Loaded another 200 rounds of 300 Blackout, deprimed and re-sized some 45 ACP. And reorganized my brass holding racks.
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Loaded another 200 rounds of 300 Blackout, deprimed and re-sized some 45 ACP. And reorganized my brass holding racks.
Loaded up some .357 mag to replace what I shot last week, loaded some good old fashioned .45 Colt with some lead round nose boolits and got in a few mags worth of a new .45 auto load I've been testing.
Today, I loaded my first rounds ever. After spending time in January decapping, sorting, trimming, chamfering, pocket cleaning, degreasing and priming, I finally got to load my first rounds. I'm working to get the best rounds for both antelope and elk this fall, so I loaded up 5 rounds each of Barnes 150gr tipped TSX in Wincester brass and Federal 210 primers with 46, 47 and 48 grains of Varget. I also loaded 168gr Barnes TTSX in Federal brass with 43, 44 and 45 grains of RL15. Once I figure out which of those set ups I like best, I'll finish off the boxes of Barnes and load up the remainder of my powder with 150gr Hornady FMJ and 168gr Hornady AMAX for practice.
I usually like to ladder up in 1% jumps in rifle (and usually less as I approach max). In this case, half grain increments. You might skip right over your sweet spot (or the threshold for overpressure). What cartridge are we talking about here? .30-06?Quote:
Originally Posted by Rucker61
Also - not trying to give you grief or anything, but you know the barnes all copper bullet is going to have a long bearing surface. What your gun likes for this probably won't be plug-and-play with a traditional fmj or amax of the same weight. No free lunch. Load development takes time and effort.
Good luck on shooting the first rifle loads. Be safe.
With those charges I would suspect 308 and not 30-06. I like to do half grain charges until I find the area the gun seems to like and then run a second test run at every 0.2 grains.Quote:
Originally Posted by Zombie Steve
No grief taken. I shot the 150 gr last year in my .308 Tikka, and really didn't see much accuracy difference between 44 and 47 gr (one grain increments). I'd love to do more experimentation to really hone in on the best load, but with the scarcity of bullets, power and primers, I can't play around as much as I used to. I didn't see any pressure issues at 47 gr with the 150, so perhaps I should just start from there and load 3 at .2 gr increments. First time with the 168s, so I didn't want to jump into max load (45). I realize that the non-Barnes aren't drop in replacements, but as long as they group somewhere (and a known somewhere) I can at least stay shooting over the summer. I don't even have enough RL15 and Varget to load the bullets I do have. At least my arrows are reuseable.Quote:
Originally Posted by Zombie Steve
If you are not seeing a difference in group sizes from one test load to another, something is off. It could be many things. Most common is the OAL is too short and you are jumping the bullet too far to see where the rifle is really wanting the bullet at a certain velocity. Another can be the gun just doesn't like the bullet. Neither of my 308's shoot 150's for damn. They both shoot 175 SKMs in half inch groups. Barnes bullets are a PITA if you ask me. They are long and light, and this makes everything kind of a craps-shoot like Steve was mentioning earlier.Quote:
Originally Posted by Rucker61
I guess I'm confused. I thought today was your first loads you've ever done.
48 grains of Varget sounds like a pile. Maybe the barnes data is different, but it's a grain over max on the Hodgdon site, and more than 3 grains over the sierra data for a 150 grain bullet. Maybe I just need some sleep, but that looked like a light '06 charge, and when I think hunting, I think '06. =)
Edited to add - if he's not seeing anything grouping better than anything else, they all might be overpressure too. Again, don't know about Barnes bullets and I'm not researching anything right now. Have a good night.
Sorry. A hunting buddy loaded my rounds for my last season.Quote:
Originally Posted by Zombie Steve
48 is max according to Barnes latest data.Quote:
48 grains of Varget sounds like a pile. Maybe the barnes data is different, but it's a grain over max on the Hodgdon site, and more than 3 grains over the sierra data for a 150 grain bullet. Maybe I just need some sleep, but that looked like a light '06 charge, and when I think hunting, I think '06. =)
We did 43 to 47 grains last year, and I only shot one 5 round group at 100 yds with each load. Not the best test, for sure, but all were around 1" with one flier. My rifle really liked the Freedom Munitions 155 gr AMAXs, but that's not a good elk round.Quote:
Edited to add - if he's not seeing anything grouping better than anything else, they all might be overpressure too. Again, don't know about Barnes bullets and I'm not researching anything right now. Have a good night.
When we first set up the OAL, we backed off 0.05" from the lands, but the cartridge wouldn't feed from the detachable Tikka magazine. Right now I'm at 2.177" to the ogive, using the Hornady Comparator. Don't think I can get too much longer and still feed.Quote:
Originally Posted by SA Friday
Edit: and thanks very much for the advice. Given that the 150 will just be for goats and whitetails, I think I'll not worry about getting too hot. I'll just stick around 46 and play with .2 gr increments. My best three round group with 46 was 1.25" at 250 yards.
Well again, have fun, be safe.
Sorry to derail the thread.
