I had ought to have used should instead of would.
2x fired brass chambers but with difficult extraction and marks near shoulder
- Thread starter SGK
- Start date
I wish I had asked this question about 2 weeks ago...
Dusty Stevens
Shiner
Remember the rifle is a Blaser straight pull. R8 Professional Success to be precise. (So not the custom precision build on my wish list but a 'premium' sporting rifle nonetheless.) The entire action slides back out away from the barrel and the ejection 'area' is very large. The 2x fired brass is definitely stickier on extraction than the residual ammo of the same batch that is only 1x fired. But it doesn't seem at all difficult to slide the 2F cases fully forward into the chamber by hand. The skew of the extraction spring will exacerbate friction on extraction. I guess I will only know if I get the chamber examined with a bore scope or such. In any event it seems the key point remains the same: FL resize for a 2 thou bump or so (test with feel, albeit this isn't as easy as with a conventional bolt action, and measure).
Yeah but in this case it has only been used on about half a dozen cases as I worked through the setup instructions. And I purchased the Type S Match bushing neck die set thinking "buy once, buy right" even if it hurts a bit more upfront. I should still be able to use the body die and follow with the neck die even if it is a bit more hassle. At least I won't make the same mistake when I purchase dies for my .223 Rem, Hardy RE 7mm Rem Mag and future calibers.
Dusty Stevens
Shiner
just remember one thing- 2 dies have twice the chance of inducing runout. sending your fired cases to whidden gunworks and getting a properly fit FL bushing die will be the end all and probably cheaper in the long run.
Alex Wheeler
Site $$ Sponsor
I tried telling the guys at long range hunting to stop neck sizing... that went over well.
searcher
Gold $$ Contributor
You are getting contrasting opinions on whether to full-length size after each firing VS neck sizing to fire-form. Technically, all of this "conflicting" information is right. You ARE well advised to try to fully fire-form your brass - and that is probably best performed by having your bullet as close to the lands (or touching) when the bolt closes in order to position the brass against the face of the bolt when the bolt is closed. This will allow the shoulder to fully "blow" forward upon firing (or near so). Whether you had full-length resized prior to this operation is mute. After you have fired is where differences in opinion come into play - and your conflicting advice. Some people neck size only after this first firing and will not resize until the brass is hard to extract - then they run the brass through a body die or full-length size it. The benefits are longer brass life than full-length resizing after every firing however, it creates more work to maintain the brass in the long run for what amounts to a better chamber fit only part of the time. This is assuming you are using factory dies. Probably the best method (after you blow your brass out) of maintaining your brass IS to full-length resize after each firing, bumping the shoulder back .001" to .002" AND doing so with either a custom die or a semi-custom die that does not squeeze your brass down to fit any chamber on the planet as most factory dies are designed to do. You want a die that just takes the brass down a little bit in diameter, specific to YOUR brass. There are advertisers on this website that make both custom dies and semi-custom. You can send a few of your fired casings to Harrel's Precision, for example, and they will match up a die that is fairly close to your brass size, though, of course a bit undersized. They are relatively inexpensive and work very well. They only make them in a few calibers - but .308 is one of them. On your 7 mag - if it is a hunting rifle, I'd say just full-length size it when you get to that one. I doubt a custom die would be worth it. As to your scratches on the brass - I think it is a combination of two things - When you are neck sizing, I think your die is adjusted to come down on the shoulder and it is slightly flaring the brass at that shoulder/wall juncture. That is creating the friction you are feeling when loading/extracting and the scratches are from a rough chamber finish that would otherwise go unnoticed. Ask me how I know...
hogpatrol
Gold $$ Contributor
Good post. Yes, tired brass and/or headspace issues with the brass eventually giving up.
Not sure how a body i.e. that doesn't touch the neck would impact runout except for user error - maybe I am missing something?
You might be right re custom dies but I want to get on my feet here first. I just landed in the USA a couple of months ago and I am only just starting out reloading but trying to do it right from the beginning. I'm realising also that, too an extent, I was a bit spoilt in the UK (and even more so in NZ). Despite living right in the middle of densely urban London I could hunt deer any day of the year (the Brits say "stalk" as "one hunts with hounds dear boy") and it was only an hour to get to Bisley the home of UK target rifle, a massive MoD facility with shooting out to 1100 yards and many electronically marked/scored targets making use convenient. At Bisley we also had running boar and running deer facilities, a rifle sport more 'aligned' with hunting than conventional target rifle. (Add to that seasonal driven bird shooting and simulated game shotgun facilities within easy reach.) I know there is a rifle range south of me at Homestead that I believe has a 500 yard range but I haven't made it there yet. Was meant to go last week but had to reschedule. If I can sort out ready access to good facilities here (and hopefully some sensibly priced hunting as well) I will make the jump to a full custom rifle in a calibre with better ballistics for long range. (My 223 and 308 are interchangeable Blaser barrels on the R8 Success while my 7mm Rem Mag is a lightweight hunting setup by Hardy Rifle Engineering of NZ (carbon fibre stock, carbon fibre wrapped barrel around a Tikka action). I also have an Anschutz 1416 D HB thumbhole.) At that point custom dies for that rifle would probably make absolute sense.
