20 tactical troubles

[Hammerdown75]

Hey everyone, I’ve got a dilemma, recently bought a 20 tactical rem 700 used. Had it shipped to me on Saturday. Had a Redding 20 tac fl sizing die set before hand. Bought 100 nosler 223 brass and loaded up some 32 gr sierras with 25gr of h322. Gun came with about 40 pieces of fed. And Winchester brass all empty. Most were primed 7 were not. I was going to load the primed. And fl size the rest. Upon resizing I noticed that the cases were really getting dented up on the shoulder. So I measured the primed cases and they were mostly 1.770. I took the empty primed cases and fired them and resized and trimmed to 1.750. Loaded and went shooting. First shot with new scope on for sight in. After the shot I opened the bolt and no brass comes out. The case broke half way up the body and the case head stuck in the bolt. I used a Sheetrock molly and screw to knock the case clear with my cleaning rod. Shot 6 more times with new brass and the primers were flat like I’ve never seen before? Used a friends loaded rounds that work in his 2 different tac 20’s. Also nosler brass on #3 loading. 24.2 gr h322 coal 2.200. First shot blew the brass in half again. Used the molly trick to clear chamber. Shot once more. And quit. Sat down at the reloading bench last night trying to make sense of it? Looking at the last brass shot it too was fractured about 1/3 the way up from the base. Also the rifle will cycle loaded rounds if fed through the floor plate. But if I drop an empty case in the chamber and close the bolt. It will be stuck in there. Need to bang the buttstock lightly on the floor and it drops out? What the H is going on? Any help would be greatly appreciated! Going to be bringing to local riflesmith. But really bugging me now. Chamber reamed to deep? Guy I bought it from said he shot 200 rounds through it no troubles. Seemed like a great guy 65 years old. Contacted through this site.

 

[Hammerdown75]

To clarify friends bullets 40 gr bergers 24.2 h322. Also the bolt closed hard on the long primed cases that I fired prior to loading. Not sure if that helps?

 

[JSH]

Sounds like you have not worked with wildcats very much. Barrels may be marked the same cartridge wise between you and your buddies, means very little other than a base line. From your description it could be several things that could have been spec’d out by original owner.
I learned years ago when working with various wildcats and one offs, never assume. Loading ammo before gun is in hand, don’t. Lesson learned.

 

[L.Sherm]

Sounds like your getting alot of case stretch.

 

[Rdlningcltchdmpr]

Tight neck diameter.?

 

[Lougler]

Stick with one lot of brass and get the headspace set correctly.

 

[chuckshooter]

We get a post on here quite often like this, where the person is looking for the secret answer, but in reality the answers are the basics. If you going to shoot a wild cat you must :"must" know your chamber dimensions. Either get a chamber cast done or do one yourself. it's not hard and it's not expensive. Case head separation is caused by case stretch, which generally means the case has been overly sized down causing to much headspace. The fact that the case is stuck when cycling an unfired round simply means another specification is too tight. It doesn't mean it's the proper headspace. Neck or base diameter dimensions are probably what you should be looking at and my money is the neck dimension. The brass neck walls are too thick, measure a loaded round at the neck diameter . My chamber neck is a .230.. I would not recommend sticking anything steel inside your rifle like a sheetrock Molly. An oversized bronze brush will usually do the trick. Keep us posted on what you figure out the problem is. good luck

 

[Evan]

Strip your bolt of firing assembly and ejector. Take a brand new piece of 223 and size it only part way with 20tac die. Test in rifle. Thread die down a little and size again. Repeat until the stripped bolt just closes on the case. You want just the tiniest bit of resistance at the very bottom of the bolt closing. This gives you a case sized the exactly fit the chamber. That gives you the right headspacing. If you can't get the bolt to close with minimal resistance, then the base of the case may be too big for the chamber. I don't know how Todd specced the 20tac, but the default 20 Vartarg is .375 if I recall. That's too tight for some types of brass, like Lapua, that are meant for SAAMI chambers specced 0.3769.

You need to know your neck dimension too. A loaded case needs to be 0.002 or more smaller than the chamber neck to not create the potential for pressure spikes. For example, my 20 Vartarg has a 0.234 neck. My loaded rounds, unturned, are 2315 to 232. This is a tight fit. More typical with a 234 neck would be to turn to 231 or 230 to get a safer amount of clearance.

 

[paperpuncher]

^^^^ This... Get some new brass and starts from scratch. I would add when you seat the bullets leave them long and allow for some jam in the lands, this will help insure that the case stays against the bolt face during fire form. After you have fire formed just bump the shoulder very slightly back and you should be golden. Not sure about the rounds ejecting when coming out of the mag but not when fed from on top of the follower, perhaps a new extractor is in order.

 

[Hammerdown75]

Thanks for the feedback everyone. So basically the hornady 9th edition reloading manual that has the tac20 data is not a baseline? I’m exactly that trim and am loaded .010 under max coal. First reply was right on. First wildcat. Maybe I didn’t explain very well. A fired case slid into the chamber,will not be grabbed by the bolt. Not tight fitting hard to pull the bolt just won’t grab it! I had reached out to the previous owner who has been reloading since the 70’s and a benchrest shooter. I asked for dimensions of ammo for this particular gun or a load that shot well. He didn’t keep record and pulled the bullets on the loaded brass before sending to me. Fully understand! Been reloading rifle/pistol 10yrs myself for 8 different calibers. Thought I knew some things, evidently not enough? Tried making a modified case to play with bullet depth. Scuffed the bottom of the brass while drilling out base of the case so I gave up for now.The guy I bought it from is sending me the barrel critter to get me some chamber dimensions? To clarify I used a plastic molly that expanded to remove the broken cases steel screw didn’t touch anything

 

[Evan]

Yeah, it sounds like your case is sized way to short, so it's loose in the chamber and the extractor doesn't grab it. Try backing the die out 2 or 3 turns, and only sizing a fresh piece of 223 until the bolt closes.

