Several months ago I reviewed the Colt accurized rifle ,the CAR HBAR ELITE as it is also named, and said I do a follow up post about how it shoots and further ranges. So while out this week testing the new Federal Gold Medal 556 load using the Berger VLD 73 gr. bullet I killed two birds with one stone.

The new GMM load has come out alongside the very popular 77gr Sierra bullet loaded loading. Berger has been around a long time but until relatively recently, if you weren’t a handloader you may not have heard about them. Berger has been making very accurate and innovative bullet designs for bench rest shooting, high power and varmint hunting for a long time. It was a wonder it took as long as it did before some company started using those bullets in a factory load.

The new gold medal load is loaded to 223mm pressures and will feed through AR15 magazines.  Cases are the federal match cases with the bluish water proofing sealant.   The bullet is the “open tip” match hollow point boat tailed.     The Colt has  a marking of “1/9” on the  barrel but don’t let that give you the impression that these will work in your other brand 1/9 twist barrel. The reality is the Colt barrel more closely measures 1/8.5  twist.  So before spending a lot of money on this ammo or buying those bullets, take a careful measure of your barrel twist.  This is easy enough to do with a cleaning rod, a sharpie and a tape measure.

I shot the ammo at 500 yards using a NRA 200 yard bullseye target.

The new gold medal load is loaded to 223mm pressures and will feed through AR15 magazines.  Cases are the federal match cases with the bluish water proofing sealant.   The bullet is the “open tip” match hollow point boat tailed.     The Colt has  a marking of “1/9” on the  barrel but don’t let that give you the impression that these will work in your other brand 1/9 twist barrel. The reality is the Colt barrel more closely measures 1/8.5  twist.  So before spending a lot of money on this ammo or buying those bullets, take a careful measure of your barrel twist.  This is easy enough to do with a cleaning rod, a sharpie and a tape measure.

I shot the ammo at 500 yards using a NRA 200 yard bullseye target.

A full 20 rounds was fired at the target for a record group after sighter shots. I can’t offer up more than one targets because conditions and light started to change and I was afraid it woud become a matter of me fighting wind and light as opposed to trying to shoot in conditions to give results one could look at without having to determine how much was error from wind, light or shooter. I hope the group gives an idea of what the ammo is capable of as well as the HBAR ELITE. I ran out of time and light before I could shoot the same ammo in a MK12 SPR.