I have had a left handed stag 6.8/224 bolt for quite  a while and am contemplating building a new rifle with it. i have everything but the barrel on hand and the appropriate headspace gauges (i always use in any build)

i bought the thing with the intention of building a 6.8 rifle but as i now have access to a long range range i am intrigued by the .224 caliber. i am not a hunter

questions are

is there enough interest in .224 valkyrie to make ammo available long term. i do not reload currently but anticipate doing so for other calibers in the future

who makes the best barrel?. will go 22 or 24 " this would be for precision shooting and not hunting so weight is not the paramount factor
it looks like 1:6.5 is the current twist rate for this purpose


i am intrigued by 6.5 grendel /6mm arc and will probably pursue one of those in the future as well

It really depends on what you want to do with the gun and caliber.  To me, there is little crossover between 6.8 SPC and .224 Valkyrie.  One is a close-mid combat cartridge(6.8) and the other is a mid to longish varmint/precision cartridge.  

I have a 20" Bison Armory 1:6.5 twist .224 Valkyrie barrel that loves the Hornady 88gr ELD-M rounds and they could be found for under $22 a box of 20, but that was before this 2012-type panic buying started.  Mine is simply for punching holes in paper and shooting at steel.

The 6mm ARC is intriguing and I am finding myself wanting one because the heavier bullets will be easier to spot target hits on steel at distance, but right now ammo will be difficult to find for damn near anything.  A friend was telling me that a distributor had 1800+ boxes of 7.62x39 ammo the other day when he went to bed at 2300 PST and when he went to bed, then the next morning at about 0800 it was all gone.  

Just this last week I bought the last case of 200 rounds of 88gr ELD-M from a local shop and they have no idea when they can get more, or what they will have to pay for it.

Even if you did reload, this is a tough time as all those components are in extremely scarce supply, too.  People seem to be buying ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING they can get their hands on right now and don't necessarily blame them!

If you're interested in either the 6.8 SPC or .224 Valkyrie, you should absolutely email Ben at Bison Armory.  He's an incredible wealth of knowledge, on top of being a great guy, and while his barrels might seem too good to be true on price, I can attest that they flat-out SHOOT!!  Why spend more if you don't have to?!  He has them custom-made to his chamber specs, his profile and his twist rate.  I initially wanted to go 18" but he talked me into the 20" if I ever want to shoot at 1k repeatedly.

Also, he has(or at least had) 200gr subsonic loads for the 6.8, which are awesome out of a shorter barrel for HD or hunting pigs, deer and the like.  Apparently they hit really, really hard!  If I didn't already have a shorty 300 Blackout, I'd get one of his Pistol/SBR 6.8 uppers for sure.

I hope this helps!

I second what stitchclimber wrote.  The Valkyrie and 6.8 are really different animals.  It sounds like for your purposes that the Valkyrie is the way to go.

My long range gun is a 6.5 Creedmoor.  Of course, it's a large frame AR and darned heavy.  This is fine for me because I shoot it only from a bench or prone, and the weight mitigates recoil nicely.  I have considered an AR15-sized gun that's a bit handier for long range, so of course the question then becomes do I want a gun chambered in .224 Valkyrie, or 6.5 Grendel, or now 6mm ARC?  I have two QD rifle suppressors that I swap among guns, one .30 cal and the other .22 cal.  One fairly significant advantage that the Valkyrie affords is that I can use my .22 can, and it's shorter and lighter than its .30 cal brother.  For a handier long-ish range gun, this is certainly a consideration.  You might not be in this boat, but it's something worth noting.

I would go 6.8 personally. I love mine. Great for hunting or home defense.

When I got/built my 224V it was very underwhelming with factory stuff and reloads at first was horrid.  Thankfully there is a small community of 224V people and a lot of good info out there.  My barrel LOVES the 88 elds.   Factory stuff was good for 1.5-1moa. (1 on a perfect day).  After ALOT of trying different powders and bullets, my 88 load is a solid 1/2 moa round and in a perfect world I can get it into the. 3s

Could you post your load or if not the exact load what powder have you had good luck with.  I'm working on Valkyrie loads and so far CFE223, RL15 and H335 have shown the best accuracy with 75 ELD's.  Have tried a lot of other powders and some other bullets.  Would consider the 88 ELD.

