Starting over...
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So in my "help me understand" thread I had mentioned that I was going to shoot a match and then take a break and really sit down and start over an develop a load with the 123gn AMAX bullets.
So basically I am starting over. I have read through the entire article by Greg on reloading. So I'd like to share what I have in mind and have Greg (@orkan) validate what I am doing or beat me upside the head and correct me. So here it goes...
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Since my gun already has over 400 rounds through the pipe, I don't think I need to do those 1st 20 rounds. But since I just shot about 78 rounds at the match, I am going to give it a good cleaning. I use Shooters Choice and the process I've been using is the one I saw by Ryan Cleckner on how to clean the barrel. So brush a few times, then wet patches, then dry patches, then brush again, then wet patches, then dry patches, etc until the patches come out clean. Lastly run an oiled patch through.
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I have the Hornady OAL tool and had already measured the distance to the lands for the 123AMAX bullet (also did it for several other bullets and kept a log of that for future reference). My problem is that since I am using a MDT HS3 Chassis with the MDT polymer mags, and the gun is a 6.5CM, I am limited to mag length, in my case, 2.82". If I back out from touching the lands by .020" or even .050" the bullets won't fit in the mag. So I've been seating bullets, regardless of which ones I use, to an OAL of 2.82". Any thoughts or comments on this part?
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The brass - I have Hornady 3X fired brass and as of the last reload, they were still under the length specified in the manuals by a range of .005-.020" or there about. I have already deprimed and cleaned out the primer pockets. I will tumble them, then anneal, then resize, then tumble, then reload. Based on Gregs article, even if I don't have to trim the brass I will chamfer the cases. My resizing steps are to run the brass through a full length Redding die to bump the shoulder .002" and then neck size with a Redding bushing die. I know I can get the Redding full length bushing die and do those 2 steps in 1, but for now that is what I have. First question: does this process look ok?
- The Lee manual has a charge range for the 123gn bullet of 40.0-44.8C for H4350 and the Nosler manual has a range of 40.5-44.5 for the 123 AMAX. So my plan is to start the pressure ladder at 41gn. 2nd question: is this reasonable, or should I start at a different load? Since I have already shot rounds with 45.2gn of H4350 with no pressure signs, the plan is to load 1 round starting at 41gn and then going up in 1 gn increments until I get to 46gn. Whether I see signs of pressure like flattened and/or cratered primers, ejector swipes on the case head, etc. or no, I will not go further than 46gn.
I think this is as far as I can go for now before moving onto the OCW test. Once I've had time to get the rounds loaded up and do the pressure ladder, I will report back what I find. I will take pix of the cases and post here, get further inputs, and then move on to the OCW test.
By the way, just because I am asking for Greg's guidance here, doesn't mean that others can't post, comment, or make suggestions. Since I am learning, I welcome all inputs.
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What action is the rifle? If it's not a Howa you should be able to get a regular steel AICS mag and get a little more length.
I think the Magpul polymer mags also allow a little longer COAL the the MDT.
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@ramirojpc said:
- The brass - I have Hornady 3X fired brass and as of the last reload, they were still under the length specified in the manuals by a range of .005-.020" or there about. I have already deprimed and cleaned out the primer pockets. I will tumble them, then anneal, then resize, then tumble, then reload. Based on Gregs article, even if I don't have to trim the brass I will chamfer the cases.
Trim all the brass to be uniform in length.
This should give somewhat uniform neck tension after annealing.
If paying attention to SAAMI specs, the shortest you should be using is 1.900
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@rhyno said:
What action is the rifle? If it's not a Howa you should be able to get a regular steel AICS mag and get a little more length.
I think the Magpul polymer mags also allow a little longer COAL the the MDT.
It's a Savage 12 LRP. I'll see if I can get my hands on a steel AICS mag and give that a try.
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@ramirojpc said:
Lastly run an oiled patch through.
Better make sure you clean your chamber and get it dry before you shoot if you do this. If you store the rifle muzzle-up after that, the oil will run from the barrel down into your chamber/action. I'll often run a patch of kroil through when done cleaning, and then a dry patch to catch most of it. Chambers must be clean for the brass to interact with it favorably.
@ramirojpc said:
So I've been seating bullets, regardless of which ones I use, to an OAL of 2.82". Any thoughts or comments on this part?
Set the bullets at max length they will reliably feed from the magazine to start your OCW. Then after OCW, set them back incrementally for your OSD. Mag length is mag length.
@ramirojpc said:
First question: does this process look ok?
Some unnecessary steps in there, but it'll work. I take my fired brass, anneal, size, tumble, chamfer/trim, load. If you get the idea that your brass must sparkle out of your head, reloading becomes easier. ;)
@ramirojpc said:
Whether I see signs of pressure like flattened and/or cratered primers, ejector swipes on the case head, etc. or no, I will not go further than 46gn.
