.008 Bump Required to Smoothly Chamber Round??

[hawlejr]

Sounds like you have too much headspace. Cases are stretching when fired. Virgin cases chamber fine but are .006-8 shorter to shoulder. If this were a Savage, I'd loosen the barrel nut and turn the barrel in until it hit the short guage and then turn it out just a little. Probably require a smith to accomplish this on a Howa?

Good luck

 

[Huntz]

I would try a no go or field gauge and if the bolt does not close on them use a Redding base only die .

 

[Hondo64d]

Are you having to bump the shoulder that far so that the base can be sized down enough? (Fld)

Try using black sharpie on the case to see what's actually causing the hang up

^^^^
This.

John

 

[General RE LEE]

Thank you all for the replies. My gut is telling me my die is not sizing the base above the case head. I noticed to get the brass to chamber, the shell holder has to contact the die form enough the press handle cams over.

There is a guy that sells a "Belt Buster" due to size the base of 6 ARC cases. This is to prevent "belting" when sizing 6 ARC cases but I bet it will help my issue.

Also, I think Hornady beefs up this area of the brass compared to others.

 

[8x68s]

By the by, I have probably 200 pieces of once fired hornady 6 arc brass I'd let go for next to nothing. I also have a bunch of starline 6.5 grendel, most of which hasn't been used. I went to Alpha munitions as soon as they released it.

EDIT: This post wasn't meant to be an Ad to sell brass. I have one of those in the classifieds. The 6.5 Grendel Brass is all converted to 6 ARC. I can only seem to find about 199 of the once fired. I'm not sure what happened to the rest of the brass. It's lost in the sauce.

PM'd you about your brass...

 

[JPaul]

Are You setting up your FL sizing die with a light cam over?

 

[General RE LEE]

Are You setting up your FL sizing die with a light cam over?

I am now. When I set up die with a slight cam over, shoulder bump is .008". Case length grows very little though.

 

[RichCoyle]

Interesting recent development loading my 6mm ARC Howa bolt action. If I bump shoulder .002", bolt is difficult to close. Virgin brass shoulder is .008" back from a fired case and chambers easily. I kept lowering my FL die in increments till case chambers smoothly, which is right about .006-.008" shoulder bump. Cases are not growing more than .003" when bumping shoulder back this much, which is interesting.

I've never had a chamber that needed more than .002" shoulder bump to smoothly chamber a case.

• Rifle has 1500 rounds on it
• Carbon ring removed in throat
• Bullet seated to jump .060
• Using .350 Hornady comparator and a fired case
• Loads are within Hornady load data and no over pressure
• Hornady 3x fired brass

I'm stumped. Any suggestions?

I didn't read any posts passed this. I had the same problem. It was solved by a small base die.