@pmiya

I haven't tried anything lower than the 80 elds.  Here is my (long) post I made about my reloading experience with 224V.  I've found Varget was best for 88s and H4895 for 80s.  I don't know the exact load for each but the below thread im sure has it listed.  In the end I ended up stick with the 88s and that's all I reload for it now.

Thread

I think the Valkyrie will be around for an extended period of time. It’s a great cartridge if you get a barrel with the proper chamber.

The WOA barrels have been solid with the 75gr American Eagle and Fed 90gr FGMM. I haven’t tried the FGMM 80.5’s in them yet. They are 1:6.5t barrels.

The Rainier arms Ultramatch has been great with 80gr ELD, Berger 85.5 handloads and factory FGMM 80.5. These are a 1:7.5 twist.

The Hornady 88gr eld ammo seems to be hit or miss. Some ppl have had good luck, but I’ve had 3 barrels that I couldn’t get consistent sub-moa results out of.

I wouldn’t get too hung up on twist unless you really are planning on shooting the 90’s or 95gr bullets. For those, I’d definitely go with a 1:7 or 1:6.5 twist. After testing and running them in matches, I’d stick with the 80’s if you’re barrel shoots them and you’re running a 22-24” barrel. They shoot flatter and have equal or better wind drift than the heavies at the velocities you’ll likely be able to hit.

Thanks for the information.  Right now it's hard to find many powders to try.  The powder and primer shelves have been pretty bare.  Varget and H4895 are 2 powders I haven't tried.  My upper is a PSA 20" 6.5" twist.  It shoots the American Eagle 75 FMJ consistently around 1".  I've been able to get that ammo at a reasonable price and shooting it just to get a supply of brass.  I was shooting prairie dogs with the FMJ but typical FMJ lack of terminal performance, will just use the FMJ to ring some steel.

I’m reading through this thread as I find myself weighing a .224 valk or 6.5 Grendel.

The Grendel has a slight advantage with hunting medium game but has issues with bolt lugs breaking and finding reliable mags from what I’ve read in the past.

The .224 has had reamer/twist rate problems that have been reported to be fixed. 6.8 mags seem to be more reliable and available. It’s also a very good performer with a flatter trajectory.

My questions come from does the problems with the bolt lugs/mag reliability  hinder the Harder hitting 6.5 Grendel enough to give the edge to the flatter shooting .224 Valkyrie?

I have both. The grendel does good in a 12-18" barrel and the bullets aren't fussy about being a little slow. My Valk is 24" and is running 3000 or so with 80s. I don't think they really share a purpose. Long grendel and short valk barrels make me shake my head.

I’m leaning toward the Valkyrie.

Having both, what do you consider the purpose of each?

My thought was a 6.5G was a hunting cartridge. The .224 as a dmr to 600y and target rifle past that.

As someone else that has both, the Valkyrie is primarily a target or varmint cartridge for me. It still holds 1000ft/lbs of energy at 300yds, so it’s certainly capable of medium sized game if your state allows hunting with a .224 diameter bullet.

The 224Valkyrie has a noticeably softer recoil which helps for target shooting/matches. I’ve found the 6.5grendel to be “snappy” with its recoil impulse. Admittedly, I don’t shoot the grendel that often, because the 224Valkyrie has such a ballistic advantage coupled with very light recoil. The one benefit that I see the 6.5grendel having over the 224Valkyrie would be in <18” barrels. The Valkyrie needs a 22-24” barrel to shine imo. If I was going with an 18” barrel or shorter, I wouldn’t get a valkyrie. And with current offerings, I wouldn’t get a 6.5grendel either. I’d just go with a 6ARC.

The 6ARC has clear advantage over the 6.5G but I’m wondering if it’s plagued by the same bolt/mag problems or if these problems were exaggerated to begin with.

.224 Valkyrie has enough popularity now that I doubt it’s going away any time soon.  The .224 is better for target/precision shooting.  If you’re not a hunter, then there’s no reason to go with the .6.8SPC.