Why? Why let a book tell you where pressure is, when your rifle and eyes will do it better? If you have fired rounds at 45.2 and have no pressure, start your pressure ladder at 44gr and go up in 1gr increments until you see pressure, then push past that a step or 2... just like the article says. You need to KNOW where the pressure is and know what it looks like when it starts to form. This, within reason obviously... as you need to know what to look for in order to see it. If you don't know where pressure starts, you won't know how far you need to be away from it to set your MAX limit based on knowledge of the conditions you'll expect to encounter throughout the year.
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@orkan said:
Some unnecessary steps in there, but it'll work. I take my fired brass, anneal, size, tumble, chamfer/trim, load. If you get the idea that your brass must sparkle out of your head, reloading becomes easier. ;)
I’m always trying to learn more to improve on reloading skills/techniques in hopes of bettering accuracy. As of late, I’ve been doing more frequent annealing (on a single torch setup) between firings and have no where even close to the knowledge you have on the subject of annealing.
That said, I’ve always been tumbling before annealing, sizing and then tumbling again. I do this not because I’m looking for the sparkly brass end result, but more so because I was theorizing that a clean surface (without blotches of carbon etc)at the shoulder neck junction during the first tumbling would lend itself better to an evenly distributed flame/burn temp on a consistent surface during the annealing process. I have nothing to really support the theory. So in your opinion, am I (and likely others) wasting my time or at least dealing with diminishing returns with the extra tumbling?
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I do these steps. Deprime, tumble, anneal (if needed), size, trim, prime, powder and seat.
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@midwestside said:
So in your opinion, am I (and likely others) wasting my time or at least dealing with diminishing returns with the extra tumbling?
I have noticed no improvement in my precision or accuracy by cleaning the brass before sizing. It was a waste of time. With getting those ops out of the way, I can shoot more, and spend less time on ammo.
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Just weighing in, but I too tumble two times in my normal reloading process.
The first one is after I deprime, to knock any grit off that may damage dies or other equipment. It keeps dies cleaner, and keeps stuff from potentially scratching brass. I realize it's improbable anything will damage a hardened die, and the brass will be just an aesthetic thing if it's scratched.
The second time is before I load them, to get the lube and any shavings off. I realize I could just wipe the lube off too, but tumbling gets the inside better than I can.
I suppose it depends on your situation.
I don't have the ability to shoot a centerfire rifle (or rim fire) daily, so a extra hour or two in my process isn't a hindrance to putting rounds down when the opportunity arises. I may readdress this now that I'm using rice and would like to keep it fresh as long as I can.
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@orkan said:
@ramirojpc said:
Lastly run an oiled patch through.
Better make sure you clean your chamber and get it dry before you shoot if you do this. If you store the rifle muzzle-up after that, the oil will run from the barrel down into your chamber/action. I'll often run a patch of kroil through when done cleaning, and then a dry patch to catch most of it. Chambers must be clean for the brass to interact with it favorably.
That is a good suggestion, I don't remember if Cleckner mentioned that or not or if I missed that step.
@ramirojpc said:
So I've been seating bullets, regardless of which ones I use, to an OAL of 2.82". Any thoughts or comments on this part?
Set the bullets at max length they will reliably feed from the magazine to start your OCW. Then after OCW, set them back incrementally for your OSD. Mag length is mag length.
Sure, I'll give this a go. I though that once one gets a bit "far" from the lands there are diminishing returns in terms of improving accuracy. But I'll do the OSD as per the article after OCW and see what I can get.
@ramirojpc said:
First question: does this process look ok?
Some unnecessary steps in there, but it'll work. I take my fired brass, anneal, size, tumble, chamfer/trim, load. If you get the idea that your brass must sparkle out of your head, reloading becomes easier. ;)
I am not too particular on shiny brass. The reason for the double tumble was based on your suggestion on SniperCentral. I think you posted on a thread your process and I sent you a PM asking why tumble before annealing and you said that it was to remove any carbon build up on the brass that could otherwise affect the annealing process. I also like the idea of keeping the inside of my dies clean. Since I don't shoot more than maybe twice a month, I figure the extra reloading steps don't take too much away from shooting.
@ramirojpc said:
Whether I see signs of pressure like flattened and/or cratered primers, ejector swipes on the case head, etc. or no, I will not go further than 46gn.
Why? Why let a book tell you where pressure is, when your rifle and eyes will do it better? If you have fired rounds at 45.2 and have no pressure, start your pressure ladder at 44gr and go up in 1gr increments until you see pressure, then push past that a step or 2... just like the article says. You need to KNOW where the pressure is and know what it looks like when it starts to form. This, within reason obviously... as you need to know what to look for in order to see it. If you don't know where pressure starts, you won't know how far you need to be away from it to set your MAX limit based on knowledge of the conditions you'll expect to encounter throughout the year.
