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Shooter937

Shooter937

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Hey all

I've been reloading .223 for around 10000 cartridges now and recently started doing .308

I've worked up a few different loads for various projectiles EG. Hunting , plinking and precision shooting with great success... Until the other night


Running a single stage press I was de-capping / resizing 50 once fired .308 brass I got for a few bucks from the local gun store.... This is the first time I've done this... But I had the depth set to shallow when recapping / sizing and I managed to leave a small buldge just above where the cartridge tapers into the neck.

I've ended up finding this out the hard way... Shooting today and the first round I tried to load didn't chamber smooth - so I decided not to shoot it and eject it ! Nope stuck case -

Managed to open the bolt without damaging it , I did shear a small part of the cartridge doing so , took a soft mallet and a small cleaning rod and a few taps later my cartridge dislodged

I proceeded to take a much closer visual inspection - then I had seen the mistake and realized what happened....

I came home and case lubed and resized the cartridge again ... Same one that got stuck .... Chambered it and it functions perfectly fine....

So.... Is there any way I can remove the recapping rod from my die and remove the .03 buldge from the loaded cartridges ???

Or do I need to pull all 49 projectiles and salvage the power and primer ?



Thanks

Mike
 
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Were you just neck sizing or full length sizing the cases? There's no way you can oversize a case (compress) if the FL sizing die is set to kiss the shell plate unless the die or shell plate was modified or the cases you bought were shot out of a very generous chamber or you're using gobs of lube.
 
The case neck with a bullet seated will be much larger than the die diameter. IMHO its not gonna fit in the die unless you pull the bullet.
With 50 to do I'd invest in a Hornady collet puller.
Pull, dump, resize without expander so you dont need to decap. Then intall the expander but way too high so it wont hit the primer and size the neck. The expander has to go back through the case because it opens the neck after the full length resize.
 
Trinimon said:
Were you just neck sizing or full length sizing the cases? There's no way you can oversize a case (compress) if the FL sizing die is set to kiss the shell plate unless the die or shell plate was modified or the cases you bought were shot out of a very generous chamber or you're using gobs of lube.
Click to expand...



I made the error of only neck sizing.... Lesson learned - now to move on


Thanks for the responses , I'll let everyone know how this goes
 
I'm wondering if this bulge is from seating the bullets with the crimp feature set too low?
Crimping tightly on the bullet, then pushing this into the case causing this slight bump to form?
 
I have removed the decapping rod completely from my mostly RCBS sizing die and just run the whole loaded cartridge through the die with quite a bit of lube of course. Just be careful and go slow.

There is nothing coming into contact with the primer so it isn't going to go BANG. It may swage the base of the bullet a thou or so but I haven't found the practice to degrade accuracy. I had to to this with close to 500 reloads I picked up in a trade last summer. These were 308Win as well. It took a couple of hours but all went well and it all chambered perfectly after. I shot it all off and have since reloaded all of those case without any issues. Sounds like you may have a relatively tight chamber as well and maybe the once fired cases you have came from a rifle with a generous chamber.

Often when I neck resize only I will leave a similar bulge at the base of the neck to help with alignment of the bullet within the chamber. It seems to make a difference. In the case of my Tikka T3 in 6.5x55 this isn't possible because of its tight chamber. My varminter rem 700 also has a tight chamber and I can't get away with this in it either. Most of my other rifles, especially the milsurps will gobble this condition up.
 
This is exactly what has happened....

I attempted to remove the de capping pin and run a few carts through - to no avail so far...

I'll try again tomorrow with a fresh perspective !


Thanks for your tips -

Also I agree - the chamber is tight in this savage 10ba stealth.... My factory rounds I purchased and once fired seem to have no issues even tho I can see they are a few thou out in the same area - il bet these were fired from a Milsurp weapon with generous chamber size which didn't meld well with my savage


Lessons learned ....
 
Most of us have had similar problems.

If I had 49 rounds with a little bulge on the neck, this is what I would try first:

I would lube the locking lugs with a dab of grease. On a Savage, this is the rear of the front set of lugs.

I would shoot the ammo. The Savage bolt has a very strong handle, and if you push the handle down, the chamber will size the bump down enough to let you shoot.

If you try this, and the bolt wont close, the grease on the locking lug will make it easier to get the bolt back up.
 
Shooter937 said:
This is exactly what has happened....

I attempted to remove the de capping pin and run a few carts through - to no avail so far...

I'll try again tomorrow with a fresh perspective !


Thanks for your tips -

Also I agree - the chamber is tight in this savage 10ba stealth.... My factory rounds I purchased and once fired seem to have no issues even tho I can see they are a few thou out in the same area - il bet these were fired from a Milsurp weapon with generous chamber size which didn't meld well with my savage


Lessons learned ....
Click to expand...

