Saracen
Well-Known Member
Sounds like the cases may need full length sizing as some rifles simply have to be regardless of the case being fireformed . Was the brass fireformed in your rifle
Need some help, very confused, trying to load some hammer hunters
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Saracen
Well-Known Member
I have a 270 that gave me the same problem. I full length size each time now and the problem is solved..
Saracen
Well-Known Member
Have you checked that it's the correct t trim length?
mountainman83
Well-Known Member
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- 74
I had the exact same issue as you are having a couple years ago with a 7LRM that a bought from another member from this sight.
I had a shoulder bump issue that showed up on twice fired brass. That was not allowing me to chamber a round.
Use shoulder bump gauge, adjust as needed and check case trim length.
I also use hornady one shot lube.
This is more of a question than an answer for those very knowledgeable here. If belted cases headspace off the belt, could the fact that this seems to be previously fired Nosler brass from another rifle be causing this issue from the bulge just above the belt, that is not getting resized? Again, not making a statement, it's a question.
Tagging in
It looks to me like you need to bump your shoulders more like others have said. I would pick one case and keep bumping it until it closes easily. I'd even sacrifice a case and bump it too far.
I quoted the first pic and that's what leads me to believe the above is true. See the shiny ring around the outside edge of the shoulder? Every time I've seen that on brass it needs to be bumped back another .001". At least that's been my experience in my rifles.
bigngreen
Well-Known Member
I didn't catch that before but ya, especially on belted mags it's real easy to have issues because you can't resize right in front of the belt without a collet die. Really need to run brass only from one rifle, especially on belted mags.
Gary kittelson
Member
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- Sep 22, 2017
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- 16
Photo shows base to datum difference
300 win mag factory ammo is designed to headspace off the belt. we as handloaders want to change that to headspacing off the shoulder to avoid case head separation. lots of case body growth with belted magnums. the only part of the measurement you took with the stoney that is accurate on a fired case is from the shoulder to the bullet ogive. i would bet the base to shoulder datum on your threaded case and a fired case are much different.
you really need a set of hornady headspace gauges. they are quite inexpensive.
you say some of your fired brass chambers easily and some chambers tight. this is where you need the headspace gauges to compare your brass measurements. simple enough to take one of your tight fitting cases (this sgould be a fully fireformed case) and bump the shoulder slightly where it will chamber but without measuring how much did you actually bump it? what base to shoulder datum measurement do you want to use in the future?
now if a 1 to 2 thousandth bump to the shoulder case doesn't chamber easily it is time to measure the difference between a new case, fired case and sized case diameter of case body just above the belt. this can be a problem area to size. special dies are made for this but lets hope we don't need to go there.
you really need a set of hornady headspace gauges. they are quite inexpensive.
you say some of your fired brass chambers easily and some chambers tight. this is where you need the headspace gauges to compare your brass measurements. simple enough to take one of your tight fitting cases (this sgould be a fully fireformed case) and bump the shoulder slightly where it will chamber but without measuring how much did you actually bump it? what base to shoulder datum measurement do you want to use in the future?
now if a 1 to 2 thousandth bump to the shoulder case doesn't chamber easily it is time to measure the difference between a new case, fired case and sized case diameter of case body just above the belt. this can be a problem area to size. special dies are made for this but lets hope we don't need to go there.
See if an empty/resized case will chamber. Assuming your good there, sizing isn't an issue. If your concerned your bullet is touching the lands, it will show rifling marks on the bullet where it's engaging the rifling. Chances are it's not even close to the rifling. Two other things may be causing your problem.
- Your primer is not fully seated or for some reason that primer isn't compatible.
- Your powder is to compressed causing bulging of the case. It's happened to me with soft Nosler brass.
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theosmithjr
Well-Known Member
Basically Rule of thumb for Re-loading ANY Cartridge. FULL LENGTH the Brass. TRIM the brass to specs. In Manuel. Check & Clean (Ream) the Primer Pocket & Flash hole (Inside & Out)for any Burrs or heavy spots. NECK Size the case again. SEAT the PRIMERS. WEIGH & CHARGE the Case. I start with a MINIMUM Charge for FIRE FORMING the Brass to the Rifles Chamber. SEAT the Bullet. I PERSONALY start .0010 OFF the LANDS. (OFF the OGIVE) Being I shoot the LONGER Style bullets. THEN I SHOOT to FIREFORM. I then work the LOAD UP to PETLOAD stats., THEN I PLAY with the Bullets Seating Depth to find the ULTIMATE PETLOAD for that given Rifle. If you follow this example you'll save TIME & MONEY, BOTH on the BENCH and at the RANGE! YOUR Rifle, given everything about the weapon and optics are CORRECT, will SHOOT at it's PEAK ACCURACY! Just my OPINION & 2 cents. Theosmithjr
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theosmithjr
Well-Known Member
Also, if your in QUESTION about the Seating Depth you used to start this THREAD, you can take 1 LOADED round and COLOR the Bullet with a BLACK PERMANENT MARKER, then CHAMBER the round, then cycle the Bolt to Extract that round. You'll SEE VERY PLAINLY WHATS GOING ON INSIDE YOUR CHAMBER & THROAT. Theosmithjr
This has been said earlier, but I want to emphasize that comment for clarity.
