power55316
Gold $$ Contributor
I have a five gallon pail of once fired lake city match brass and was wondering if its worth prossesing to shoot in f class
308 lake city match brass
- Thread starter power55316
- Start date
For fun, yes.
To win, no.
Military teams' 7.62 semiautomatic service rifles never had their bolt faces squared up. They shot very accurate with new cases.
Some teams tried reloading them without good results. Fired cases from them had heads out of square enough to shoot near 1 MOA bigger groups. They strung out mostly between 1 and 7 o'clock.
Most members let the civilians pick up those cases. I gave away thousands. Lots of commercial match cases were given away, too. Civvies paid for them with their income taxes.
To win, no.
Military teams' 7.62 semiautomatic service rifles never had their bolt faces squared up. They shot very accurate with new cases.
Some teams tried reloading them without good results. Fired cases from them had heads out of square enough to shoot near 1 MOA bigger groups. They strung out mostly between 1 and 7 o'clock.
Most members let the civilians pick up those cases. I gave away thousands. Lots of commercial match cases were given away, too. Civvies paid for them with their income taxes.
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Dusty Stevens
Shiner
send me a drum of that. I need some bulk 308 for my EBR m1a
If your willing to devote some time it can give you a few hundred cases of winning quality. Even if fired in a gas gun it will eventually square up. But the fact is that high grade brass like Lapua or Norma doesn’t have the many issues that the LC cases have. It is far more valuable as trading stock. Take the pail and divide it into 500 round lots. Offer to trade to a M14 or AR10 shooter one bag of 500 for 100 new Lapua. I’ll bet you get all the Lapua brass you need.
Even if it's fired with an out of square bolt face behind it?
AR10 bolt faces may well have the most square bolt faces from their maker. What percent of its barrels 3000 round best accuracy life will you sacrifice to get 300 square head cases?
How do you measure case heads for being square with their body and neck axis? Or bolt faces to chamber axis, for that matter?
"How do I measure"? I made a tool that looks nothing like what a reloader uses and or would recognize. I needed a gage down in S. Texas, 260" long (or tall), I made that one also.
F. Guffey
I've used a spring, mirror, Wilson case holder and laser pointer.
What about firing them again in your rifle and squaring them back up . If firing took them out of square , it should be able to do the opposite Y/N ? I'd assume you'd need a little more head clearance to allow for the extra stretch . Thinking if you only bumped the shoulders to have .001 clearance . That would not be enough to square them up . How much I don't know but would think at least .004 . Just a thought but seems like it should work .
How square is needed? The cartridge sits in a chamber larger than the cartridge so the axis of the cartridge isn’t necessarily coaxial with the barrel. When it is fired does it expand from where it sat or does it find the center? In reality it’s a mix of both. And if the chamber is tight and coaxial within a thousandth ( about the best you can get consistently) the cases will square within two firings.
As for measuring square? Optical comparator and you need to rotate the case 120 degrees to get three readings per case. Measure at .200 above the face and .200 below the datum diameter.
As for measuring square? Optical comparator and you need to rotate the case 120 degrees to get three readings per case. Measure at .200 above the face and .200 below the datum diameter.
Dusty Stevens
Shiner
You got a picture of this tool? Id love to see how you do it.
Guffey must be a genius,.and the only man with no headspace
Most cases, when fired, stretch the most on their thin side. The more head clearance there is on their first firing, the more that alone can make case heads out of square.
All the 7.62 M118 match cases I measured wall thickness on were not as uniform as better commercial cases. Therefore, I don't think "fire squared" case heads will be too successful with M118 match cases. Too many things have to be just right to be successful at least 80% of the time.
Most of the DCM match components sold to clubs was out of spec to meet match ammo requirements. Bullets were more of a problem than cases.
Those cases may well be pretty good. Are their necks tight on seated bullets?
In rifles with in-line ejectors, they push the loaded cartridge forward perfectly centering its shoulder in the chamber shoulder. The extractor pushes the case body against the chamber wall opposite it.
Firing pins drive case shoulders into chamber shoulders before the round fires, if not by the ejector. This may force the case head any direction against the chamber limits, but not often and only about .001" or so.
In either instance, when fired, it's this way. The case body touches nothing forward of its pressure ring. Its shoulder is centered in the chamber shoulder. The cartridge axis is a tiny bit crooked to the chamber/bore axis when fired. But it's fairly repeatable from shot to shot. If the case pressure ring is .001" off center at the back of the chamber, the bullet tip on a straight cartridge is about. 0005" off bore center opposite that of the pressure ring's contact point with the chamber.
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A simple, easier way:
Set the empty case head in the inside corner of a small metal square laying flat on a table, then twist it. If the case mouth center makes a circle, head is out of square.
Fix a magnifying glass over the mouth. It'll be easier to see.
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Well, if something was wrong with them, I was none the wiser. I sorted them by weight, prepped them, loaded, shot and reloaded them many times. I just didn't have a lot of experience with other brass. I'm doing much better with the Lapua Palma brass but I'm not sure what will happen when I finally run out of my stash of RWS primers and have to switch to another brand. I've only got a few hundred of the smalls left. I don't know of anywhere to buy RWS primers now.
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