Poll: What is your preferred M1917 ammunition

[SkyHunter]

Hopefully this topic will be of interest to other M1917 owners. I am still a newbie with Milsurps and I’m looking for recommendations on ammunition. I have searched for discussions on ammunition on this forum and have found bits and pieces in a wide variety of postings. I am hoping this poll is an opportunity to have one posting cover this topic so the search becomes easy for everyone. I think the way to do this is ask 2 questions:

1. What is your preferred ammunition and why does it work for you? If you use different ammo for different objectives (target, everyday use, etc) then include that. If you use factory, surplus or handloads please share specifics. Include disclaimers if you wish. If you reload your own ammo, is there anything about equipment, supplies or specifications you wish to share?
2. What ammo do you not recommend and why does it not work for you?

If you have written on this subject in another posting, please provide the link to what you wrote. I look forward to learning a lot on this topic from this community's knowledge and experience, so thank you in advance.

Information

Warning: This is a relatively older thread This discussion is older than 360 days. Some information contained in it may no longer be current.

[Skip]

I have never been disappointed with 168 Hornady HPBT.

[Aragorn243]

You may want to add a third question: What type barrel do you have? I have a two groove replacement barrel. This will affect how the ammunition behaves from rifle to rifle.

[rangerbluedog]

I have the original 1917 Remington barrel on mine. I've never seen anything it didn't like!
I prefer to shoot the Greek HXP surplus ammo from 1973, only because I have a lot of it.
My handloads are more accurate. I'm using moly-coated 168 grain Sierra Matchkings BTHP, Winchester brass, CCI 200 primers, 54.0 grains of AA2700. Case OAL is 3.350".

[Patrick Chadwick]

Eddystone with original barrel from 12-18. 168 gn Lapua Silver Scenar or molycoated Sierra Matchking.

[jmoore]

Mine like most any M2 ammo. Also the 150gr Hornady PSP bullets work well for reloading at 2700fps.

[Bruce McAskill]

Flat based bullets in general shoot better in the 1917. That is what they were designed to shoot in the first place and at normal shooting ranges say out to 400 yards there is really no advantage to a boat tail bullet in the older military rifles. In fact some will not shoot them with any kind of accuracy. Jmoore is right about the standard 2700 fps as again most seem to be quite accurate in that velocity range as it was the standard for 30-06 for both wars.

[303Nut]

My Eddystone has it's original barrel 1-18 and missed any rebuilds. So far it shoots the HXP ammo very well, better than my reloads but not by much.

[Patrick Chadwick]

Eddystone with original barrel from 12-18. 168 gn Lapua Silver Scenar or molycoated Sierra Matchking.

Is this good enough for you?

Attachment 39217

Competition target, no rest, and the front trigger guard screw had loosened (as I discovered after the shoot). That is what caused the 3 shots to go right in the 9, and I finished the target by aiming off to the left. The 8 at 4 o'clock was just a bad attack of PWF!

If that was not quite good enough, try this:

Attachment 39216

Trigger guard screws carefully torqued, scope fitted, sandbag rest.

QED.

[GUTS]

Interesting. My Winchester Model of 1917 has the original Winchester barrel from 1918 and it won't shoot BTHPs very well at all. I started loading 48grns of IMR4895 with a flat base round nose 150grn bullet and it is a lot more accurate.