Any .223 Ackley fans out there?

Rustydust

Rustydust

Active member
Hey Guys

I have a new ER Shaw barrel for my Savage 112. It is in .223 Remington. As I have two other .223 rifles in my safe now, I was mulling over the idea of having this one rechambered to .223 AI before I ever put in on the action. I know that the gains in velocity are small and this is not all that important to me anyway, but accuracy is. So for those of you out there that have a .223 Ackley I just wondered what the pros and cons of it are. It does look cool I will give it that.
 
Yes to all of the above plus (if its at least 1:9 twist) it can keep a 75gr bullet supersonic for quite a few more yards.
 
I had 2 Savage 223 barrels rechambered to 223AI and have a 22-250AI I wouldn't say they shot better but they didnt shoot worse. Looks cool, velocity increase, never trimming brass again is a big plus the only two down sides I have found in mine are neither will feed very well now and I want to Ackley improve everything.
 
Hence my screen name I have owned a 223 AI . It was already an AI when I bought it. I ended up getting the itch for something different and traded it off. Now the AI itch is back and the 22-250 sounds fun. Mine actually fed pretty good , and accuracy was good. I would go for it.
 
Originally Posted By: SuperSeal110Faster
No trimming brass.
Looks cool.

Cons?
None in my books.

I would have to agree there. I love my .223AI, I had a few issues to start with regarding sizing brass but found it was a die issue. I did notice with my Savage you have be careful with how you load the shells into the mag in order for it to feed properly. A little trimming should take care of this though.

I am getting over 3600fps with 52gr BTHP Sierras using H4895 with very good accuracy. That is not too much behind my accuracy load with my 22-250 which made for one [beeep] of a coyote round as well. I also found my favorite .223 load of 26gr of Benchmark and 50gr BT makes for one very accurate fire forming load at 3350fps. I am very pleased with the results now that I have my die issue figured out.
 
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Originally Posted By: who meRustydust, would you be able to keep that brass seperate from your regular .223 brass?

Ah geeze. I dunno. I mean, I have to keep the .17 Remington brass separate from the .204 brass and the .204 brass separate from the .223 brass as it is. I wish the dang stuff was color coded. Hey! Maybe that is what we all need! Brass in different colors! When you go to the range you don't have to worry about picking up anybody else's brass but your own! Why, I'm a jeanyus! Now I just have to find a manufacture that will do it. Remington? Federal? Starline? You listening?
 


I've been shooting the .223 Ackley for about fifteen years and totally love the round.

It's possible I might have written the first ever article about the round (Varmint Hunter Issue #15, July 1996; VHA Custom Gun Number Eight, Page 56-64).

Frankly, I was so impressed with the super-heavy Rifles Inc rifle that I have three field-weight rifles made and I've enjoyed them ever since. These later rifles were featured in later articles I wrote about the .223 Ackley.

Over the years, I've fired a couple hundred thousand rounds of .223 Ackley and have never seen any shortcomings from the cartridge. Afield or at the bench, the .223 Ackely is a total winner.

I cannot talk about it (sworn to secrecy), but the .223 Ackley came within a hair of becoming a commercial cartridge a few years ago. I've always thought that the company (that will remain nameless) totally screwed up a fabulous commercial opportunity and that a huge number of American shooters would have been enjoying the .223 Ackley today, but for the faint-heartedness of a bean-counting executive.

Anyway, the .223 Ackley is a fabulous cartridge that is capable of greatly-enhanced ballistics over the parent round. The accuracy is uniformly superb and case-trimming is just about eliminated.

One thing I've also noticed about the .223 Ackley Improved is that it seems to be a "better balanced" cartridge than the regular .223 Rem because the extreme spreads (in muzzle velocity) are always much tighter than the regular .223. It's quite common for me to fire twenty rounds of .223 Ackley over my Oelher 35P and have an ES of 15 fps ... that is almost impossible with the .223 Normal.

The .223 Ackley is one of the few cartridges that I will own and shoot until I die.

Steve Timm
 
Hey Guys

Wow. Thanks for all the info. I have been pondering the idea of having me a .223 AI for some time now and doggonit I may just have to have me one built now. It just looks interesting as all heck. Now then, does anyone know if standard .223 Rem go and no-go headspace gauges will work with the AI?
 
You will need a 223Ai go gauge your standard 223 go gauge becomes your no-go gauge that should give you about a .004 crush fit on say a factory 223. With AI cartridges the parent cartridge go gage becomes the no-go gauge
 
Originally Posted By: Steve Timm

I've been shooting the .223 Ackley for about fifteen years and totally love the round.

