.280 rem issues

silverado7

silverado7

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I'm having grouping issues and during troubleshooting I have found that the difference between a chambered bullet and the lands is .184 inch. this is obviously way too much. The gun is a 280 rem on a mauser action with a shillen barrel. since I have no idea how to correct this I'm thinking a gunsmith is my only option....
Help?
Thanks
Dave
 
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That's not headspace. That's the OAL of the loaded cartridge. Measure your ammo. Max OAL of a loaded round is 3.350" according to my manual. What bullet weight are you using?
 
ok... I know it's supposed to be aruond .040 so what i got was out to lunch. I used 162 hornadys to do the check. I pushed bullet to the lands, put a dowl down the barrel, then marked it. then chambered the same bullet but loaded to specs pushed the dowl in again ... 0.184 inch difference!! I've been trying to get hold of the fella that built the gun but no joy yet.
 
Actually in some rifles .184 isn't out to lunch. It all depends on how the chamber/throat was cut. As mentioned, how long are your loaded rounds? If you are handloading, seat the bullet further out, closer to the lands. What is the maximum COL your magazine box will allow? These are all dimensions that you have to deal with to make accurate ammo. - dan
 
Are you absolutely sure that's the cause of your grouping issue?

My 280 will shoot either 175 or 139 Horns to an equal degree of accuracy & I load either of these bullets simply to the crimpimg groove. I have also found the 162s have never been as accurate in my gun as all the rest of Horns offering in 7mm??? May just be my particular gun:confused:

It is also not possible to use COL as a measurement when trying to get such fine tolerances in your barrel jump measurement, take your dial indicator & measure a bunch of Horn bullets tip to base & you'll see huge diffs here, mostly just due to tip differneces.
 
Yeah, it make sense, but when we measure with a loaded cartridge to max OAL and one loaded to the Land we had a difference of .184". Seems pretty long, the rounds seemed really goofy as well. The bullets was sticking out really far. There was about a 1/4" of the bullet inside the cartridge. Maybe it's right but that is weird.

Cheers
Gaetoune
 
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Hey senior, we figured out that the gun didn't like the hornady so we reloaded a bunch of barnes triple shock and same results so far. So at this point I really don't know what's going on.

Cheers
Gaetoune
 
gaetoune said:
Hey senior, we figured out that the gun didn't like the hornady so we reloaded a bunch of barnes triple shock and same results so far. So at this point I really don't know what's going on.

Cheers
Gaetoune
Click to expand...


Thats really weird, I have never seen many rifles that didn't shoot most Horns well??

I guess my point above was that my rifle shoots the really short 139s as good as any longer bullets loaded close to the lands! I even tried one time drilling a hole in a plate the land dia. & sitting the loaded cartridge into the hole bullet first, that gave me a more consistant measurement (base of cartridge-to-bullet dia where it would touch the land) that I could use to get my bullet a set distance to the lands, but after much fiddling & fufora I ended with just as much hunting accuracy & much less time consuption just loading to crimping groove :)

Course all gun are diff & sometimes re-act in a diff manner :confused:
 
Please define "grouping issues"... I doubt that bullet jump is the causal issue, as Senior has pointed out. Bullet weight is probably the biggest influence - its not clear whether the Barnes were a different weight than the Hornadies? Once you've satisfied yourself that bullet weight doesnt solve things, suggest you look at the scope/mounts, stock screws, and finally bedding of the stock. (As the rifle is a put together, there is a good change the bedding is suboptimal.)
 
thanks guys....
is this the accuracy problem? don't know for sure. but the stuff i was using to clean the copper from the barrel wasn't doing squat! i'm running butches bore shine that i got from gaet through right now. and getting tones of copper out.
but back to the "bullet jump" (i think thats what i was calling head space) if this distance is usually around .040 and i'm at .184 could this damage the beginning of my lands (if it hasn't allready).
as you can see i'm a noob to the fine details of setting up rifles, so all your input is greatly appreciated.
thanks
 
silverado7 said:
thanks guys....
is this the accuracy problem? don't know for sure. but the stuff i was using to clean the copper from the barrel wasn't doing squat! i'm running butches bore shine that i got from gaet through right now. and getting tones of copper out.
but back to the "bullet jump" (i think thats what i was calling head space) if this distance is usually around .040 and i'm at .184 could this damage the beginning of my lands (if it hasn't allready).
as you can see i'm a noob to the fine details of setting up rifles, so all your input is greatly appreciated.
thanks
Click to expand...

YES that deffinately could be your accuracy problems.

And no Bullet jump is not called Head Spacing that is something completely diffenent.
Bullet Jump is something that can or cannot affect your accuracy, after-all Weatherby has used HUGE amounts of Freespace or Bullet Jump for years to lower the pressure of their big magnums & I haven't heard of any huge problems with them concerning accuracy!
 
Too many variables here. First off seat your bullets to .030 of the lands or as long as the magazine will allow, then leave it alone. Second, I assume you are reloading for this gun or we wouldn't be having this discussion, so how have you worked up a load? Did you start at x # of grains of x powder and load multiple sets of 3-5 in 1/2 grain increments or..... ? Don't mess with more than one variable at a time or you will never figure out the problem. If your reloads (again, worked up with different charges - same bullet, primer, case, etc.) show no sign of improving things and you are sure it is not your shooting, then look at floating your barrel, bedding the action, et al.

If you want to figure out your bullet seating depth, the Nosler manual has a very good procedure for working this out. I have no idea what that dowell is telling you. Keep it systematic and you will sort it out just fine.

Cheers
 
I really doubt that the .184" bullet jump is the problem.

I have several rifles that have more than that and they all shoot just fine. One 270 Wby has .350" when loaded to fit the magazine and it shoots under an inch at 3500 fps.

Ted
 
Yes Guys we've work up loads. The problem is re-occuring with any loads we would try. The copper in the barrel could be a big issue right now, so we're trying to get that out of the problem. Now Silverado cleaned his barrel and as expected we discovered that some copper remover products were not working as advertised.

After that we'll see, I guess, but the bullet jump is quite big (my own opinion). If nothing solve our mystery we'll have to adress new issues (I Guess)...

Cheers
Gaetoune
 
sooooo...
yup if it says it removes copper and the patches ain't blue/green it ain't doing sh!t!!
my bad!
it'll be shinny new soon. back to the range and see.
if .184 wont wreck my gun it'll shoot her the way she is and so so be it!
thanks for all your input.
dave
 
this gun use to group 140 gr silvertips in an inch (more like 1\2 inch)now i might get 2 bullets an inch apart and the others 4-7 inches. I'm 99% sure copper fouling is the culpret! I was using a remington cleaner that said it removes copper...BS! as soon as I started using an ammonia product I was getting tonnes of blue/green from the barrel. I'll head back out today of tomorrow and see how she likes a CLEAN barrel.
thanks guys....
 
If you have changed anything with your reloads, such as primers or seating depth, and your groups went from 1/2" to 2", I would say that the copper is probably it. Let us know how things work out.

Ian
 
i bedded the recoil lug (solidly) and fixed the copper issue. she is back to sub 1" groups. but the bullet jump is quite high (it has always been). is there a safe or max limit to leave the 'pill' out of the case? i'd like to see if we can tighten up the groupings.
 
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