Sure, I'll give it a go beyond 46gn. It makes sense to know where the pressure starts building up, and if I am starting at 44gn, then I probably only looking at 4-5 rounds anyway. The only reason I said I would stop at 46gn is to be on the safe side, since that is already 1.2gn over published data, at least on the 2 manuals I have.
Thanks for the all inputs and feedback. I'll report back on this thread after I run the pressure ladder.
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@ramirojpc said:
I am not too particular on shiny brass. The reason for the double tumble was based on your suggestion on SniperCentral. I think you posted on a thread your process and I sent you a PM asking why tumble before annealing and you said that it was to remove any carbon build up on the brass that could otherwise affect the annealing process.
Evolution :smiley:
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Ok, so I did a pressure ladder during my time at the range yesterday and here is what I found. I started the ladder at 43gn of H4350 and loaded up rounds up to 48gn for my 6.5 CM. Below is the image of the cases with 45gn, 46gn, and 47gn, I never shot the 48gn round. The image is not that good to see things clearly, but under a magnifying glass, the 45gn case showed a very faint ejector swipe and very slight primer cratering. At 46gn I noticed a little bit of a sticky bolt, a more pronounced primer cratering and ejector swipe. At 47gn the bolt was a bit hard to lift, not terribly, but it was now very noticeable, some serious cratering on the primer and a very noticeable ejector swipe. So I stopped there and did not fire the 48gn round. Since pressure signs started showing up at 45gn, I went 2 additional steps to confirm.
I think I will set my OWC range between 41.5-44.5gn. So I will clean the gun thoroughly, load up 3 rounds each at .5gn increments, and head to the range again. Hopefully I'll be able to get this done before the next match in the middle of June.
Please share your thoughts.
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Sounds like you have a good plan together.
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Ok, so I didn't get a chance to do the OCW test before the match, but after the match is done, I am going to clean the bore, take 10 fouling shots, then the OCW test. However I have a question.
I scored some once fired Prime brass which is what I would like to use for the matches. But I also have 5X fired Hornady brass that I have been using. Question is this: if I trim all brass to the same length, will it make a significant difference if I determine the OCW with the Hornady brass and then load the Prime brass for the matches, or should I use the Prime brass for the OCW as well?
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@ramirojpc
Changing any component could effect the OCW. In a brass change it could be as little as .10 grain or as much as a .5 grain or more to get to the same result.
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@ramirojpc said:
or should I use the Prime brass for the OCW as well?
Brass is a major component. You can't go from one brand to another without consequence. You must do OCW's with the specific brass you intend to use with that load. Different brass = different load.
Recently I did a load workup with a 22-250 using winchester brass. The customer also wanted to get a load for lapua. I had to reduce my load from the winchester by 2.5gr before I stopped seeing pressure in the lapua.
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Perfect! I'll start using the Norma brass. Thanks for the feedback.
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Ok, here's another update. I shot the match on Sat. and I did better on some of the stages I had done before, even after a 6 month break from the match, and I sucked at some new ones...a tubular cattle gate was a POS to shoot from. Anyway, I had developed 3 rounds for 41.5gn H4350 in .5gn increments up to 44.5gn. I also gave the gun a really good cleaning after the match was over. I also loaded 9 rounds at 41.5gn as fouling rounds before I would start shooting the OCW rounds.
The way I shot the fouling rounds was in groups of 3, following all the steps of the JNPA from beginning to end for each set of 3 rounds. This was in a way to practice what I was going to be doing for the OCW rounds. The 1st set was way off (high) because I had forgotten to dial my cope back to zero after the match so I didn't capture that target. Here is the 2nd and 3rd set of fouling shots.
Then I proceeded to shoot the OCW rounds, rebuilding my jNPA for each set of 3 rounds. I always seemed to be pulling one shot one way or another, but it looks to me that there is a node between 41.5gn and 43gn. If you guys agree, I will proceed in creating loads from 41.5-43gn in .2gn increments to fine tune the load. Again, please let me know what you think.
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Yup, looks right to me. However you could save time if you trust those shots.
You can see the node, you know where the middle of it is. Load some up there and confirm.
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@orkan Greg, so the middle is 42.3, what would you suggest, loading up 5 rounds at 42.3 and confirming, or loading 5 rounds each at 42.3, 42.5, and 42.7 and testing to see if any group shows better promise?
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@ramirojpc said:
loading 5 rounds each at 42.3, 42.5, and 42.7 and testing to see if any group shows better promise?
You can do that... would be good to confirm.
However, you need to remember that you don't select OCW based on group size. You select it based on the groups vertical relationship to your POA.
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@orkan Sounds good, I'll do this and report back with a follow up.
