OAL measurement on remington 700

[stroked96s10]

Im about to start reloading, and I used the OAL tool and from base of bullet to base of case I got 2.472". The bullet, a sierra game king 165gr hpbt measured 1.185", giving me 3.657... I measured a loaded federal 180 grain and I get 3.316". So that means the factory load is sitting 0.341" off the lands. Does this sound right? I feel like my measurement may be off?? Gun is a Remington 700 .300 Winchester mag, 26" barrel. I haven't made any changes to it.

 

[Erik Cortina]

Base to tip means nothing.

Ogive profiles differ between bullets, that's may have something to do with it.

Having said all that, factory rounds usually jump a lot.

 

[ohaniazx]

Not sure what you are measuring here as your wrote 'base of the bullet to base of the case'
Ogive of the bullet determines the part where it would engage the rifling and the jump is function of that, throat in the chamber and how far you seat the bullet. You can easily make a tool to measure where you need to seat the given bullet to jump very little. Measuring it the way you do IMHO is not the way to go. I reloaded many rounds for many caliber in my shooting career. Is your goal accuracy or ?

Get one of the Hornday or similar tools or you can make your own easily for $6 worth of brass tubes.
http://www.stu-offroad.com/firearms/hornadyoal/oal-1.htm

You can make your own for $6 using brass tubes from Hobby shop and a case that was shot in your rifle and some epoxy.
That would allow you to seat a given bullet in the case's mouth and push it into the throat of the barrel to see where it stops. You can pull it out gently and measure the AOL using a say .300 round stock of metal. I drilled a 19/64 hole into a large NUT (3/4" nut from Hardware store) to measure the AOl.
Please note you are trying to determine what the jump is for the given bullet for the given rifle and you can't depend on the tip of the bullet to be an accurate measure.
It will be close but won't be consistent.

Zareh

 

[stroked96s10]

http://www.sinclairintl.com/reloading-equipment/measuring-tools/bullet-seating-depth-tools/sinclair-bullet-seating-depth-tool-prod35491.aspx is what I used. I sat a bullet it in against the rifling using my bore guide. Pulled the guide and stuck that tool in, and set my first stop on the tool. The tool touches the bottom of bullet. Took the bullet out and put a spent case in and set the second stop on the tool, the end of the tool sitting on the primer. My first set of loads will be for accuracy at the range. Then some for hunting. I'm just trying to figure out how far I should be seating my bullets, I bought this tool after talking with someone who suggested buying it, maybe I didn't need it after all?