Benchmark in .20 VarTarg

[Gary in Illinois]

I seem to recall that someone posted results here of shooting Benchmark in the .20 VT a while back - must have been on the old board since I can't seem to find it now. I am looking for a starting load for 32 grain bullets. I have used both VV N120 and H335 in the VT and since Benchmark is between those two on the burn rate charge I thought it might be worth a try.

I am trying to find a way to reduce the number of powders I keep on hand - I think I have more variety than Precision Reloading had when I stopped there last summer!

Thanks for any help.

Gary

[montdoug]

I'd think BenchMark might be a bit on the slow side for the VarTarg but I've never tried it.

[Gary in Illinois]

Doug,
OK - I found the following that I snipped from a post in August, 2005. Looks like there was a post by ric showing some (apparently nice) groups using Benchmark in the 20 VT. Unfortunately, this is all I have found - no powder weight, bullet or velocity information. I thought someone might have the missing information.

You may very well be right that Benchmark is too slow. Benchmark (#66) is between VV N120 (#49) and H335 (#73) on Varmint Al's burn rate chart. I shot some H335 in my .20VT a few days ago and got some decent groups. Since my Chrony decided to take the afternoon off, I wasn't able to get velocity readings from that session.

Just thought I might give Benchmark a try since I need to keep it on hand for my .20 PPC and it is supposed to be fairly "temperature insensitive".

I checked my powder supply and found that I have 40 different smokeless powders on hand. Hope my insurance agent isn't subscribed to this board! I'm sure that others have more variety than I but I would like to cut the number in half.

Gary

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Re: Benchmark in the 20VT
Re: Benchmark in the 20VT -- ric Post Reply Top of thread Forum
Posted by: jim barker ®
08/29/2005, 12:10:55
Author Profile Edit
five shot groups that look very much like one hole and you want to change powder! the mad scientist is restless. LOL great fun yesterday. thanks for your help.

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[Alex]

... Benchmark is about a half a grain slower than N-133. In the 20VT, we already know that N-120 works, but isn't a "case full at max load". In the 20VT, N-130 is a case full at max, and a full case of N-133 doesn't give near the velocity the 20Vt is capable of at reasonable pressures.

That would tell me that even a compressed case full of Benchmark would be too slow.

Or is my reasoning too convoluted?

Alex

[Gary in Illinois]

Alex,
The logic sounds right to me. Have you seen good accuracy with N130 in the .20VT? Is N130 stable accross a wide temperature range?

In fairness, N120 has been accurate in my .20 VT's and I will probably need to keep it for my .17AH. However, if N130 is better in the .20VT I may be looking at 41 powders in my stash!

Thanks for the information - and I really enjoyed your article in the last SCN. Congratulations!

Gary

[montdoug]

Your reasoning is just convoluted enough to make perfect sense to me Alex.
My personal load is using 18.7 grains of H4198. It's very temp stable gets right under 3,800fps and shoots bug holes, plus which I have a bunch of it and it costs a lot less than VV powders. Oh yeah, it fills the case right to the juncture of the neck and shoulder as well.
Only draw back is metering, small price to pay for all the benifits.

[tim simbari]

I've used a fair amount of Benchmark in the 20 TAC. Since I found it to be about 5% slower in that round it's probably worse in the smaller case. You may wish to try the Reloader 7.