I am brand new to reloading and this is my first load. Any help in getting this ironed out is appreciated.
<span style="font-weight: bold">The rifle</span>: Rem. 700P with a 24" cut down factory barrel.
<span style="font-weight: bold">The load</span>:
168 gr. SMK
45 gr. varget
LC brass
Fed 210
<span style="font-weight: bold">Conditions</span>: 45 degrees, 5-6 mph wind from 12 o'clock, wet overcast february winter day in Louisiana.
<span style="font-weight: bold">The problem</span>: Really low velocity, with inconsistent spikes. With 45 gr. of varget, I expected velocity above 2600. Ergo, I am a bit confused.
1. 1981
2. 1916
3. 1940
4. 2026
5. 1917
Hi - 2026
Low - 1916
SD - 42.2
ES - 110
AVG - 1956
On the round that chrono'ed at 2026 there was a difference in sound and feel of the round. Also, there was a noticeable shift in impact point (big surprise). Otherwise, the load grouped well.
I only chrono'ed the first five, and shot a total of 28. The consistency was pretty uniform. One round in five did the same thing, different sound, feel, and point of impact. I don't suspect the shooter, because commercial rounds did not do this.
Is it possible to have weak batteries in your chronograph, and it give reduced readings? I don't think this is it because all the reduced velocity rounds POI is several inches low from POA.
<span style="font-weight: bold">Troubling Observations</span>: All primers have backed out some. Hard to notice, but you can see it and they wobble when placed down on a table. Other commercial fired brass does not do this, those primers stay flush with the primer pockets.
<span style="font-weight: bold">Case prep</span>: Brass had been fired 1X, so I tumbled, uniformed flash holes, reamed primer pocket, polished with steel wool, neck sized, and annealed.
Note on primer pocket reaming and flash hold uniforming - During the flash hole uniforming, I used a drill, a lee case holder, and a lyman flash hole tool. I reamed the bejeezus out of the flash holes. I suspect I was over aggressive, but don't understand why this would lead to the problems I am having. I did try to uniform the primer pockets, but I was not nearly as aggressive in this step. Still, perhaps I wallowed out the pockets too much.
A note on case neck trimming - I was told that when neck sizing only, triming the neck is not necessary. The guy who told me this is a friend, but everywhere else I read says to do it. Nevertheless, none of these cases were neck trimmed. I used a chamber length tool to measure the chamber, and the idea was to back off .02. Am I proceeding right with my line of thought on this? Fire-formed brass custom fit to your chamber backed off enough that it doesn't crimp the bullet when loading? Anyway, that length proved too long for the magazine. After measuring the magazine, I backed the COAL down until the rounds would function in my magazine. During firing, a few of my rounds were slightly hard to close the bolt the last little bit. There was no observable connexity between difficulty in chambering and velocity spikes.
<span style="font-weight: bold">Loading</span>: Primed with RCBS hand primer. Each primer noticeably required different amounts of force to seat.
During charging, I weighed each powder load individually and do not suspect any problem with my scale. I then seated the bullets and checked COAL.
I did not weigh the bullets, but would think that different weight bullets would cause what I am seeing in velocity spikes. I don't think this explains the low overall velocity, but does explain velocity jumps. All of these came out of one box of bullets, but were opened by someone else. Perhaps when cleaning their bench, they just put a bunch of different weight bullets in the same box and gave them to me?
After shooting these, I shot some factory rounds and those all performed as expected with no problems.
Next batch:
I plan on using 1X fired Federal brass, then skipping the flash hole uniforming/primer pocket reaming to see if that helps. Any suggestions would are appreciated.
<span style="font-weight: bold">The rifle</span>: Rem. 700P with a 24" cut down factory barrel.
<span style="font-weight: bold">The load</span>:
168 gr. SMK
45 gr. varget
LC brass
Fed 210
<span style="font-weight: bold">Conditions</span>: 45 degrees, 5-6 mph wind from 12 o'clock, wet overcast february winter day in Louisiana.
<span style="font-weight: bold">The problem</span>: Really low velocity, with inconsistent spikes. With 45 gr. of varget, I expected velocity above 2600. Ergo, I am a bit confused.
1. 1981
2. 1916
3. 1940
4. 2026
5. 1917
Hi - 2026
Low - 1916
SD - 42.2
ES - 110
AVG - 1956
On the round that chrono'ed at 2026 there was a difference in sound and feel of the round. Also, there was a noticeable shift in impact point (big surprise). Otherwise, the load grouped well.
I only chrono'ed the first five, and shot a total of 28. The consistency was pretty uniform. One round in five did the same thing, different sound, feel, and point of impact. I don't suspect the shooter, because commercial rounds did not do this.
Is it possible to have weak batteries in your chronograph, and it give reduced readings? I don't think this is it because all the reduced velocity rounds POI is several inches low from POA.
<span style="font-weight: bold">Troubling Observations</span>: All primers have backed out some. Hard to notice, but you can see it and they wobble when placed down on a table. Other commercial fired brass does not do this, those primers stay flush with the primer pockets.
<span style="font-weight: bold">Case prep</span>: Brass had been fired 1X, so I tumbled, uniformed flash holes, reamed primer pocket, polished with steel wool, neck sized, and annealed.
Note on primer pocket reaming and flash hold uniforming - During the flash hole uniforming, I used a drill, a lee case holder, and a lyman flash hole tool. I reamed the bejeezus out of the flash holes. I suspect I was over aggressive, but don't understand why this would lead to the problems I am having. I did try to uniform the primer pockets, but I was not nearly as aggressive in this step. Still, perhaps I wallowed out the pockets too much.
A note on case neck trimming - I was told that when neck sizing only, triming the neck is not necessary. The guy who told me this is a friend, but everywhere else I read says to do it. Nevertheless, none of these cases were neck trimmed. I used a chamber length tool to measure the chamber, and the idea was to back off .02. Am I proceeding right with my line of thought on this? Fire-formed brass custom fit to your chamber backed off enough that it doesn't crimp the bullet when loading? Anyway, that length proved too long for the magazine. After measuring the magazine, I backed the COAL down until the rounds would function in my magazine. During firing, a few of my rounds were slightly hard to close the bolt the last little bit. There was no observable connexity between difficulty in chambering and velocity spikes.
<span style="font-weight: bold">Loading</span>: Primed with RCBS hand primer. Each primer noticeably required different amounts of force to seat.
During charging, I weighed each powder load individually and do not suspect any problem with my scale. I then seated the bullets and checked COAL.
I did not weigh the bullets, but would think that different weight bullets would cause what I am seeing in velocity spikes. I don't think this explains the low overall velocity, but does explain velocity jumps. All of these came out of one box of bullets, but were opened by someone else. Perhaps when cleaning their bench, they just put a bunch of different weight bullets in the same box and gave them to me?
After shooting these, I shot some factory rounds and those all performed as expected with no problems.
Next batch:
I plan on using 1X fired Federal brass, then skipping the flash hole uniforming/primer pocket reaming to see if that helps. Any suggestions would are appreciated.