Think about what you are trying to do. The sizing die squeezes the neck down enough so that the ID of the case neck is smaller than the bullet OD in order to provide neck tension. So if you try to run a loaded case through your FL die, obviously the case neck OD with the bullet in place will be larger than the neck ID in the die. Therefore you would have to exert enough force to actually swage the bullet to a smaller size in order to force the loaded round into the die. You could use a body die to remove the bulge as it doesn't size the neck, but I wouldn't use a FL die.
 
Do you by any chance have a 300 WSM die or maybe borrow one.......The 300 WSM has a thicker neck than the 308 and you could remove the decapping stem and remove the donut at the neck base with this sizing die without undue swaging of the bullet. It seems to me that when I was playing one day I noted that a loaded 308 would go into a 300 WSM die......don't recall what I was doing or why, just that it snugly did.
 
Trinimon said:
Were you just neck sizing or full length sizing the cases? There's no way you can oversize a case (compress) if the FL sizing die is set to kiss the shell plate unless the die or shell plate was modified or the cases you bought were shot out of a very generous chamber or you're using gobs of lube.
Click to expand...


I didn't have the die set to touch the shell plate , look I didn't notice until the next day... Such a big mistake - also I think these were shot from a mil surp rifle with larger chamber then my savage....

Including a pic so people can actually see what I ran into.... Cart on the left was the stuck case that I ran through the press again and voila buldge removed ! Now I gotta figure out how I'm gonna fix these 49 rounds :(

0vXVL4.jpg
 
OK. Now get "the rest of the story". I thought this was just a minor neck sizing issue with brass shot in your rifle.

If this brass was shot in another rifle, then what you have is an insufficiently sized case. The case has to be Full Length sized.

If you can borrow a body sizing die, that might solve the problem.

But, If it was me, I would pull those bullets, dump the powder and lube/size the cases properly. If you don't have a Hornady cam lock bullet puller, now is the time to get one.
 
Please, please, please do not use a FL sizer without the rod. you will have to crush the bullet and pressures might just sore. The bullets will be destroyed so you might as well pull them now and save adding more fuel to this fire.

Can you solve this? YES... but you are going to need a bunch of dies and some precise trial and error.

You may have several problems.. headspace length, case girth, neck diameter.

To size the neck, find a Redding or Forster bushing neck die.... Use a bushing that will reduce the fat portion or the neck to the diameter of the sized portion.. err on the large size so you do not risk crushing the bullet. You do not want to actually size the base of that neck. Just size it down enough so it will safely chamber.

For the headspace portion, Redding body die or Forster bushing/bump die and move headspace just enough to ensure safe chambering. You are dealing with loaded ammo so test the sizing on any other fired case from this batch first.....

If you have a headspace issue AND a girth issue, the best die would be a Redding Type S FL sizer.

simple... but I would just pull the bullets and call it a lesson learnt.

Jerry
 
Mystic Precision said:
Please, please, please do not use a FL sizer without the rod. you will have to crush the bullet and pressures might just sore. The bullets will be destroyed so you might as well pull them now and save adding more fuel to this fire.

Can you solve this? YES... but you are going to need a bunch of dies and some precise trial and error.

You may have several problems.. headspace length, case girth, neck diameter.

To size the neck, find a Redding or Forster bushing neck die.... Use a bushing that will reduce the fat portion or the neck to the diameter of the sized portion.. err on the large size so you do not risk crushing the bullet. You do not want to actually size the base of that neck. Just size it down enough so it will safely chamber.

For the headspace portion, Redding body die or Forster bushing/bump die and move headspace just enough to ensure safe chambering. You are dealing with loaded ammo so test the sizing on any other fired case from this batch first.....

If you have a headspace issue AND a girth issue, the best die would be a Redding Type S FL sizer.

simple... but I would just pull the bullets and call it a lesson learnt.

Jerry
Click to expand...

I've got access to a bullet puller , it's a Lyman inertia ... Hoping it will do the trick
 
Shooter937 said:
I've got access to a bullet puller , it's a Lyman inertia ... Hoping it will do the trick
Click to expand...

Inertia puller? WAY too much work! Get yourself an RCBS or Hornady bullet puller.

If you have more FL sized brass, seat some primers in them and line them up in a loading block. As you pull one bullet out of one of the wonky batch, pour the powder into the new case and then reseat the bullets after. This will save you having to weigh out each load again. Just make sure to tap the case to get any grains that might get stuck in the flash hole. Then pop the primers out of the old cases and use them later. Resize the bad cases, trim and store them for the next reload.
 
I would prep another set of cases, pull bullet, dump powder into prepped case and
continue on.
Weigh the odd powder charge..................well, just because.
 
It has been said a couple of times on here, but a body die will solve this problem and virtually any other similar problem you will have, somewhere down the road, with your 308.
A body die is just like a full length resizing die without the centre decapping rod, except the throat is large enough to accept a loaded cartridge, without squeezing the bullet. A body die is often hard to find and almost never talked about, but probably the most useful "extra" a hand loader can have.
 
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