Good shooting. What a great trophy. The Ham'r sure does deliver!

Thank you. I own four of your factory built AR rifles and love them all but never knew this.

Good job Benny !

I just got notification from Graf that they have the 150gr SST #30303 back in stock

Had a great weekend with the HAM'R. 4 pigs, biggest was 165 pounds shot at 70 yards using 130gr HHC. All 4 pretty much DRT, 1 moved about 10 feet before the rest of the body got the message that it was dead. On 1 we could not find a bullet hole so I think the HAM'R just scared it to death :-)


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I've had no problem finding bullet holes in the ones I've shot. They leak pretty good when the Ham'r smites them.

Leaking like this

Only had the one and that was very strange, the rest were very leaky.

This is my primary pig hunting rifle. It has an 18" 300 Ham'r barrel. I was stretching its legs today and got repeated hits on 10" steel to 400 yards. The little 3X prism scope was lucky to manage that so 500 yards & beyond was out of the question without a spotter. The plan is to put a 3X15 target scope on it and see how far it will shoot. It is a reload with 150gr Speer btsp bullets and 25.2 gr of CFE BLK. I never hunt past 100 yards so this is just playing around to see what is possible.

I'm not surprised with your experience. This is also my favorite load although I use 25gr out of a 16in barrel. A 5 shot group at 50 yards (which is the normal distance I shoot) can be covered with a dime. My Ham'r is sighted in for 150yd so everything between 30 and 170yd is plus or minus an inch from point of aim. With the ballistics of this bullet 500 yd shouldn't be a problem. I like it so well I'm considering loading some up for my 300 Win Mag and see how they do at 1000yd.

Good point. I have wondered if this bullet would do well in the Ham'r, Blackout and 308. I only hunt with the Ham'r so the others would just be for plinking and practice. Guess I have a winter project. Hope it works in your 300 Win Mag.

I just finished reviewing a YTD report of AR barrel sales for production planning purposes. WOW, what a bunch of surprises....

We've sold over 12k barrels YTD
.308 Win barrels are our best sellers
.300 Blackout is #2
.224 Valkyrie is in the top 10 ???
We sell a LOT of 11.3" barrels
The 18" fluted Tac Hunter HAM'R 1-13 is the best selling HAM'R barrel
Overall 1-13 sells the best in spite of overall the 1-15 shooting the best ???
My "personal" favorite HAM'R barrel (Ranger 1-15) is near the bottom

I just ordered Bill’s “personal favorite” HAM’R barrel to 1) Help get it off the bottom of the WC bestseller list, and 2) Improve my chances of getting Texas-size deer here in northern Virginia.

I bought my BARREL, 300 HAM'R, TACTICAL HUNTER, 18", FLUTED, STAINLESS, GLASS BEAD, 1-13 from Primary Arms when they were discontinuing them. I think it was marked down to less than $200 at the time. I have mainly been shooting the 300 HAM'R | 130GR, SPEER HAM'R HOT-CORE, 2500 FPS, and it has been fairly accurate and most definitely lethal on pigs if the shooter does their job. I do have to build another one and I think the Ranger 16" 1:15 is the barrel going into the build. My wife claimed my rifle so I will build her a lighter model to hunt with and maybe I get mine back.

I also ordered the 338 Federal barrel from Wilson Combat last night it is still processing. Once I finish it I will buy the Ranger barrel and build my wife a lightweight Ham'R. I would like to thank Mr. Wilson for all his contributions and his willingness to engage with us and Wish Bill, Joyce, and the rest of the Wilson family a very merry Christmas.

Does anyone have any load data for 338 Federal?

Probably best to start a new thread to get more eyes on your question.



I'm surprised also. I would have thought the 16" .300 Ham'r barrels would have been more popular than the 18". I have built 2 18" Bill Wilson Ranch barreled uppers and 1 16" Ranger. I much prefer the 16" for maneuvering and it's lighter than the Tac Hunter with not much of a velocity penalty.

Does WC offer the Ruger American Ranch barrel conversion gunsmith service?

Yes, I have had 2 done. One for the Boss and one for me.

Any idea on the Gunsmith cost, in addition to the conversion barrel kit? I tried to find it on the WC website but had no luck.

I tried to find some info on my current issue but came up short.
In loading up some 150SST's (30303), starting at 24.4(max is 25.8) the area of the brass just aft of the shoulder begins to bulge. This causes the round to fail the "chamber check" with my chamber gauge. It was apparent at 24.4 but at 25.8 it's visibly bulged out. Is this a sign that the brass is at the end of its life? The same thing happens with the Speer 150 BTSP. This Starline brass is on the second firing cycle. No issues with the 130-135 grain bullets though. Thanks for the help.

I haven't ran into this due to powder capacity, the only time I've seen it is when the neck is pushed down when seating the bullet since the cases are fairly thin. Do you chamfer or flare the case mouth before seating? We use a Lee Universal Case Expanding die

Cajun.... That certainly is a head scratcher. I don't load SST's in my Ham'r but have loaded many hundreds of 125, 130 and 150gr btsp up to full pressure.

Sorry for the dumb questions below...

Unlike BW I have never expanded cases but ALWAYS chamfer though if Bill does it, it's probably a good idea.
Do you vibrate the powder before putting the bullet in the case?
Are the case length and shoulders within OEM spec?
Starline cases are very tough and the second firing has never been an issue. They do have slightly less capacity than the Sig cases. NBD.
I don't see signs of a "lee factory crimp" but is the case otherwise crimped?

Though it looks like the powder may be pushing the case out sideways, I've never seen it do that. The powder usually pushes the bullet back out of the case a few thousandths. And finally... chamber gauges are worth their weight in gold.

I had a similar issue when using my RCBS dies. After some experimenting I found I had the die screwed in too far and the crimper was pushing the case mouth back and causing the case to either bulge or push the neck into the shoulder. After backing the die out to insure minimal crimping and trimming the cases to minimum length every time the problem went away.

That's most likely the correct answer. The seating stem is pushing on the bullet which isn't going to seat any deeper because of the crimp, but your round is still being pushed up into the die, resulting in a collapsed shoulder. Basically a timing issue.

Prepare another charged case, but before seating a bullet back your seater die out a turn or so and then adjust the seating stem gradually to restore your desired OAL. Hang on to that single round and then, IF you do want to put a crimp on the bullet, back the seating stem a few turns so it won't be pushing the bullet deeper into the case and then screw the die back in just a bit at a time to set the crimp where you want it. At that point tighten up your seating die lock ring. Run that round you just used to set the crimp back up into the seater die and turn the seating stem back in until it makes firm contact with the bullet and lock it down also. If you continue to get that bulge, you're probably still applying too much crimp too soon during seating. Repeat the process until you can seat and crimp in a single pass without collapsing the shoulder or case mouth, then you should be good to go.

Some guys always crimp for self-loading rifles, but I never do. I find it to be unnecessary for the application.

CajunHam’R I forgot to add that even though the SST is a boattail it still would be a good thing to do a light chamfer on the inside of the case mouth just to make sure there's nothing for the bullet to snag on and if you are using flat base bullets you might have to do a more aggressive chamfer. Let us know when you find a solution!