It's NEVER a good idea to chase two problems at the same time. You will end up chasing your tail.
I would stick with using one brass that fits "easily" to debug the seating problem, then deal with the sizing problem later. You can (and should) sacrifice one good brass to do this. Cut the OAL short intentionally to make sure that brass length isn't the issue. I'd take maybe 0.025 off the length of the neck. This will not affect seating depth as long as the bullet still reaches the neck.
This brass should be a once fired brass that fits easily (bolt closes) with no bullet in it.
Now put a tiny little dent in the edge of the neck at the mouth with a needle nose plier. The purpose of the dent is to hold a bullet in place but not so firmly that it can't be pushed in by hand. Make sure the case will still fit before inserting the bullet.
Now push a bullet into the brass just enough so the bullet is held in place by the dent, and then manually insert the brass and bullet into the chamber and carefully close the bolt, then extract the round using your fingers to hold the round aligned with the bore as the bolt is slid open to make sure the extractor doesn't whack the bullet against the action port opening. And then examine the overall length and compare with what you learned before.
This is the basic method that was used before the stoney point gauge was introduced. (I love the hornady/stoney system but sometimes you have to go back to basics).
You may have to repeat this process several times to make sure that the bullet isn't sticking in the lands.
Sometimes I use a long wooden dowel down the barrel to help push the bullet out with the case as I open the bolt or lextract the case. This is especially true if I am "jamming" the bullet seating depth.
A few other points - I make all my own overall length gauge cases out of once fired brass. You can buy the required tap on line. The rest is easy.
Digital calipers can lie..... The old verniers were hard to read, but they never lied. Dial calipers fall somewhere in the middle.
For your purposes, I'd forget about using the ogive bushing system for measurement. Just measure the full overall length from case head to bullet tip. Bullets do vary slightly from one to the next using tip length, but not enough to matter for your purposes debugging this problem.
One last thought - are you sure you understand that ogive measurements can vary wildly from one bullet make to another? I hope you are not comparing the ogive measurement for two different bullets. I re-read your first several posts but could not convince myself that you were not doing that, so I thought it was worth clarifying. For example, I can easily see a full tenth or two difference between a Berger vld and a Hornady spire point. I even saw a difference of 50 thou once on two sierra bullets of the same part number but different lots. This ogive measurement only really applies within a single lot of the same bullet. Changing to a new lot generally requires checking the length over again and then "hoping" that nothing changes.
It's NEVER a good idea to chase two problems at the same time. You will end up chasing your tail.
I would stick with using one brass that fits "easily" to debug the seating problem, then deal with the sizing problem later. You can (and should) sacrifice one good brass to do this. Cut the OAL short intentionally to make sure that brass length isn't the issue. I'd take maybe 0.025 off the length of the neck. This will not affect seating depth as long as the bullet still reaches the neck.
This brass should be a once fired brass that fits easily (bolt closes) with no bullet in it.
Now put a tiny little dent in the edge of the neck at the mouth with a needle nose plier. The purpose of the dent is to hold a bullet in place but not so firmly that it can't be pushed in by hand. Make sure the case will still fit before inserting the bullet.
Now push a bullet into the brass just enough so the bullet is held in place by the dent, and then manually insert the brass and bullet into the chamber and carefully close the bolt, then extract the round using your fingers to hold the round aligned with the bore as the bolt is slid open to make sure the extractor doesn't whack the bullet against the action port opening. And then examine the overall length and compare with what you learned before.
This is the basic method that was used before the stoney point gauge was introduced. (I love the hornady/stoney system but sometimes you have to go back to basics).
You may have to repeat this process several times to make sure that the bullet isn't sticking in the lands.
Sometimes I use a long wooden dowel down the barrel to help push the bullet out with the case as I open the bolt or lextract the case. This is especially true if I am "jamming" the bullet seating depth.
A few other points - I make all my own overall length gauge cases out of once fired brass. You can buy the required tap on line. The rest is easy.
Digital calipers can lie..... The old verniers were hard to read, but they never lied. Dial calipers fall somewhere in the middle.
For your purposes, I'd forget about using the ogive bushing system for measurement. Just measure the full overall length from case head to bullet tip. Bullets do vary slightly from one to the next using tip length, but not enough to matter for your purposes debugging this problem.
One last thought - are you sure you understand that ogive measurements can vary wildly from one bullet make to another? I hope you are not comparing the ogive measurement for two different bullets. I re-read your first several posts but could not convince myself that you were not doing that, so I thought it was worth clarifying. For example, I can easily see a full tenth or two difference between a Berger vld and a Hornady spire point. I even saw a difference of 50 thou once on two sierra bullets of the same part number but different lots. This ogive measurement only really applies within a single lot of the same bullet. Changing to a new lot generally requires checking the length over again and then "hoping" that nothing changes.
