I have been reloading for more than 20 years and never had any real interest in wildcat cases. Even when I owned a wildcat I didn't have much interest in making my own. The one I bought was sorted out by someone else and I just followed the recipe.
Recently I have been half obsessed with making my own unique cartridges, especially where they are really easy to make from existing components.
My first experience with forming my own cases came from the 300 Whisper. From that I learned just how easy it is to modify a cartridge case.
Next I made my first wildcat, the 6 x 38 SPEX which is a mid sized 6mm PDW round designed to feed out of AR15 mags and be used in short barreled PDW type carbines. That one was made by running a 6mm Whisper reamer in another 3mm to make the case long enough to feed reliably. Cases are trimmed down 223 and dies are 221 Fireball using the appropriately sized 6mm neck bushing. It was simple to do and cost virtually nothing to try.
My next project is going to be a mod sized .20 cal varminter. The goal is to try something in the middle of the 204 Ruger and the 20 Vartarg. The basic dimensions that leads me to is .20 x 40 which I think will be called the 200 SPEX.
This is an easy configuration to achieve as it is simply a 20 Vartarg reamer run in 5mm deeper. Brass will be made by sizing and trimming down 223 cases. Dies will be 20 Vartarg set to give me the proper headspace. Again this will be easy to do and cost very little except for a set of Vartarg dies.
So for very little money I will have several unique cartridges to play with and shoot.
Recently I have been half obsessed with making my own unique cartridges, especially where they are really easy to make from existing components.
My first experience with forming my own cases came from the 300 Whisper. From that I learned just how easy it is to modify a cartridge case.
Next I made my first wildcat, the 6 x 38 SPEX which is a mid sized 6mm PDW round designed to feed out of AR15 mags and be used in short barreled PDW type carbines. That one was made by running a 6mm Whisper reamer in another 3mm to make the case long enough to feed reliably. Cases are trimmed down 223 and dies are 221 Fireball using the appropriately sized 6mm neck bushing. It was simple to do and cost virtually nothing to try.
My next project is going to be a mod sized .20 cal varminter. The goal is to try something in the middle of the 204 Ruger and the 20 Vartarg. The basic dimensions that leads me to is .20 x 40 which I think will be called the 200 SPEX.
This is an easy configuration to achieve as it is simply a 20 Vartarg reamer run in 5mm deeper. Brass will be made by sizing and trimming down 223 cases. Dies will be 20 Vartarg set to give me the proper headspace. Again this will be easy to do and cost very little except for a set of Vartarg dies.
So for very little money I will have several unique cartridges to play with and shoot.