 

[Hammerdown75]

How can it be sized too short when the factory brass for the nosler 223 that I bought brand new is at 1.740? You mean I bumped the shoulder back to far. Wouldn’t that really bulge just below the shoulder? And become hard to chamber? I guess I’ll try more new brass glad I blew $100 on this lot. At least they weren’t Lapua.

 

[Evan]

How can it be sized too short when the factory brass for the nosler 223 that I bought brand new is at 1.740? You mean I bumped the shoulder back to far. Wouldn’t that really bulge just below the shoulder? And become hard to chamber? I guess I’ll try more new brass glad I blew $100 on this lot. At least they weren’t Lapua.

Yeah, I mean the shoulder was bumped too far back. Doesn't take much to have it all not work.

If you have a 22 expander, you can neck your brass up and then try again. It would be advisable to anneal, but you can try it out with a couple and see how it goes without annealing.

 

[Hammerdown75]

Might be a dumb question? Can I use my 223 die? I have mandrel for annealing I would definitely do that. Thanks for helping

 

[Hammerdown75]

Expander has way more taper I’m guessing?

 

[Evan]

223 die would work. Depending on brand. Hornady has nice long expander plugs, rcbs has short ones that are less friendly to necking up. Try out on a piece and see.

All the neck up and down will work harden the brass. Annealing when you are all done could help the brass last longer.

Edit: If you quote me, I'll get an alert you replied. Otherwise I won't know and you'll need to wait until I meander through again.

 

[Hammerdown75]

Just updating, brought gun to my local rifle Smith he had a 20 tac go gauge. Went in no problem. Didn’t have the no go. Used 5 pieces of 2mil tape on base of go gauge. Bolt still closed. Barrel needs turning down in front of recoil lug. Headspace not within Sammi spec. The brass was not oversized. Custom rifle shop owner figured 12 thou more than go. Thanks for all your input. Pretty much ruins factory 223 brass trying to fireform. Never had broken case heads x3 pierced primers x3. Even had a couple primers blow out. $150 job to get it in shape.

 

[chuckshooter]

The old saying "there's more than one way to skin a cat" seems to be accurate here, not that I ever wanted to skin a cat. At the risk of offending you, I'll take a second stab at this. You can have.012 taken off of the barrel shoulder and still end up in the same situation. Brass needs to be sized appropriately for the size of the chamber. There are several methods of achieving this goal. You can start with a virgin 223 brass and size it down slowly until the bolt just closes. Or you can do as Evan suggested and neck up a piece of brass and then neck it down slowly until the bolt just closes. There's obviously a little more to it than that. you don't want the ejector or some other portion of the brass to be affecting this tension that you're feeling as you're closing the bolt. After you have achieved brass that fits your chamber regardless of whether the chamber has been shortened or not, then you can work on the other factors. Proper neck clearance, if the neck is too tight, it will cause excessive pressures, without a doubt. That's why I suggested a chamber cast so you'd know your neck dimension. But you can figure it out without a cast. Can you slip a bullet into a fired case that hasn't been sized yet? It's not always an exact science, if the brass neck is too hard it may not give you good feedback, but it's one of the ways gathering information. There you have it , you can either pay $150 and have your chamber shortened (you will still have to fit your brass) or you can size your brass longer to fit your existing chamber. Because remember, in wildcatting there's no such thing as standard , the phraseology to use is the most popular version.. one more thing, if you do get some fired brass to examine make sure it matches your buddies as far as shoulder angle, maybe the old guy sold you a 20 practical. anything is possible. again good luck and I hope you get to shooting it soon. I have 5 of these and they are my favorite cartridge on Prairie dogs.

 

[Evan]

Makes sense. My method would allow you to use it as is. It doesn't matter that the chamber is 0.012 long, you just need to make your brass that long.

You can start with a virgin 223 brass and size it down slowly until the bolt just closes. Or you can do as Evan suggested and neck up a piece of brass and then neck it down slowly until the bolt just closes. There's obviously a little more to it than that. you don't want the ejector or some other portion of the brass to be affecting this tension that you're feeling as you're closing the bolt. After you have achieved brass that fits your chamber regardless of whether the chamber has been shortened or not, then you can work on the other factors.

That's why I said you have to strip the bolt. Remove firing assembly, punch out the rolled pin and remove the ejector.

 

[JSH]

This may bring bowls of outrage, as far as wildcats headspace is what you make of it.

My machinist/gunsmith/mentor friend and I actually met and became friends over the subject. He has taught me a lot. I have showed and taught him a few things outside the box.

My angle on wildcats of an unknown or unsure chamber, the are custom, so you have to make brass custom as well.
I bought several older wildcats on commercial Mauser actions several years back. Some were marked as to what they were others were not. It was a very interesting 2 year project to get them all figured out and shooting.
My favorite and one I kept is a 30 caliber Luft. Pretty much a 300WM, but made and built before the 300WM was introduced.