what twist is it?
with that twist you can shoot some pretty heavy projectiles. 200ish gr hybrids and VLD's , 180gr hammers will max out the twist you have. Do some math on how much freebore you have and see what will fit. heavy is good flat shooting is over rated
Powder? My dad is no PRS guy so ES doesn’t mean much.185 berger juggernauts are solid too
Both my boys shoot it. 168g TTSX great round to 400.
The 168 ELD-M or TMK (serria tipped matchking) will be your best overall for out of state.
I've shot their old 152 HH out of my 308 for a while with good results, I'm sure the 154 HHT will be similar. I would even be tempted to look at the 124 HH to see what speeds you can get.
I will get you the load when I get home. 22" barrel around 2700FPS I believe.Are you running Varget also? What fps and barrel length if you don't mind?
I was hoping you would chime in. It's probably safe to assume *any* hammer 154/138/124 will shoot well? I would be a little worried about the 124 on heavier animals, would you run them on out-of-state deer/elk? I am also worried about recoil with the heavy pills, the gun will be about 5lb 8oz scoped (Howa superlite).
Do you have a brake on it?
I have zero concern with the 124 gr pills even on elk. A "field tester" of hammer bullets has killed several buffalo with them out of a 300 RUM. My biggest concern is BC and wind drift.
For the hammers, I haven't messed with the HHT but the other pills have shot well out of my 308.
For powders,
Varget
AR-COMP
CFE 223 (max speed but temp sensitive)
IMR 4166 (IMR version of varget that is no longer in production - I actually have a ton if you want some)
In my tikka (22" barrel), I swapped out the bolt stop and magazine for long action ones and could seat the 175 LRX out further and shot it at 2750 over 47 gr of CFE 223. The 168 TTSX is great too, can't go wrong with either.