Everybody Loves Velocity

The 4,500-fps WSSM Project

- Jim Matthews

The .223 WSSM rifle used in testing featured a regular short-action Model 70 with a 26inch Douglas barrel and a 1:14-inch twist for optimal use with light bullets. The stock is a factory Winchester synthetic stock and the scope was a Tasco 4-16x World Class model.

Four .22-caliber bullets on the light end of the spectrum were used in the Mach IV project with the .223 WSSM: (1) Speer 30-grain TNT Green, (2) Hornady 35-grain NTX, (3) Nosler 40-grain Ballistic Tip and (4) Hornady 52-grain ELD-X match bullet.

There were six vehicles lined up along a dirt road on the edge of an irrigated pasture. About 15 of us were shooting at Columbian ground squirrels in the lush spring grass. The locals call this species of ground squirrel "gophers," and they are little targets, especially the "young-of-the-year" juveniles, which probably have less than a one-inch vital area cross-section. We started with semi-automatic .22 rimfires until we had eliminated or educated all the squirrels within 75 yards or so. Then we unlimbered the bigger centerfires in a wide variety of calibers. The game switched to a team sport where we alternated between being on the trigger and on a spotting scope or binoculars looking for likely targets. We almost universally agreed that it was more fun spotting than shooting because view of the target was usually lost at the moment of bullet impact for the shooter.

It is not very often a shooter sees a chronograph reading top the Mach IV mark of 4,500 fps with a varmint round. The .223 WSSM did it handily with the light Speer 30-grain TNT Green bullets and CFE 223 powder.