Would you mind seeing if i'm making the right changes in my reloading.

[Supersubes]

Why can you not simply back the sizer out to minimize the amount of sizing you’re getting? To get .008 LESS sizing than you have
at any given die setting, all you need is to unscrew the die 1/8th of a turn. It’s that simple.

 

[want2learn]

i tried that so very many times....don't ask me why but it's almost like it skips the requisite range overshooting.... and i promise you, i've been very slow and careful.

I think I'm going to send Forster the dies with some newly fire formed cases which i hope to get from new factory loaded ammunition...pay more money and see if they can hone it to the fire formed sizing minus .002 inch.

The great challenge for me is very few places are willing to sell ammunition to California and very few carry this caliber. We do have a couple of companies that will sell to California....our new law requires ammo to go to an FFL and then we must pay a background check each time. Such is our reality.

Brownells is awesome, they will sell to us but they're out of the 123gn, Target Sports, also great, will but they don't carry this caliber and won't be able to get it. Grafs used to be a great place to purchase ammo but unfortunately they'll no longer sell ammo to us even if it goes to an FFL.

 

[Supersubes]

i tried that so very many times....don't ask me why but it's almost like it skips the requisite range overshooting.... and i promise you, i've been very slow and careful.

I think I'm going to send Forster the dies with some newly fire formed cases which i hope to get from new factory loaded ammunition...pay more money and see if they can hone it to the fire formed sizing minus .002 inch.

The great challenge for me is very few places are willing to sell ammunition to California and very few carry this caliber. We do have a couple of companies that will sell to California....our new law requires ammo to go to an FFL and then we must pay a background check each time. Such is our reality.

Brownells is awesome, they will sell to us but they're out of the 123gn, Target Sports, also great, will but they don't carry this caliber and won't be able to get it. Grafs used to be a great place to purchase ammo but unfortunately they'll no longer sell ammo to us even if it goes to an FFL.

This is how literally everyone does it. What press are you using?

 

[Taylor4862]

Wasn’t it established pretty early on that you were jamming bullets? Surprised you didn’t try and chamber a sized(unloaded) case. The 1.467 sized case ought to be fine. The ammo you loaded can simply be seated deeper(provided the headspace is correct). Getting the bullets out of the lands is going to lower pressures, so no issue there.

Initially it would of course lower pressure, but wouldn't it start to rise again the deeper you seat as you decrease the case volume?

 

[want2learn]

i use a Forster Co-Ax, which i've been very pleased with...that's yet another reason i thought it best to use their dies. Plus i had a good experience with their .308 dies and their .222 Remington dies in the same press.

At one point i got close to where i wanted to be but trying to guild the lilly hasn't worked.

I think i'm going to just send Forster the dies and the case holder and see what they say. If that doesn't pan out i'll pick up a different set of dies, not sure which brand/model are preferred?

I've spent so much time trying to do this and It's just not going in the right direction. Likely it's my fault but i never had problems with the .222 Remington or the .308 Winchester. Best to be safe.

Very grateful for everyone's help....i am learning a lot from this experience.

 

[Supersubes]

Initially it would of course lower pressure, but wouldn't it start to rise again the deeper you seat as you decrease the case volume?

In the ranges we typically work in, from jammed to say .100 off, no.

 

[Supersubes]

i use a Forster Co-Ax, which i've been very pleased with...that's yet another reason i thought it best to use their dies. Plus i had a good experience with their .308 dies and their .222 Remington dies in the same press.

At one point i got close to where i wanted to be but trying to guild the lilly hasn't worked.

I think i'm going to just send Forster the dies and the case holder and see what they say. If that doesn't pan out i'll pick up a different set of dies, not sure which brand/model are preferred?

I've spent so much time trying to do this and It's just not going in the right direction. Likely it's my fault but i never had problems with the .222 Remington or the .308 Winchester. Best to be safe.

Very grateful for everyone's help....i am learning a lot from this experience.

If the die has the ability to oversize, it can be adjusted to size less as I described above. When you run the press handle down, is it hitting a hard stop? Are you holding it firmly against that stop for a moment while sizing cases? Any chance you’re reading the decimal in the wrong place in your caliper. Dial or digital caliper? Early in this thread, you were giving datum measurements to the 4th decimal place, and they weren’t in increments of .0005. The finest calipers available won’t do that, a micrometer is needed for those ranges.

