COAL for Tikka mags

[butiwanna]

Hi guys,

I know that when reloading for Tikka people often have the problem of the magazines being too short for getting the perfect COAL, and that bullets have to be seated a bit lower than the perfect length for best accuracy.

Will the Tikka mags only accept the standard max COAL for their calibres? e.g. all the books say max COAL for .308 is 2.800"

Would Tikka .308 mags only fit rounds at 2.800" long?

Sorry, know this is a bit vague, asking on behalf of a friend who wants to do some reloading while waiting for this rifle. Doesn't have the rifle/mag yet to do any testing with.

Thanks.

[Lorgar]

They fit pretty snug with the 'normal' max COAL.

Can't speak for every calibre, but for my 7mm-08 the norm is 2.800"

I seat mine for 2.820" and the tip is just brushing the mag.

[Hardcast]

While we're on Tikkas, Does anybody know the internal length of a Tikka 25.06 magazine.

[Member-Deleted]

While we're on Tikkas, Does anybody know the internal length of a Tikka 25.06 magazine.

I can look this arvo if you want

[jays]

Tell your mate to have some patience

[Chronos]

"Tikka people often have the problem of the magazines being too short for getting the perfect COAL,"

What's the perfect COAL?

IMHO too many people get carried away thinking they need to have their bullets almost touching the lands, I have personally owned two tikkas, my first a .223 Varmint stainless 1:8" twist, my current one a 7-08 Varmint stainless and both rifles have managed to shoot sub 1" groups at 200m on many occasions with loads that fit and feed reliably from the standard magazines.

tell your mate not to stress, measure the magazine that comes with the rifle and set the seating die to seat his chosen bullet .010-.020" less than that then do his load development. he will have no trouble finding a good load if he does his part

Chronos

[butiwanna]

Ok, 'perfect' wasn't the right word for it.

Ideal coal, just off the lands was all I meant.

Not saying it won't shoot Ok with loads that fit in the mag. He's just wanting to experiment and explore things, try some shots at the best they can be and all that.

Any hoo, thought this was asking a bit much but you never know

He'll have to wait till he picks up the gear.

[Monty]

If he's that desperate to get reloading straight away, just have him do them at factory length 2.8".

They'll still shoot fine, and if he's doing load testing will still give information on their accuracy or lack of for particular loads.

He can fine tune the COAL of whichever load is most promising once he's in a position to test things properly and has the equipment.

[Hardcast]

While we're on Tikkas, Does anybody know the internal length of a Tikka 25.06 magazine.

I can look this arvo if you want

If you could jaso, please.

[butiwanna]

So he's picked up all his gear and done his reloading.

Managed to get about 0.01" longer than "max" and still fit in the mag.

Doesn't appear to be touching the lands so looks like that's the best he'll get.

Range day was on the weekend. Waiting to hear the results from him

[hughston]

Tikka T3 Varmint 308w & long OAL fix. 2.900"+

I been wanting to seat my projectiles out to the lands but couldn't find any defiant fix. I didn't want to hack up my mag or chop my bolt release. So I just bought a tikka 30-06 mag and a long action bolt release assembly pack from brownells in the US sent to aus for about a $100, & mag was $130. The rounds feed and eject like normal. There's a vid on ytube on how to swap out the bolt release easy as. I've attached photos of the mags side by side with 2.900" oal bullets, also the under side of the bolt once I replaced to new bolt release button
Cheers John Rambo

[RealNick]

Nice workaround

[Lorgar]

IMHO too many people get carried away thinking they need to have their bullets almost touching the lands, I have personally owned two tikkas, my first a .223 Varmint stainless 1:8" twist, my current one a 7-08 Varmint stainless and both rifles have managed to shoot sub 1" groups at 200m on many occasions with loads that fit and feed reliably from the standard magazines.

Same for my Tikka Hunter.

I never even measured the COAL as it relates to the lands. Just set it as long as would fit in the mag and started shooting.

Shoots good.

