Hey guys,

I posted the question a while back, but I can’t find it now. I have been trying to get a tracer load to work for a while now. I have tried the following powders, all near the max load:
AA2230, IMR 4895, IMR 3031. Last night I tried IMR 4895 and still am not having any luck getting these things to light. Am I not going to see a trace at 100Yds? I tried shooting them in my 20” bushmaster and my Bushmaster M4gry. No luck seeing traces from either rifle. I have probably fired over 100 of my loaded tracers with various loads and have not seen one trace yet. The longest range I have access to is 100Yds. I have one more type of powder to try, Win 748 so we’ll see what happens.

Any insight would be great.

Eric

You should see trace at 100 yards.  It's just getting cooking though.  I have several incendary tracers I fire on a regular basis.  They start cooking then explode on the 8" plate.  Pretty cool.

Any one have any recipes for succesful tracing?

Thanks,
Eric

Powder Manufacture : IMR  
Powder Type :  4064  
Powder Weight (Grains) :  25.5  

Winchester Primer

What kind of tracers are you using.  FMJ's

I don't think they have to be loaded to max spec to set them off. This is a pretty weak load.

Also dig the crap out of the back of the tracer bullet before loading, scratch it up a little at least... it should work.

Who has deals on tracers now? Can you buy the bullet anywhere?  I bought about 2k SS-109's bullets only at a local gunshow.  It the linked way the best way to go?

You also might just be seeing the tracer start to fire at 100 yards, I shoot lots of tracers that I reload and they get quite a ways out there before you can see the trace.

Also the 1 in 9 will stabilize them fine, it's just not quite as accurate. I shoot them out of a 1 in 8 and 1 in 9 DPMS and they are equally accurate.  

One more problem is make sure the tracers still have their "pellet" of tracer material in the bullet.  Some dumbass was selling a sack of 500 tracer .223's at the last show for some exhorbitant price. The only problem;  only about 5% of the bullets actually still had the pellet.  he got all pissy when I pointed out to him that he was basically selling 55 gr bullets and not really tracers.


cbr

For tracers to reload check out
www.iidbs.com/hitech/

IMR 4064 reliably lights my .223 and .308 tracers.

I buy the bullets from theammunitionstore, usually at the fun show, but you can get them online.

It is very difficult to see a tracer at 100yds in the daytime.  NIghtime, you should see them for an instant at 75 yds.

I just load them to slightly less than mag length, and use a grainage in the middle of the max/min for that bullet weight.

748 did not light my .223 tracers more than 2 in 10

TXL

Quoted: For tracers to reload check out www.iidbs.com/hitech/

These guys are a rip off!! Don't buy from thieves.

IIDBS price $75.00 for 500
Pats Reloading $21.95 for 500

Pat's Reloading

I've done business with Pat's for a while now and have NEVER been disappointed. Tracers light right up almost immediately. If you have a question about them ask him when you call, he is upfront and honest as far as I can tell. A good place for all reloading components....'cept SR primers, he doesnt have any last time I checked.