the OCW tests from that series: You can see from the picture above that 42.0 grains was a load that worked well in the rifle being tested. It will keep 80gr. However, it absolutely sprays anything heavier. Do you have experience loading the Hornady 88 grain ELD-M bullet for 224 Valkyrie? We will see! 224 Valkyrie Load Development Pack Custom Ammunition Results $ 34.99 – $ 40.99 If you have shot your load pack one, two, or three and are ready to order some ammo, you have come to the right place! I was having some issues running same load suppressed and unsuppressed so I went back to drawing board and ran OCW from 25-26gr CFE at .2 intervals. on what other people are doing for load development as “inspiration”. Precision-minded shooters tend to adopt their own “obsessive” or “religious” rituals when it comes to finding the perfect load for their rifles. Results are fantastic. The latest QuickLOAD data update contains 224 Valkyrie. Here’s the technical details on these bullets: From the Hornady Product Page: Let’s see how these bullets will do with a bit of load development, and the 224 Valkyrie Remington 700 I’m using to test new loads with! Using bullets from Nosler Varmageddon, Speer Gold Dot, Nosler Custom Competition, Hornady ELD-Match, Berger VLD Target. 224 Valkyrie - Load Development - Round 1 #7727608 01/24/20 08:38 PM: Joined: Oct 2011. A database of .224 Valkyrie handloads. Always cross-reference load data with manufacturer’s published data. Do you know of any load data using gas checked cast lead bullets Poll: What Progressive Reloading Press Do You Use Most? For this round I use Varget, H4350, and H4895 powders. Define the problem domain: The rifle and chambering (with related specifications such as barrel length and twist rate), and selection of components- typically the bullet that will be used. The rifle is a Howa M1500 Mini Action. 224 Valkyrie is all about pushing heavy high-BC bullets to crazy-long ranges with an AR-15, or even a bolt gun. In this section, lets looks at how we can model the 224 Valkyrie against these selected loads. The valkyrie was the exact opposite, and a huge pain in the ass. CFE223 produced half inch at best groups. While the group sizes here are “reasonable” – the SD numbers didn’t look so good: So I decided, even though the 10-shot load development data doesn’t support it, I would try the max charge. My 224 V . Their load data was *super* light. Always cross-reference load data with manufacturer's published data. If you’re in a “speed node”- you can make slight changes to charge weight without changing velocity much. The rifle used for load testing is pretty typical in the AR era, a rifle my father built from an Anderson Manufacturing lower and replacement.224 Valkyrie upper. What is the twist rate in your test guns? 1000 Yards: .224 Valkyrie Vs. 6.5 Creedmoor Material connection (partnerships) information available at http://ultimatereloader.com/about/. Posts: 14. But at the end of the day I believe each shooter has to find for themselves what will work best for their equipment, goals, and needs. More specifically, at just over or under the point where the load becomes compressed (if applicable). You are one of the only ones I know of who are putting the 224 Valkyrie through a systematic load development. You then shoot each batch of ammunition (I load and shoot in batches of 5) and look at the group size for each batch of ammunition. Material connection (partnerships) information available at http://ultimatereloader.com/about/. In this video I discuss the loads that I am choosing for taking the 224 Valkyrie out to longer ranges. Which dies did you use for this project? What dies do you recommend for reloading the .224 Valk for precision shooting? *Note:  when I’m talking about load development in this article, I’m really only focusing on powder charge weight. 'http':'https';if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src=p+'://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js';fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document, 'script', 'twitter-wjs'); © 2021 Copyright 2016 Ultimate Reloader LLC. Min Charge Max Charge Optimal Charge Bullet Make Bullet Type 224 Valkyrie fight! Posts: 14. Determine the charge weight range of interest. Then picked best SD and ran seating depth test at .010 intervals from 2.250 to 2.310. target below is seating depth test, confirmation load and gas block tuning. Awesome, and thanks! Thanks again for sharing your wisdom. 