6.8 Western. I had 7.5 inches cut off the barrel of my X-Bolt Mountain Pro Long Range Tungsten.

Working on load development for a buddy's custom 6.8 Western with a 20 inch barrel I was really liking how things were going so I bought the X-Bolt Mountain Pro Long Range Tungsten in 6.8 Western. My buddy dropped off some factory rounds he had bought just to be able to shoot the gun before bringing it to me to work up a hand load for him. So when I had picked up my rifle I decided to check velocity differences between a 20 inch and 26 inch barrel, 48 fps with the factory loads (Winchesters 170 grain) and just shy of 100 fps with the hand loads. I was working up loads side by side to test the differences. I was honestly surprised at the results so I decided to cut the weight and go a bit shorter yet to test velocity differences in barrel lengths. I couldn't be happier with the results as a lot of front heavy weight was lost without near the velocity loss I should have seen. If the rifle's weight is not an issue then yes with different powders you could see more of a difference as some powders need to have that long of a barrel to make sure to get a complete powder burn. I settled on H4350 because of group sizes, standard deviations, and extreme spreads. 1/4 MOA 7 round groups with single digit SD and ES. My buddies rifle is setup using the 165 grain ABLR moving at an average of 2906 fps and even though my rifle loves them I decided to use the 150 gran ABLR's that I have a bunch of I bought for a 270 Winchester Short Mag I ended up donating to Montana Wounded Warriors and had not replaced. The 15 grain difference is not enough for the game I shoot to notice a difference when they get shot. The BC differences are not enough either. I am still not seeing any pressure signs but the guns are shooting so good and will have more then enough maintained velocity and energy for our style and range limitations hunting that I thought it best stop and get to hunting. I can see how far I can bush them after the hunting seasons are over.