It's possible I might have written the first ever article about the round (Varmint Hunter Issue #15, July 1996; VHA Custom Gun Number Eight, Page 56-64).

Frankly, I was so impressed with the super-heavy Rifles Inc rifle that I have three field-weight rifles made and I've enjoyed them ever since. These later rifles were featured in later articles I wrote about the .223 Ackley.

Over the years, I've fired a couple hundred thousand rounds of .223 Ackley and have never seen any shortcomings from the cartridge. Afield or at the bench, the .223 Ackely is a total winner.

I cannot talk about it (sworn to secrecy), but the .223 Ackley came within a hair of becoming a commercial cartridge a few years ago. I've always thought that the company (that will remain nameless) totally screwed up a fabulous commercial opportunity and that a huge number of American shooters would have been enjoying the .223 Ackley today, but for the faint-heartedness of a bean-counting executive.

Anyway, the .223 Ackley is a fabulous cartridge that is capable of greatly-enhanced ballistics over the parent round. The accuracy is uniformly superb and case-trimming is just about eliminated.

One thing I've also noticed about the .223 Ackley Improved is that it seems to be a "better balanced" cartridge than the regular .223 Rem because the extreme spreads (in muzzle velocity) are always much tighter than the regular .223. It's quite common for me to fire twenty rounds of .223 Ackley over my Oelher 35P and have an ES of 15 fps ... that is almost impossible with the .223 Normal.

The .223 Ackley is one of the few cartridges that I will own and shoot until I die.

Steve Timm





I have the article Mr Timm wrote and sent to me that I scanned into PDF. With Mr. Timm's permission I would be happy to forward a copy to you. I tried to pattern my build off of his rile specs in that article and used the posted loads as a good starting point. My barrel HATES 40gr bullets but will spit them out at over 3900fps with a 22" barrel length and no pressure signs. 50gr BT shoot great at close to 3700fps. Great information in that article.


P.S. Steve, it is GREAT to have you on the site!!
 
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Years ago I thought seriously about the 223AI but decided to go another route and built a 22-204. The same performance, 30 degree shoulder and no fireforming or need to set back the barrel for rechamberring a 223 to it.

AWS
 
Originally Posted By: Steve Timm

I've been shooting the .223 Ackley for about fifteen years and totally love the round.

It's possible I might have written the first ever article about the round (Varmint Hunter Issue #15, July 1996; VHA Custom Gun Number Eight, Page 56-64).

Frankly, I was so impressed with the super-heavy Rifles Inc rifle that I have three field-weight rifles made and I've enjoyed them ever since. These later rifles were featured in later articles I wrote about the .223 Ackley.

Over the years, I've fired a couple hundred thousand rounds of .223 Ackley and have never seen any shortcomings from the cartridge. Afield or at the bench, the .223 Ackely is a total winner.

I cannot talk about it (sworn to secrecy), but the .223 Ackley came within a hair of becoming a commercial cartridge a few years ago. I've always thought that the company (that will remain nameless) totally screwed up a fabulous commercial opportunity and that a huge number of American shooters would have been enjoying the .223 Ackley today, but for the faint-heartedness of a bean-counting executive.

Anyway, the .223 Ackley is a fabulous cartridge that is capable of greatly-enhanced ballistics over the parent round. The accuracy is uniformly superb and case-trimming is just about eliminated.

One thing I've also noticed about the .223 Ackley Improved is that it seems to be a "better balanced" cartridge than the regular .223 Rem because the extreme spreads (in muzzle velocity) are always much tighter than the regular .223. It's quite common for me to fire twenty rounds of .223 Ackley over my Oelher 35P and have an ES of 15 fps ... that is almost impossible with the .223 Normal.

The .223 Ackley is one of the few cartridges that I will own and shoot until I die.

Steve Timm





I hate to admit this but I didn't read the article but sure liked the reloading data on page 64. I spec a rifle pretty close to the one in the article and shoot just as good and I've been using 8208 instead of N-133 might try Tac one of these days. What it did for me is add yardage beyond the standard 223 shooting PD and I like the 223AI so had another one build same spec as the first one and makes it nice having one cut from same chamber reamer. I also shoot a 222AI,22-250AI,22BR so the 223AI fit in there nice.
 
Well then! This certainly is getting intersting isnt it? Okeedoak, looks like my new .223 barrel is going to become a AI barrel after all. Now then, I do believe you guys when you say that it shoots well, as I have heard this before. However- big "however" here- will it make a good shooting .223 into a great shooting .223 AI? Some cartridges just seem to be more accurate than others that are very similar. This seems to be true more by accident than design, but is there something about the AI .223 round that makes it more accurate? I like one hole guns and have a couple right now but one more sure wont hurt anything will it?
 
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