6.5 Creedmoor

[RifleBowPistol]

I have said before the 6.5 Creedmoor is very close to a 250 Savage, based off of all that I know about the 300 Savage, 250 Savage and the 22-250.

I just happened to get some 300 Savage and 250 Savage cases. Then remembered that I had wanted to set a 250 Savage and a 6.5 Creedmoor side by side.

Here are a 300 Savage, 6.5 Creedmoor, 250 Savage, then a 22-250. The 300 Savage is the oldest, the 250 Savage was originally called the 250-3000, since it was the first commercial caliber to achieve 3000 fps. The 250 Savage is based off of the 300 Savage. The 22-250, is based off of the 250 Savage.

What I can see, comparing the four rounds, is that the original 300 Savage, has a straight wall body, does not seem to have any taper. The 250 Savage and the 22-250 do have a slight taper to the cases. Then the 6.5 Creedmoor has a straight wall case, like the old 300 Savage. Just having the 250 Savage and the 6.5 Creedmoor in my hand, it was hard to tell which was which. They are very close. But when looking at the close up picture, with them lined up o the bench, at that point you can see the straight body on the Creedmoor and the taper to the 250 Savage case.

I still say the 6.5 Creedmoor is very close to a 250 Savage and looks more likely based off of the 300 Savage, than off of a 308, like claimed by many. If you notice the Creedmoor case has a wider groove forward of the rim. That's most likely because my Creedmoor cases are Lapua. I may be wrong, there is a possibility all Creedmoor cases are made that way. The Lapua cases use small rifle primers, instead of large rifle primers, like most other Creedmoor cases.

In some of my experimenting with powders and powder charges for the 6.5 Creedmoor. I have used load data for a 250 Savage, a couple of times. Since it has been around so long and likely been loaded with multiple powders, you won't easily find load data for.

The shoulder angle looks very close to the shoulder angle of the 250 Savage, also. The Creedmoor, looks like a slightly improved 250 Savage necked up from .257 caliber to .264 caliber. So there is only .007" difference in bore size between the two.

Would have also been nice to have a 6mm Creedmoor to compare it to the 250 Savage and the 22-250.

[RedYote]

Never really thought about the 22-250 having a tapered case but its clear after looking at a few rounds. 223 seems to have a slight taper also.

[RifleBowPistol]

Never really thought about the 22-250 having a tapered case but its clear after looking at a few rounds. 223 seems to have a slight taper also.

Yes, the 223 does also. I think it's done to make sure that fired rounds come out of the chamber easier. When a straight wall case, expands when it's fired, if there are any tooling marks in the chamber wall, the case could form into those marks/grooves and make it difficult to extract.

Most all of the older designed rounds have tapered cases. 30-06, 270, 25-06, 7X57, 8X57, 257 Roberts that is based off of the 7X57. Most of the rounds designed in the 1950s or older will have a taper to the case. Even some of the straight wall cases, have some taper to them. All to make extraction of a fired case easier. But if you make a straight walled, or non tapered, version of a common round, that has a tapered case. You can get a little more powder in that case, depending on how much taper the original case had and how big the case is. But if you do so, your chamber wall better be nice and slick.

[Mike D]

Yes, the 223 does also. I think it's done to make sure that fired rounds come out of the chamber easier. When a straight wall case, expands when it's fired, if there are any tooling marks in the chamber wall, the case could form into those marks/grooves and make it difficult to extract.

Most all of the older designed rounds have tapered cases. 30-06, 270, 25-06, 7X57, 8X57, 257 Roberts that is based off of the 7X57. Most of the rounds designed in the 1950s or older will have a taper to the case. Even some of the straight wall cases, have some taper to them. All to make extraction of a fired case easier. But if you make a straight walled, or non tapered, version of a common round, that has a tapered case. You can get a little more powder in that case, depending on how much taper the original case had and how big the case is. But if you do so, your chamber wall better be nice and slick.

Hmmm I was always under the impression taper was in cases to ensure reliable feeding, not extraction.


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[McClain]

Good visual comparisons. The 6.5 Creed's parent case is the .30 Thompson Center, which I believe was modified from the .307 Winchester lever action case (which I think was modified from the .308 Winchester. Not sure though.

[RifleBowPistol]

Good visual comparisons. The 6.5 Creed's parent case is the .30 Thompson Center, which I believe was modified from the .307 Winchester lever action case (which I think was modified from the .308 Winchester. Not sure though.

The 307 is a rimmed case. If I remember correctly Winchester came out with the 307 and I think the other round was the 356. They were basically rimmed versions of the 308 and 358. The cases were nearly identical, except the lever action rounds had rimmed cases.

Would not make any sense to take a rimmed case, cut the rimmed case, turn it back into a .473” case head rimless case, then create a “New cartridge” from what would basically be a 308 case.

I guarantee I can take those 250 Savage cases, run them through my 6.5 Creedmoor dies, load them with a a powder charge and a 6.5 mm bullet and fire them in a 6.5 mm Creedmoor. That will blow the case out and take the taper out of the case. At that point you will have a 6.5 mm Creedmoor case. You might have to trim it a little, but I would bet not much at all.

Either someone went to a lot more trouble than I was needed to come up with the Creedmoor, or their story is BS.

It’s basically a 264-300 Savage or a 264-250 Improved. They did not want to call it either of those. Hornady’s marketing’s guys wanted to disassociate this new round from any old round as much as possible. Including some off the wall story how they came up with the case.
That or they took a really long route to get what they came up with, when it could have been done a lot easier.

I guarantee they knew that it would not have taken off like it did, if they said oh we just necked up the old 250Savage case to 6.5mm, then blew the case out, to get rid of the taper, so it would hold a little more powder. It would have never become what it has. It would probably still be popular, but it could have easily been another 6mm Rem. A good round, but beat out by some other round that got better marketing. The 6mm is in every way better than the 243 Win., but obviously Winchester did a much better job of selling the public on the 243, than Remington did on selling the 6mm/244 Rem.

[TXBowhunter2009]

As far as performance goes, I think the 6.5 Creed is closest to the 260 Remington.

[Cottonfish]

I seem to remember several years ago when 6.5CM brass wasn't so available that folks were "creating" it out of 22-250 brass........

Stu

[McClain]

The 307 is a rimmed case. If I remember correctly Winchester came out with the 307 and I think the other round was the 356. They were basically rimmed versions of the 308 and 358. The cases were nearly identical, except the lever action rounds had rimmed cases.

Would not make any sense to take a rimmed case, cut the rimmed case, turn it back into a .473” case head rimless case.

I know, that sounds odd to me too. However we know that the 6.5 creed was developed from the .30 TC case. That is widely published. However I seem to recall reading someplace that the parent case for the 30 TC was the rimmed 307, but I can’t remember where I saw that and can’t verify that. The only hint that makes me think this could be the case is that since TC/Hornady loaded the 30 TC to higher velocities than a 308 Win, this would have been possible because the 307 case had thicker case walls than the 308. So, does the 30 TC have thicker walls like the 307? I’m not sure! Perhaps someone who know more about this than me can fill us in.

By the way, it is not unusual for a particular cartridge to be able to be formed from more than one other existing cartridge cases. This occurs frequently.