224 Valkyrie: Hornady 88 grain ELD-M Load Development Success, 224 Valkyrie Reloading Info Facebook Page, Subscribe to Ultimate Reloader Reloading Blog by Email, TESTED: Lapua 6.5 Creedmoor Brass (Large and Small Primer), My Most Sensitive Scale: AND EJ-54D2 (0.003 grains), TESTED: Winchester StaBALL 6.5 Creedmoor-Class Powder, Learn From the Best: Rifle Building Class with Gordy Gritters, Unsolved: 44 Magnum Over-Pressure Mystery, RCBS Lock-Out Die Part II: Setup and Maintenance, RCBS Lock-Out Die Part I: Theory of Operation, Reloading Safety: Powder Check Systems Overview. Read and review load data and related information online, and in loading manuals. Light Foot. The entire point of 224 Valkyrie is to shoot long range, and it has almost "ZERO" advantage under a few hundred yards as compared with normal .223/5.56. I would expect at 70 F that I’d be within 10 FPS of their claimed velocity. Great article and videos. Would it shoot well in the AR-15? Always cross-reference load data with manufacturer's published data. AR- … Poll: What Progressive Reloading Press Do You Use Most? I look forward to data on heavier bullets. For 224 Valkyrie, I started working with a mid-weight bullets (Nosler 70 grain RDF), and have been working my way up in weight- and hope to top out at about 95 grains. Here’s the unedited video showing the shooting of this group: Now things are looking good- with an SD of 7.0 FPS, and a group size of 0.500″, this load met my goals, and for both rifles no less! I had some data from the Remington 700 to go off of, and I used that and my “hybrid approach” to validate that this load was truly optimal for the AR-15. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. This is of tremendous importance once you get to really long ranges like 1000 yards, and beyond. This is the first systematic load work up for the 224 that I have seen, and anxiously look forward to your experience. However- the 224 Valkyrie really shines when you get into the heavier high-BC bullets, and that will be my next focus. In this case, I had a load that I knew shot really well in the Remington 700 Bolt-Action rifle I had built. Haven't found much for results with Hornady but it seems to possibly have a thicker web. The .224 Valkyrie (5.6×41 mm) cartridge is a .22 caliber (5.6 mm) rimless bottlenecked intermediate rifle cartridge, developed by Federal Premium Ammunition to rival the performance of the .22 Nosler, while still being compatible with modern sporting rifles. Ron Reiber (Hodgdon chief ballistician) has advised me that accurate and consistent loads will most often occur at near max loads. Dec 31, 2019 #1 Got a chance to shoot some quick ladder tests to establish max charges in my Valkyrie. Ultimate Reloader is not responsible for errors in load data on this website. Always cross-reference load data with manufacturer’s published data. Poll: What’s your number one reason for reloading? ... Development continues. I'm seating .010" off the lands. Dillon XL650, 223/5.56, Video 11, Sierra, 22 Cal .224 DIA 50 GR Spitzer BLITZ Med Vel #1340 - Duration: 16:12. And here are the results for each charge weight tested: If I had been entirely “data driven” and literal with my OCW, I would have had pause about target #4. With the 88 grain ELD-M 224 Valkyrie load- I started with H-4350, but ran into a couple issues: So I changed over to Varget (thanks to some input from the guys on the 224 Valkyrie Reloading Info Facebook Page), and found success! Please note, the presumption here is you don’t need the payload to kill a bull Moose at 300 yards. Light Foot. Poll: What handgun cartridge do you reload most often? Please leave a comment sharing your experiences! 224 Valkyrie: Hornady 88 grain ELD-M Load Development Success 224 Valkyrie is all about pushing heavy high-BC bullets to crazy-long ranges with an AR-15, or even a bolt gun. There are many other factors including primer type, bullet type, bullet seating depth, and other factors that can be equally important. And that leads me to my “hybrid approach”. With 1 powder you have selected, load every .3 grains apart, lots of 10, with at least 3 different powder charges, 5 is best (50 bullets total) Proceed to range, shoot 5 shot group at 100. Since both rifles are shooting very similarly (see my post showing both rifles at 600 yards) I’m pretty sure the same will be true for this load.

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