This whole work thing is going to really cut into my casting / reloading time today...
1.25" groups at 250 yds? You're done, that's about as good as you are ever going to see with a high end hunting bullet from most rifles.
BTW shooting 5 round groups at 100 yds is the best test possible for building reloads. There a whole thread on this in the reloading section I started about a year or so ago.
It was just the once ;) Usually it's an MOA.Quote:
Originally Posted by SA Friday
The 250 yd groups are where I was zeroing for goat hunting. I did follow the suggestions on groups at 100 yds for initial load development.Quote:
BTW shooting 5 round groups at 100 yds is the best test possible for building reloads. There a whole thread on this in the reloading section I started about a year or so ago.
I'm gettin' there......and lemme tell ya, those shelves are straining! Those cans are as full as I can get them of boxed ammo of all kinds, I need to work on making new labels for 'em now.
http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b1...g/DSC_0068.jpg
Quote:
Originally Posted by rondog
You have more ammo than most stores right now.
That's a metric ton of ammo cans! Thanks for reminding me of how much I need to go find a few more 30 and 50cal cans. [facepalm]
Very, very little commercial stuff though. Only a couple hundred 9mm & .40 S&W, and all the .22's of course. The rest are milsurps or handloads for the majority.Quote:
Originally Posted by Rucker61
168 grain amax with 45 grains of RL-15 shoots like a dream in my .308, but it really is over-pressured just so you know. My barrel is 24" so if you have a shorter one maybe it wont be a problem but I get two maybe three loads out of the brass before the neck splits (from brand new brass). The primers are hammered flat too; any further and I would not even considering using it, but I can hit a clay at 500 yards 9 out of 10 times so it is hard to let it go. Maybe if you anneal your brass you will have better luck near the max pressures.Quote:
Originally Posted by Rucker61
I need to get some more fat 50's. That is a pile of ammo cans, I don't even know what I would put in them all.Quote:
Originally Posted by rondog
I watched another blue unit being unloaded in the "shop" 3 car garage just ain't cutting it no more. Gotta get me a new hat.
Good to know. My rifle has a 22" barrel, and this is the elk load, so it won't get a lot of these rounds through it. I won't have the powder or time to shoot like I did last year. I've added a bow to the arsenal and I need much, much practice and strengthening with it, though. Given SA Friday's comments on my 150 load, I just unloaded the hotter test rounds and loaded everything up at 46 grs. Why mess with what works?Quote:
Originally Posted by Danimal
You got another one huh? I need to insulate and heat my garage so I can do the same. Called Giraud, he is going to get back to me today about the .308 discs for the annealer.Quote:
Originally Posted by jim
PM Sent!Quote:
Originally Posted by Danimal
Ordered a Redding T-7 and am waiting expectantly for my xtreme bullets to arrive.
Fiddled with the crimp on my 9mm loads, loaded up another 100 rounds after de-crimping these stupid WCC crimped once-fired cartridges... The little, cheap Lee chamfer tool works great for that task!!
I hated the crimp on WCC and FC cases so bad that I would have nightmares about them after a long day of reloading.Quote:
Originally Posted by sellersm
Stashing the bullets that came in today and dreading the massive cleaning i need to do
Rubbing my little paws together with maniacal chipmunk glee that I managed to snag a bottle of Unique all to myself. Sad, no?
I sniffed my 8lb jug of Varget a little bit.
http://images.sodahead.com/polls/001...ed_xlarge.jpeg
Just one jug? Friggin new guy.Quote:
Originally Posted by Zombie Steve
[Twist]
Just decapped 2.5k of 223. Found out I have a hell of a lot of berden primed brass, anyone have any ideas on what to do with it?
Sent from a Magpul enhanced tactical iPhone using High Capacity "clips".
Depends on how motivated you are for the brass :) Either add it to the recycle bucket, put it up for sale or try to find some berdan primers and reload
I dreamed of being in my reloading room, opening up all of my boxes filled with powder, primers, brass and bullets. Soon very soon I will be back in my room.
If its brass, the recycle bucket.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mazin
Discovered I was out of ammo and full of empty brass.
Quote:
Originally Posted by bobbyfairbanks
See you in a few days, Amigo. We need to do some casting.
Just cleaned, sorted by caliber then headstamp about 2k worth of pistol brass. 1k of it was already grouped by .40s&w, but the rest was all together in a bag.
Note to self and anyone else getting started with cleaning their pistol brass: sort by caliber THEN clean.
Boy oh boy, its amazing how perfectly a 9mm fits inside a .40s&w which fits inside a .45acp. And then, tiny bits of cleaning media get stuck in between the cases and wedge them together.
Looking forward to getting my press so I can start decapping and priming.
I just started working up some loads for my 2 new 22-250's. The books say OAL to be in the 2.350 range but I measured my chambers with the wooden dowel methed and come up with 2.500 OAL and longer with 3 different bullets. (40 and 50 grain nosler balistic tips and 64 gr winchester power points) I'm using H380 powder so far. Is 2.500 too long?
Finished up 1k of 9mm on the 550b