Your die is not the issue, don’t bother sending it off.

What rifle do you have?

 

[want2learn]

the rifle is a Sig SSG3000

i'll borrow a friends caliper and check.

thanks

 

[want2learn]

update: just spoke with Forster...they were very nice and asked me to send in the dies and shell holder and some fire formed cases. I'll let you know how it works out

 

[want2learn]

hi, just wanted to update.

I got the dies back from Forster, they honed the sizing die using my fire formed cases and shortened the die a thousandth if i recall. They also polished the bullet seating die accommodating the geometry of the Scenar bullets i sent them. They were very nice to deal and professional to deal with. Scott from Forster went out of his way to call me, asked me some questions and went through some options and thoughts with me.....i really appreciate that.

I did load up a few sets of rounds (...I'm still working up a load, kind of starting over again i guess).... and was able to get a couple of promising groups.

They all chambered so much easier.

I really appreciate everyone's help.

BTW, I picked up a Whidden case gauge, sure is a nice little device to have. It's quick and easy.

One day i'll have some nice one hole groups to show...i hope.

 

[Nimothy]

918v.....what a great question. like a fool i thought i had it so i went and loaded a bunch of ammo meticulously following my folly without ever taking the five minutes to see if a round chambered.

so as you can imagine, i went to the safe, took out my rifle, put on ear and eye protection, pointed in a very safe direction, kept my finger off the trigger and tried to chamber a round......impossible to chamber and of course on extracting the cartridge the projectile had separated from the case.

this afforded me yet another opportunity to do a bunch of measurements. Here's what i found:

I first measured a Factory Lapua loaded round with the same projectile, the 123 Scenar. It measured 2.694 COAL and 2.140 COTB (thank you T Rex)

Then i measured yet another of my new finely and meticulously created reloaded rounds. It measured 2.74 inch COAL, 2.184 inch CBTO and 1.469 inch Base to Datum.

I'd like to say that i know the true headspace on my rifle's chamber as i've measured it many many times...but for the life of me I can never seem to secure a reproducible value despite slowly and carefully using the Hornady tool with the custom base, rereading the instructions, watching 2 videos etc.

My first inclination after looking at the measurements was to seat the projectile deeper into the case to match the factory COAL since i knew that the new case sizing seemed to chamber pretty easily (I did check to see that my "bumped case" did chamber ok using my bolt without the firing pin.).

That said, i wouldn't imagine that it would take a lot of effort for the bolt to merely push the bullet down deeper into the case on closure if that were the rate limiting step...so probably that's not the way to go.

So now what to do?

I don't have a new, never fired factory brass to measure the base to datum value, but on accurate shooter there is a diagram and it looks like that value would be 1.85 inch...if that's correct then my base to datum creation is way off having measured that to be 1.469 inch for a difference of 0.381 inch.

quite an educational experience...but i want to be safe, i want to learn, and i want to excel at this sport.

appreciate any other thoughts/help. thank you

hi, just wanted to update.

I got the dies back from Forster, they honed the sizing die using my fire formed cases and shortened the die a thousandth if i recall. They also polished the bullet seating die accommodating the geometry of the Scenar bullets i sent them. They were very nice to deal and professional to deal with. Scott from Forster went out of his way to call me, asked me some questions and went through some options and thoughts with me.....i really appreciate that.

I did load up a few sets of rounds (...I'm still working up a load, kind of starting over again i guess).... and was able to get a couple of promising groups.

They all chambered so much easier.

I really appreciate everyone's help.

BTW, I picked up a Whidden case gauge, sure is a nice little device to have. It's quick and easy.

One day i'll have some nice one hole groups to show...i hope.

thats good to hear about Forster I had some dies of there’s in 6x47 once they sold with the rifle. I had my gun smith shave a bra die for me. I don’t think the trouble you are having is rare, dont get discouraged And what I’ve learned is, it’s usually the simplest thing that get over looked when you’re trying to be careful.

