Load Development with Virgin brass

[loudandproud]

Hello all,

New barrel is on the way. Also ordered 200 more pieces of Lapua brass.

Traditionally I only neck size my brass with a lee collet die. Seeing as all the brass is new, do I need to fire form it in order to get valid results? Ideally this would be how you do it... but its a waste I feel.

Has anyone ever done a back to back comparison with Fresh vs neck sized brass on an OCW load?

 

[SONIC SAAMI]

What are you loading?

 

[Splat]

I am in the same boat. I just got a AIAT 308 and loaded some new Lapua. I also just bought a Lee Collet and was going to just neck size after first couple of firings. Interested to see what people say.

 

[SONIC SAAMI]

This is just me and I'm sure an expert will come along and disagree.
Keck sizing is a wast of time and money.
Set a FL die up so it gets the dents out of the neck of the new brass.
Know how to set a FL die up so it only bumps the shoulder back .001/.002 on fired fired case.

Forget you even have a NK die and if you can return it for a refund.

 

[gstaylorg]

All of my loads have been developed in virgin Lapua brass (.223 and .308). For the .308 brass, I only open up the necks with a Sinclair oversized expander mandrel/die, then chamfer and load. The .223 brass necks have been a lot more variable, so with them I use the mandrel followed by FL resizing to make the necks more consistent. Basically, some of the necks in the .223 brass lots I have were so big the mandrel didn't even touch the sides, so they pretty much had to be resized. The .308 brass has been more consistent out of the box in that all the necks were opened up slightly using the mandrel. None of these loads has changed following fire forming and a full brass prep, so I don't feel the need to do any extra steps unless I'm going to see some effect on the target. Consistent reloading already takes a significant amount of time and effort, no need to make it even more time consuming.

 

[Steel head]

I found with new brass my initial testing stayed valid for the most part.
I wouldn't try finish fine tuning with new brass though.
My chamber is set to a go gauge so brass growth was pretty minor.
I'm also a fan of the lee collet die.

 

[loudandproud]

This is just me and I'm sure an expert will come along and disagree.
Keck sizing is a wast of time and money.
Set a FL die up so it gets the dents out of the neck of the new brass.
Know how to set a FL die up so it only bumps the shoulder back .001/.002 on fired fired case.

Forget you even have a NK die and if you can return it for a refund.

Im loading 175 SMK's into Lapua brass, BR2 primers and Varget for a Savage 10FCP, Broughton Barrel.
I prefer neck sizing more for brass life and concentricity. Ive been seeing my lapua brass lasting 20-25 reloads with annealing every 5 reloads. Usually no more than .0005"-.001" runout. I've never had feeding issues and I enjoy not have to lube the cases for sizing.

Its a win,win,win... so I think Im going to stick with the collet die.

I think I am going to shoot the Charge Weight portion of my OCW development with the fresh brass, then tumble, neck size and use the same fire formed brass to find the COAL.

 

[Brux]

I only FL size new brass for the neck and clean the flash holes up.I bought a lee collet die when I first started reloading and then Lee told me it did not work correctly with a cam over press so I don't use it.I have found loads with virgin brass,but I don't get much stretch in my chambers either.

 

[loudandproud]

I only FL size new brass for the neck and clean the flash holes up.I bought a lee collet die when I first started reloading and then Lee told me it did not work correctly with a cam over press so I don't use it.I have found loads with virgin brass,but I don't get much stretch in my chambers either.

You can most defiantly use a cam over press... you just cant cam it over. Run your dies farther in so It bottoms out on the shell holder before you approach the top of the stroke.