This is why I went with the bushing style dies. I do intend to outside neck turn my brass to a relatively constant baseline (I will be very conservative re trimming at first). I bought the 21st Century lathe. I just hadn't made the leap to FL resizing and had thought that to be a periodic need only (satisfied by the body die when necessary). As noted above, I will start out with what I have for now and reconsider custom dies a bit later. I have not purchased any dies for .223 or 7mm RM yet. I'd love to add a custom rig in 6 or 6.5mm (as soon as I can sneak it into the house without the wife noticing the expenditure!).
So this is how it started... Initially I would have waited a bit before purchasing dies until I had worked through all my brass prep. I realised I had to neck size my fired brass before I could use the 21st Century lathe setup. I purchased and used the Redding Type S Bushing neck die, but quickly noticed it left a portion of the neck near the shoulder unsized, apparently correct operation for a bushing neck die according to Redding. I wanted to resize the full neck prior to attempting to use the turning lathe as I understood the turning should just 'kiss' the shoulder. If the neck wasn't resized to the shoulder I would take off too much brass there. So I grabbed a Lee collet die to resize the full neck. I wanted to check exactly the point you made above - that I wasn't flaring the shoulder/wall juncture with the Lee die - and started chambering the resized brass. But I couldn't notice a difference between the brass I had resized and that I hadn't (from the same batch). So I concluded I wasn't messing up wall/shoulder with the die at least.
That pic scares the cr*p out of me
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How many firings on these cases? Were they ever annealed? If so, how often? Every firing? Every other firing? Every 5th firing? I am curious how long it takes for brass to develop cracks as I only have cases that have been fired 8 times, yet I also anneal after every firing. Thx
David '
These were 308W Nosler brass FL sized 10 times, never annealed and not sure that would have made any difference.
One came apart totally as shown the rest I was able to take down and re use the projectile. I believe 9 FL would be max in my situation. Moving forward I neck size until they start getting snug chambering then FL resize. Works for me.
SPJ
XTR
F-TR obssessed shooting junkie
This is what I was warning about in my first post on this thread. I shoot thousands of rounds a yr of 308 shooting F-TR. I FL everything. In fact so does ever F class shooter I know (with one exception). Since 2011 I have had (2) two case head separations, and that was because I was shooting in two rifles and one had a chamber .005 longer than the other. (that lot of brass did get tossed, but it still had about 5 reloads on it)
If you set your dies up correctly you don't get case head separations. If you follow the manufacturers instructions and screw it down till it touches the shell holder and back off ¼ turn it will happen in short order because you are pushing the shoulder back too far.
As long as you are not bumping the shoulder more than .002 you will be fine, you will lose primer pockets before you crack necks or get case head separations.
As others have said, full length size with about .002" shoulder bump. I've literally gone 50 firings of hot loads in Lapua brass! The case head separation is a classic example of working the brass too much when sizing. You don't have to have a custom die to get a custom fit either. I often spec reamers to work with Redding type s full bushing dies. This method just makes more sense to me, than buying custom dies.
Proper die to chamber relationship is critical but you can do it with custom dies or with a custom chamber reamer. Once fireformed, there is no discernible difference as both methods can result in the same amount of brass movement when fired and sized. This is an area where we are our own worst enemy, in search of perfection in all areas. As long as the chamber isn't way too large for the virgin brass, which would result in loose primer pockets early, there is no down side. We have regressed in this area by spec'ing reamers too small, necessitating custom dies to get the brass to size down. I want my brass to come out of the die sized smaller than a fired case by about .0015" at the shoulder and .0005-.0006" at the web.
To get this, you want a reamer that is about .003" larger at both areas than the die. Spring back, brass thickness and hardness are different at the two areas, yielding different resultant sizing at the shoulder vs the web area.
This along with minimal shoulder push back and good brass, will result in very good brass life at even hotter than normal loads.
Proper die to chamber relationship is critical but you can do it with custom dies or with a custom chamber reamer. Once fireformed, there is no discernible difference as both methods can result in the same amount of brass movement when fired and sized. This is an area where we are our own worst enemy, in search of perfection in all areas. As long as the chamber isn't way too large for the virgin brass, which would result in loose primer pockets early, there is no down side. We have regressed in this area by spec'ing reamers too small, necessitating custom dies to get the brass to size down. I want my brass to come out of the die sized smaller than a fired case by about .0015" at the shoulder and .0005-.0006" at the web.
To get this, you want a reamer that is about .003" larger at both areas than the die. Spring back, brass thickness and hardness are different at the two areas, yielding different resultant sizing at the shoulder vs the web area.
This along with minimal shoulder push back and good brass, will result in very good brass life at even hotter than normal loads.
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If you look at bullets.com going out of business sale, they pretty much have neck size dies available in all cartridges. They just don't sell as many. Matt
XTR
F-TR obssessed shooting junkie
You are talking about a hunting rifle with a light barrel, turning brass is probably not going to gain you much if anything.
I spec my chambers with enough neck clearance that I don't need to turn, and I don't. I don't think it's had any effect on my scores in F class. If you are shooting BR, then it will probably make a difference, but you are talking about guns and shooters that are already shooting under ¼ MOA, so if they gain a tenth of an MOA (but it is probably less) on he group size it matters, but for the rest of us, it's not going to make a difference that you can see.
I spec my chambers with enough neck clearance that I don't need to turn, and I don't. I don't think it's had any effect on my scores in F class. If you are shooting BR, then it will probably make a difference, but you are talking about guns and shooters that are already shooting under ¼ MOA, so if they gain a tenth of an MOA (but it is probably less) on he group size it matters, but for the rest of us, it's not going to make a difference that you can see.
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