reloading readressed

[winky]

Couple posts ago we were talking reloading for these guns and i said that i was on a 3rd loading for the few pieces of brass i was testing well on load 4 i had a case head seperation with lake city brass. So im about betting at this point that 2 loadings is about safe with it. I was shooting a 147 ball bullet and 40 grains of h335.

[Norton]

Couple posts ago we were talking reloading for these guns and i said that i was on a 3rd loading for the few pieces of brass i was testing well on load 4 i had a case head seperation with lake city brass. So im about betting at this point that 2 loadings is about safe with it. I was shooting a 147 ball bullet and 40 grains of h335.

The general rule is two times and three is the last time you should use the brass. So your post backs confirms that for me.
Thanks

[pigpen]

Thanx for being the guienea pig

[Geilt]

A lot of it has to do with the type of gun (semi, bolt, lever, pump...) you're cycling the brass through. Oviously the semiautos are much rougher on the brass than a relatively less destructive bolt. Having the cases properly reloaded to your chamber and gap also can increase the life span.

[winky]

no doubt true. I noticed when loading fired brass out of this gun it tends to take alot more sizing efford then normal for a 308 telling me the chamber is probably on the large size. Im loading with a standard set of redding dies so i would think that if you feel you need a small base die because its a semi auto that you dont and that if a guy wanted to reload alot for this gun and wanted brass to last it might pay him to have a custom set of dies made up that sized a little less then even stock 308 dies do. In many cases i anneal brass to get more life out of them but i dont think it applys here either as i dont think youd want to soften your brass for use in this gun. Another observation is that the other rounds with that many fireings showed signs of impending case head seperation but the flutes put in the brass by the chamber didnt show any signs of actually weakening the brass. Id say at this point that the brass failing in these guns is more of a case of excessive chamber size and case stretching then anything else. When i get a stuck case extractor and get this thing up and running again i want to try to back the load off a little more and see how it effects case life. I also have to do a little more work on my cast bullet load. I loaded up some rounds with a 170 lyman flat nose gas checked bullet with 21 grains of wc820 suplus powder which is basically aa9 and ran 5 through the gun in the barn and they ran well but when i got to the range none of them seemed to want to eject on there own so it looks like i need to bumb up the powder charge a bit there too. Ill keep you guys posted as to results in the future.
A lot of it has to do with the type of gun (semi, bolt, lever, pump...) you're cycling the brass through. Oviously the semiautos are much rougher on the brass than a relatively less destructive bolt. Having the cases properly reloaded to your chamber and gap also can increase the life span.

[Geilt]

This may thread dovetails nicely in to the discussion on the potential need of using a small base die for reloading. I'm by no means an expert but I am wondering how the flutes on the Cetme/91/G3 chamber affects pressure and the resulting impact to the brass. Thanks for running some test loads through this for us.

One would think that once we have the brass fireformed to the chamber all we'd need to do is check the cases before each reload to verify its safe to continue using and then resize the only neck. Keeping the geometry of the shoulder and body the same will help prevent working the brass too much. I would definitely be checking neck wall thickness regularly.

I have to ask though, if we're not using port buffers, how do we either prevent or address the issue of the huge dent in the side of the case body created during ejection? If we're forced to run the cases through a full length resizing to remove the dent we're back to square one regarding working the brass harder than we'd like.

I can't recall if its the Hornady or Sierra manuals but one of them has a section of 308 Service Rifles. I'll look at it when I get home and post of of the options they include. Unfortunately I don't have the Lyman manual so I can't specifically point to the cast bullets you're using.

[jfowl31]

mine only dents the mouth of the case as it chucks them out 30' and more.

Only 308 brass I have is commercial, so I wont resort to loading that stuff until its absolutely necessary and my only option.

[winky]

Ive loaded for enough semi autos to have to say that just neck sizing isnt going to cut it. I doubt if you would ever get reliable chambering with neck sized brass. The brass would at least need to be sized down enough to easily fall into the chamber on its own.

[Geilt]

JFOWL - Brass ejected from both of my CETMEs has a hellacious dent smack dab in the middle of the body. I'm able to line it up perfectly with the rear portion of the ejection port and the face of the bolt head as it ejects the case from the receiver. At this point I am still shooting my Aussie NATO rounds which are Berdan primed so its not a big deal. It will become an issue if I want to start reloading Boxer primed cases.


WINKY - I'm not questioning your expierence or the way you've been doing things, I'm just trying to understand it as its counter to what I've been doing and been taught. Now assuming you're dedicating brass to a rifle, once the case body and shoulder are fire formed to the chamber its being fired from, all you should need to do is neck size. At that point full length resizing, or using small based dies, would reset the brass and get fire formed to the same chamber again.

[winky]

neck sizing works great for single shots and bolts and can be usefull to a point in a lever gun but in a lever gun after a couple of firings you will need to full lenght size to allow the ammo to chamber. Semi autos especially military guns are cut with generous chambers to allow for functioning with about any ammo. In theroy your idea is a good one and would do alot toward adding brass life especially if your cetme is like mine and has such a big chamber that its really working the brass but in my opinion anyway a battle rifles first objective even more importantly then brass life or accuracy is it must go bang each and every time the trigger is pulled. I will usually use a small based die for an ar15 or a mini 14 for this reason. This cetme of mine anyway has a rather large chamber if you consider the force it takes to resize brass and i think it would be a waste of time and brass life to use a sb die with it but it would still never trust my life to a battle rifle with neck sized brass.
JFOWL - Brass ejected from both of my CETMEs has a hellacious dent smack dab in the middle of the body. I'm able to line it up perfectly with the rear portion of the ejection port and the face of the bolt head as it ejects the case from the receiver. At this point I am still shooting my Aussie NATO rounds which are Berdan primed so its not a big deal. It will become an issue if I want to start reloading Boxer primed cases.


WINKY - I'm not questioning your expierence or the way you've been doing things, I'm just trying to understand it as its counter to what I've been doing and been taught. Now assuming you're dedicating brass to a rifle, once the case body and shoulder are fire formed to the chamber its being fired from, all you should need to do is neck size. At that point full length resizing, or using small based dies, would reset the brass and get fire formed to the same chamber again.

[bullseye]

My CETME only hits the case mouth and rarely dents the middle of the case, but still chunks them 30'. For a buffer, could you use that liquid rubber stuff in a can that is used for tool handles. Apply it in layers to make like a shell deflector on the AR? Any thoughts on this?

[Groovy Mike]

I shoot the factory stuff in the semi guns and reload the brass for my bolt guns. I pitch anything cracked, or bulged, etc. and lose about 10% per loading.