[Chronos]

Tikka T3 Varmint 308w & long OAL fix. 2.900"+

I been wanting to seat my projectiles out to the lands but couldn't find any defiant fix. I didn't want to hack up my mag or chop my bolt release. So I just bought a tikka 30-06 mag and a long action bolt release assembly pack from brownells in the US sent to aus for about a $100, & mag was $130. The rounds feed and eject like normal. There's a vid on ytube on how to swap out the bolt release easy as. I've attached photos of the mags side by side with 2.900" oal bullets, also the under side of the bolt once I replaced to new bolt release button
Cheers John Rambo

So I'm interested if for $230 plus your time does it shoot any better? I'd be interested with around .080" less bullet in the neck what your concentriciity is like?

Chronos

[No1Mk3]

I'm with Chronos on this. Seating out to start is bulldust. I had a Bartlein barrell that would not hold consistency without a .030" jump, and another that required the projie to be jammed hard in the lands, which meant removing the barrel and machining to shorten the chamber lead rather than having not enough case grip. For hunting rifles it is even less relevant. Start at the cartridge designers max OAL, ladder test for your sweet spot, and only then see if altering the jump helps. But remember, go back as well as forward because some barrels actually prefer a longer jump. My Kreiger needs 015" jump for consistency, my mates needs .020, all barrels are individual, Cheers.

[hughston]

The main reason I changed the action length was to experiment with Berger match projectiles, if seated at standard length 2.800" I'd loose on case volume. When speaking to full bore shooters some seat closer to the lands and some don't bother. From my short experience with hand loading I haven't noticed a great difference, but the Berger match projectiles have made a big difference with accuracy and I'm sure other projectiles with the similar ogive style would shoot the same. My tikka also probly isn't suited for fine tuning ammo but it's an interesting hobby

[Korkt]

Good solution for the Bergers. Those buggers are looong.

[winton]

If you notice in the third pictures from hughston above, the 30-06 magazine feed lips is shorter than the 308.

Is it possible to take out the back stop on the end of the 308 mag and use the 30-06 follower in that mag instead to take advantage of the longer feed lip?

[Nigel]

Tikka now makes an 'M+' magazine that they are shipping with T3x rifles chambered in 6.5 Creedmoor. They are the same as the 'M' size magazine except they have a shorter spacer in the back and longer follower to suit. It should be possible to buy these and swap out or modify the bolt stop to suit as discussed in hughston's post above.

M+.jpg (984.94 KiB) Viewed 12047 times

I have been looking into this topic. The internet consensus on T3/T3x magazine internal lengths seems to be roughly as follows:
M (308) 2.83in (71.8mm)
M+ (6.5 Creedmoor) 2.98in (75.7mm)
LG (30-06) 3.37in (85.6mm)
CTR 2.92in (74.2mm)

There is also 'SM' for 223 and similar size cartridges.

[winton]

It doesn't look like Beretta Aust have any idea about these M+ magazines from the feedback or lack thereof of guys at my LGS

[steadyeddy]

Just for those interested, you can use the M+
mag without swapping out the bolt stop, the rounds feed okay, well they do with my 7mm-08

[Jorlcrin]

Just for those interested, you can use the M+
mag without swapping out the bolt stop, the rounds feed okay, well they do with my 7mm-08

What loads are you making up for your 7mm-08?
[On the assumption you are relaoding for it..]

When I got my T3(Hunter Stainless Fluted) in 7-08 back in 2014, we had all sorts of problems getting decent groupings with 120 and 140 projectiles.
We were at the point of installing the long bolt stop and using magnum magazines, but we eventually found we could get groups good enough for hunting without going to the longer mags.

Just wondering what you were shooting in yours, and what projectiles and COAL you were running with.

I have been getting hunting-acceptable results with 120gn Vmax pills with a COAL of 2.790" and a charge of 44.7gns of AR2208.
It's on the hot end of the recommended range, but I'm not seeing any over-pressure signs.
The chrono reports the 120Vmax rounds depart at an average of 3087fps.

I'd be interested to hear your recipe for the T3, if you have one.