RL-17 in a 30-284

[aixenmemphis]

I have always found the 30-284 an interesting round but have never owned a gun chambered in it. I have Win Mod. 70 action with an Obermeyer palma contour barrel chambered in 308 that I was thinking of having rechambered in 30-284 to shoot heavy Vld's out of. With the 308 tests done with RL-17 it seems that this should produce some good results. Do any of you guys have experience with this caliber and how do you think it would fare with 180gr to 210gr bullets with RL-17.

 

[aixenmemphis]

This one is a long action,originally 270 win.) Not trying to sound crass but if that is the case why don't a lot more people shoot 6.5-06 instead of 6.5-284.

 

[CJ6]

I've got one,hunting rig) on a SA Rem Lothar Walther barrel,Polygonal)12 twist.It shoots the new 185 BT's Berger's very well indeed. It'll hold .9 @ 400 with N560 or H-1000 in sub freezing temps.,single fed). Your plan to use the 284 case in a long action is a sound one if you plan to feed from a magazine,it will allow you to seat the bullets out as needed for accuracy. Good luck

 

[DJSBRS]

The 30-284 is very accurate. I shoot a 30-284 @ IBS 1000 yards, Wayne Shaw built it and it shot a 8.38" 10 shot group last month at the 1000 match.

185 Bergers, 57 gr H4350 30" barrel.

Darrell

 

[omahaguy]

I would like to try the 30-284 on a rem 700 long action, but I need to know how to neck the brass up, and some good load data, please help

Thanks every one

 

[TonyR]

Can't help you with the load data but I have been expanding the necks on 6.5X284 Lapua brass to 7mm/.284. I found that I needed three stages to do it without a lot of pressure on the press. I used expander mandrels from Niel Jones Custom Products, .267 and .273 followed by the K&M .284 mandrel for neck turning. You might be able to get away with fewer steps but it will probably take 4 or 5 stages to get you from new 6.5mm brass to .308. After I got them to .284, I just neck-turned them and shot them. They chambered fine. I annealed one batch after turning and didn't with the next. Didn't notice any difference in the results.

 

[ronemus]

You'll do less work if you start with .284 brass, and can probably go to .308 in one step if you use a Hornady die,the elliptical expander works well) and Imperial Sizing Wax in the neck. If you start with 6.5-284 brass, the necks will probably be too thin by the time you're done and may be uneven to boot. I use Winchester .284 brass in my rifle,I shoot the 7 mm parent version) and it's pretty good.

 

[DukeDuke]

I know a lot of people size the 284 brass to 7.5x55 in 1 step no problem, the 30-284 is almost identical.

 

[TonyR]

Ronemus makes a couple of interesting points. Depending on what Aixenmephis is planning to do, thinning neck walls may be an issue but there isn't much choice if he wants to use Lapua brass. I see someone is offering 250 Winchester brand cases for sale today. I have been prepping brass today and it appears that I am losing about 0.001 of wall thickness expanding from .264 to .284. This has not been a problem for me because I am turning to 0.013 on a side for a .310 loaded neck with Berger 180 VLDs. I am ending up with all of the necks close to completely clean. If the necks are expanded further to .308, it sounds like they would turn to something like 0.012 on a side. As for unevenness, so far all of my loaded rounds have shown bullet runout at the ogive of under 0.0015 and 7 out of 10 are under 0.001. I have never used an expander button because everything I've read about benchrest case prep says to avoid them because they can push/pull the necks out of alignment. This is not my personal experience. Just what I have read. I think I'll give it a try because it sure would save some time compared to what I have been doing.