 

[want2learn]

thanks...all the information and experience provided to me here is really helping and teaching me a lot. I'm enjoying this sport more and more. I was really wondering if i could afford to continue in this sport if i wasn't able to effectively and accurately reload. Factory ammo for this caliber is brutally expensive. With much of the acquired tools i'll one day be able to transition to another caliber if i were to so choose....hopefully without all too much additional expense.

 

[NamibHunter]

What kind of rifle are you running? Is it a gas gun, like an AR10 or AR15?

 

[NamibHunter]

I just reread your last post: It appears you are trying to replicate factory ammo, and most factory stuff will be very short, easy 0.008“ to 0.010”, compared to the chamber dimensions (and the dimensions of your fired brass). Brass from Reloaded ammo sized that short will have excessive head space, and will not last long, and a head separation is likely at some point, which is not good (or safe).

Most reloaders will want to bump the shoulder of the FIRED BRASS back by (about) 0.002” on a bolt gun, and 0.004 on a gas gun, regardless of what the original factory ammo brass dimensions were.

Many FL dies will not bump the shoulder that much anyway...

Get a good reloading manual and just follow the instructions. Be safe!

 

[want2learn]

thanks, I sent my dies, some fired cases and also some new projectiles off to Forster and they honed the die and modified the seating stem to tailor the reloads accordingly. They seem to chamber great now. Of course i ran out of Varget but thankfully had some 4064.... and so have loaded a series of rounds with the 4064.....looking forward to identifying a good load.

BTW, It's a bolt action Sig rifle that was originally .308 and now barreled in 6.5x47L.

 

[NamibHunter]

@OP,

Do you use a headspace gauge like this one from Hornady, or something similar:

Other companies make them too.

Vernier: My original $13 made-in-China vernier was very inexpensive and very inaccurate, and could easily be off by 2 thou.

Dumped it and got an absolute origin type of vernier (“i-gauging” model), which is super consistent. Mitutoyo makes a similar vernier. These absolute origin verniers are both accurate and consistent. A little pricy ($45), but worth it imho.

 

[want2learn]

yes, thank you...i picked up a Forster comparator/head space set and my Dad's calipers

 

[NamibHunter]

yes, thank you...i picked up a Forster comparator/head space set and my Dad's calipers

That should be good.

Measure a few bullet diameters and see if the results are the same. If your vernier/calipers pass this test, you are set.

 

[Rick7353]

918v.....what a great question. like a fool i thought i had it so i went and loaded a bunch of ammo meticulously following my folly without ever taking the five minutes to see if a round chambered.

so as you can imagine, i went to the safe, took out my rifle, put on ear and eye protection, pointed in a very safe direction, kept my finger off the trigger and tried to chamber a round......impossible to chamber and of course on extracting the cartridge the projectile had separated from the case.

this afforded me yet another opportunity to do a bunch of measurements. Here's what i found:

I first measured a Factory Lapua loaded round with the same projectile, the 123 Scenar. It measured 2.694 COAL and 2.140 COTB (thank you T Rex)

Then i measured yet another of my new finely and meticulously created reloaded rounds. It measured 2.74 inch COAL, 2.184 inch CBTO and 1.469 inch Base to Datum.

I'd like to say that i know the true headspace on my rifle's chamber as i've measured it many many times...but for the life of me I can never seem to secure a reproducible value despite slowly and carefully using the Hornady tool with the custom base, rereading the instructions, watching 2 videos etc.

My first inclination after looking at the measurements was to seat the projectile deeper into the case to match the factory COAL since i knew that the new case sizing seemed to chamber pretty easily (I did check to see that my "bumped case" did chamber ok using my bolt without the firing pin.).

That said, i wouldn't imagine that it would take a lot of effort for the bolt to merely push the bullet down deeper into the case on closure if that were the rate limiting step...so probably that's not the way to go.

So now what to do?

I don't have a new, never fired factory brass to measure the base to datum value, but on accurate shooter there is a diagram and it looks like that value would be 1.85 inch...if that's correct then my base to datum creation is way off having measured that to be 1.469 inch for a difference of 0.381 inch.

quite an educational experience...but i want to be safe, i want to learn, and i want to excel at this sport.

appreciate any other thoughts/help. thank you

Did the bullet separating give you the answer? Yes it showed the bullet is to long.