any 7-30 waters shooters out there, my son Brad just bought a complete contender set up. super 14 with 2x7 burris scope dies,brass,loaded ammo,bipod mount,two grips,case. he is new to this caliber but would like to shoot to 200 yards. from what i can tell it is very doable. what can you guys tell me?

200yds is def doable with that caliber. What bullet is he gonna shoot?

he got a bunch of bullets from 100 grn hp's for prairie dogs up to 139 grn spbt. the guy that he got it from wasn't using it for anything big but was planning on taking a deer with it. however never got around to it. the guy had some test loads prepared for shooting that he included. all marked with load data,bullet,and date. i have known him for 35 years and is as safe as anyone at the reloading bench,so Brad will have a place to start when he gets a load that performs, if there is one from the test loads. any suggestions on bullet make and weight. we are hunting in texas at willicd76 in mid-feb for a hog hunt so he wants a load by then.

I have two 7-30 Waters in the Contender. One is a Super 14 bull with a 2" break added. I shoot mostly 140grn Ballistic Tips from it for hunting. I play around with the Remington bulk Corelok bullets. The Remington or Hornady SP bullets have served me well in silhouette shooting out to 200 yard. I have taken several deer with it out to approx. 150 yards.
The other barrel is the 14" hunter with factory break. It is a package TC put out many years back, before the easy open frames.
It included the barrel with break installed from factory, frame, TC scope and sling. I made a holster for it also. It shoots 120's the best but will do 140's for hunting accuracy.
I shot a lot of 120grn Pro Hunters by Sierra in the Hunter barrel after I got it. I have taken deer with both.
I have used mostly Varget and H4895 in all of the rounds.
He should be able to do anything with that barrel. Even farther out if he practices. When I was in Wyoming a few years back, one of the guys was shooting a 7-30 Waters Contender in 14" and took a couple of speed goats out past 200 yards with 120 Ballistic Tips.
Good luck.
Mike

I picked up a 14" hunter barrel (nice barrel) 3 or so years ago and played with it for a bit. I was trying to use copper bullets and felt that i wasn't getting the velocities to ensure good terminal performance at 200 yards (most bullets are designed to function well at velocities above 1800 or 1900 fps, even the Nosler BT). It sits in a box on the shelf right now.

If I was going to play with it again, I would look at the Barnes 139gn LRX bullet figure out what the factory recommended minimal terminal velocity is. In my experience the LRX have lower terminal velocity requirements vs the TTSX or TSX but it may not be low enough to get the range I want with the heavier bullet.

EDIT, From Barnes- the 139gn 7mm LRX bullet (30295) needs about 1500fps for 2x diameter expansion.

I just ran some calculations. If I assume a MV of 200fps for the 139 gn (I was achieving ~2000-2100 in 30-30 with 150gn loads with another inch of barrel) I would have 1690fps at 200 yards. The 127gn 6.5mm Barnes LRX requires 1600fps to ensure expansion. I am not sure if the 1600 fps is the "2x" expansion velocity or the "2x" expansion plus 100fps buffer that they use to recommend for hunting.

thanks for the info. he is someone who will practice so no worries there. do you have a preference on the bullet weight for deer as you have used both. which seemed to be more terminal 120's or 140's?

120 NBT's 200 yards...No problem if the shooter is up to the task

thanks for the info.

Hornady 7mm, 120 grain V-Max bullets are actually the 120 grain single shot pistol bullet with a polymer tip.

I live within an hour of the Hornady plant. Had them vertically split the 120 V-Max. It has the Interlok ring inside the bullet.

When shot at Waters speeds it mushrooms perfectly. When shot at 3200 FPS in my 280 Remington, it performs like a V-Max.

This is what I used to use in my 7-30 Contender. Worked well for deer and coyotes.

120 Ballistic tip. The newer ones (last 6 or 7 years) that say hunting on the box act like a controlled expansion bullet from the 7-30. Accurate too.

great to hear on the 120's. i loved the ssp bullets and shot them exclusively in my 7tcu. used them from prairie dogs to coyotes and was not disappointed.

My waters is a 14? I shoot it on a G-2 frame; the 120 grain B-tips gave me good accuracy and have performed well on deer;Varget is my powder of choice

we have some varget and 4895 loads to test- has anyone put their pet loads over a chrono? what should we expect for MV out of the 120's.

I?ve been shooting 7-30 Waters for a few years now. Taken several deer with my 14? T/C Contender. Longest shot has been 80 yards. I have mine sighted in for 100 yards, but have no doubt that 200 yards would be handled easily.

I used Nosler 120 BT?s the first year, but have been using Hornady 139 SST the last few years, along with Varget for both.

In my notes, I tried 100gn Sierra HP bullets with RL7 and AR comp and was getting 2500-2600 fps in the 14" hunter barrel (factory muzzle break so ~13" actual barrel length. With the 120gn TTSX bullet I had a range of 6 weights and stopped after the second due to pressure signs. I was getting 2353fps which was 130 fps more than Quickload was predicting and giving me flatter primers than I wanted.
I have had pretty good luck with RL7 in 30-30 with 110gn bullets and it worked well for the 100gn sierra in the 7-30.

The Complete reloading manual for the Contender has a 7-30 section with 120 gn nosler. if you PM me an email or phone # I can send some photos. Hodgdon has H4895 and Varget listed with 120gn nosler FP. Data is likely on their web site. Nosler list Varget for the 140gn bullets.

pm sent