.303 brit
- Thread starter MadMarty
- Start date
I spend more time in my reloading room building .303 then anything. I load for 2 lee enfields and a Ross currently but I've worked up loads for my brothers 1920 lithgow as well.
I find that .303 British is an easy caliber to load for and most of the guns I have in 303 respond well to light charges of 4895 somewhere in the 35-38 grain area. I use hornaday .312 174gr round nose bullets and get great accuracy doing do.
If you are going to start loading .303 you may want to invest in a set of lee collet dies as it's pretty much the only way to insure that your brass lasts a long time without getting case head separations. Most .303 chambered rifles have large chambers that can be very hard on brass if you are FL sizing each time.
To answer your question in my experience accuracy gains are usually quite drastic when hand loading for a lee enfields. Most of the factory ammo available today uses boat tail bullets which usually shoot poorly out of enfield rifling. It's my experience that 170-185 gran flat base bullets shoot very well in lee enfields.
Hope this helps a little.
I find that .303 British is an easy caliber to load for and most of the guns I have in 303 respond well to light charges of 4895 somewhere in the 35-38 grain area. I use hornaday .312 174gr round nose bullets and get great accuracy doing do.
If you are going to start loading .303 you may want to invest in a set of lee collet dies as it's pretty much the only way to insure that your brass lasts a long time without getting case head separations. Most .303 chambered rifles have large chambers that can be very hard on brass if you are FL sizing each time.
To answer your question in my experience accuracy gains are usually quite drastic when hand loading for a lee enfields. Most of the factory ammo available today uses boat tail bullets which usually shoot poorly out of enfield rifling. It's my experience that 170-185 gran flat base bullets shoot very well in lee enfields.
Hope this helps a little.
Yes, can be a big improvement.
Some general findings.
Unless barrel is a real good one, a flat base bullet will do better than a boattail.
In a poor barrel, a round nose will do better than a spitzer.
A moderate does of a medium speed powder like 3031, 4895, 4064, BLC2, H335 748, Varget works well.
Try sizing your brass so that only 3/4 of the neck length is sized. This will leave the body almost untouched. See if a case sized this way will chamber. If so, lock your die to this position and avoid over working the brass. it will last much longer.
I usually use 180 gr spitzers or 174gr round nose.
Some general findings.
Unless barrel is a real good one, a flat base bullet will do better than a boattail.
In a poor barrel, a round nose will do better than a spitzer.
A moderate does of a medium speed powder like 3031, 4895, 4064, BLC2, H335 748, Varget works well.
Try sizing your brass so that only 3/4 of the neck length is sized. This will leave the body almost untouched. See if a case sized this way will chamber. If so, lock your die to this position and avoid over working the brass. it will last much longer.
I usually use 180 gr spitzers or 174gr round nose.
Wow we literally do it the exact same way! Haha powder, bullet as even the dies! We should have a .303 shoot one day haha I only have a no.5 right now unfortunately but she's a nice shooter if I do my part
