.308 diameter bullets in .303 British

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I tried some 220 grain .308 diameter bullets in my 303 today with good results.:) I replaced the 311 expander plug with a .308 plug in the 303 die and ran the 303 brass through. I thought they might tumble and keyhole, but when I went to check the target there was 2 round holes 2 inches apart from the big slugs. I have tried this with other 303's and some worked and some keyholed with no accuracy at any distance.
If you are finding the 215's hard to find, then try this it may work in your rifle too.:cool:
 
Have any idea what your bore diamiter is? I was thinking of trying .308 bullets but My bore is .313 so they probably won't work all that well.
 
Glad you finally got to try it and it worked for you too...

From my experiences...

Have a Longbranch , scoped, in .303 Epps that loves (.308) 165 gr. Hornady spz.flatbase, 180 gr.Rem ington spzfb...and 220 gr Win. Silvertips and will shoot 3 shots/100 yds. @ 1.5 inch consistantly....boattails do not shoot well though .

My Alex Henry Martini .303 Brit. shoots the 220 Silvertips (.308) at 1950 fps almost as good.
Never had any success with anything useing .308 that weighed less than the 165 grainers in either rifle.

Makes it nice to be able to use the more commonly available heavyweights in .308 @220 grains and as stated it may work well for your .303 Brit.
 
There is a danger of gas cutting from gas escaping by the bullet. I would have thought that any weight bullet you want is avaialble in 311?

I like using the little 123 gr SKS bullet to make a nice offhand plinker load for the 303. can't get real accuracy out of the rifle, but 3" groups are good for offhand paractice.
 
While that's true, the rifles in question already suffer from bore sizes anywhere from .308 to .318, so, gas cutting is sorta normal, even with the .312 bullets Hornady carries, in some rifles. But in a limited by pressure 303 sort of way. I doub't you'll see much of it for a long time.
You can of course get custom oversize jacketed bullets from Steve Regewell over at 303british.com to fit most over sized bores.
 
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"...finding the 215's hard to find..." They're not made any more for some reason. Likely not enough demand Stateside. A .308" bullet in a .303 is the wrong diameter. Mind you, apparently there are some Enfield barrels that measure .3095". They're undersized.
 
The other choice is to slug your bore and use properly sized cast bullets that are .001" over bore size. A hard cast, gas check bullet, sized to the right size can be driven up to the same velocities as factory j-word bullets without leading. The best accuracy has come at around 1800fps, with a 206gr. cast bullet, and starting with 19.2 grs. of IMR 4759 and working up. This bullet can be done at .310", .312",.314" to cover most applications(my sizers).
 
It's not at all unusual to find US loaded ammunition made dureing WWll with .308 diameter bullets. That being said, the guys above are absolutely correct, some will some won't, just like the girls we used to date before we got old. bearhunter
 
Hey it works!

I loaded 220 gr bullets with a heavy load of IMR 4350 - Presto.

This is in a #4 sporter with a pretty tight barrel. Getting about a 1.4" group @ 100.

Thanks for the tip :)
 
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