Help with some Brass...safe or ......??

T

tungngroove2000

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came across these, 14 in total that I got with some once fired brass I purchased. they are all 303 British stamped, however as you can see the shoulder on the 14 have been pushed back quite a ways. I'm assuming they were sized in the wrong die. I have run them through the 303 full length sizer to try to salvage the brass. I have pictured one of these with a properly sized 303. My question is, can these be reloaded and fired safely in order to place the shoulders forward to the proper location? They will of course be trimmed etc after to ensure proper length. Any thoughts are appreciated.

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load them up with 10 grains of unique and cream of wheat to the brim, seal with a peace of cardboard and shoot them into the air next time your at the range, they will fire form back out to the proper dimension.
 
I like it and use it, but .303 British has a (well-deserved) reputation for massively oversized chambers and excessive headspace, leading to rapid head separations. One of those is a true PITA on the range and a game-ender on a hunting trip. What I am trying to say is that somebody has done something weird to brass that tends to fail early anyway, often as early as the second loading (ask me how I know that). To be honest, if it were 1,400 or even 140, I'd say it would be worth while worrying about and trying to find a way to use them. For just 14 cases? It's your call of course, but I'd maybe keep one as a curiosity and toss the rest.
 
For 14 pieces I wouldn't bother with any of 'em. The top one looks like somebody thought they'd make some .30-30 or maybe some .30-40 Krag.
"...with a peace..." A what?
 
Suputin said:
In theory it should be fine to shoot them. The pressure will simply expand the case into the chamber and reform it in the process.
Click to expand...
Generally in a military chambered .303 rifle the pressure will expand the case in both directions causing case head stretching as well as pushing the shoulder up.

I have loads of 303 brass for myself so I'd toss them personally but if you want to try them I would give the o-ring trick a shot with ~10gr of Reddot or Unique and cream of wheat as mentioned above. Anneal them first and it may still take 2 firings to get them to headspace off the shoulder.
 
If I really needed those 14 cases I would neck them up to 35 or 37 cal and then reset the shoulder, with my 303 Brit dies, where it headspaces correctly and fireform with a proper load and bullet. You will get 100% formed cases without stretching the case body at the web junction and you will have perfectly usable brass for as many loads as your rifle and loading practices allow.
 
For starters, the large chambers of 303 Lee Enfield's, has nothing to do with headspace, or case separation. The brass in the picture shows no indication of excess head space.
The 303 is headspaced by the rim on the cartridge, thus head space has nothing to do with an enlarged chamber.
Shooting the brass in question will just expand the case to fit the chamber, as has been pointed out.
 
H4831 said:
For starters, the large chambers of 303 Lee Enfield's, has nothing to do with headspace, or case separation. The brass in the picture shows no indication of excess head space.
The 303 is headspaced by the rim on the cartridge, thus head space has nothing to do with an enlarged chamber.
Shooting the brass in question will just expand the case to fit the chamber, as has been pointed out.
Click to expand...

The last thing I would wish to do is argue with a man as knowledgable as yourself, but the .303 definitely has what amounts to a headspacing problem.

Tolerances were pretty sloppy, especially in wartime production. While the case certainly headspaces on the front of the rim, the bolt face very often is not tight against the back of the round. Particularly in oversized chambers, the round can be well forward of the bolt face when it fires. The thin forward portion of the case expands under pressure and is held by that pressure tightly against the chamber wall. The back of the case is also under pressure but cannot expand. It therefore moves backward until it reaches the bolt face. The result is a dramatic and localized thinning of the case wall just ahead of the web, which especially when reloading can lead to the classic Lee-Enfield case separation. I've had it happen on the second reload.

Call it what you will (and some refer to it as 'head clearance'), there's a problem and it's exacerbated by overly-large chambers. It's far from uncommon to get easily-visible bulging just ahead of the web and that cannot fail to stress the brass.

There are ways around the problem. Longer bolt heads are available. Privi Partisan ammo has a thicker rim, which helps. Some recommend firing the first time with an o-ring in front of the rim and neck-sizing only thereafter. My point was that the .303, while a good round, is prone to case separation and - admittedly conservative as I am on such matters - in my opinion it's not a particularly good idea to reuse cases from an unknown source, especially when some pretty dramatic mods have been done on them.
 
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H4831 said:
For starters, the large chambers of 303 Lee Enfield's, has nothing to do with headspace, or case separation. The brass in the picture shows no indication of excess head space.
The 303 is headspaced by the rim on the cartridge, thus head space has nothing to do with an enlarged chamber.
Shooting the brass in question will just expand the case to fit the chamber, as has been pointed out.
Click to expand...

H, I would normally agree with you but the 303 Brit has a bad reputation of head separations if one uses the rim to headspace and full length sizes all the time........way too much variations in headspacing........hence my advice to re-establish the shoulder to headspace on. I am having case head separations with my 470 NE, it never even dawned on me that full length sizing in a rimmed double would do this, but the dies and the factory ammo all have the shoulder back a good .100-.125" from the chamber. I have done some research and this is normal, much like the old 38-40. I now am out 60 rounds of 470 NE brass after only 3 firings, most distressing given the cost of Norma 470 NE cases. I will now have to be much more diligent in my die settings in the future, as I want the cases to fall into the chambers when loaded but do not want to lose any more than I already have.
 
There is no round more highly touted (by Canadians), and at the same time with so much fuss and folklore surrounding it than the 303 Brit (in a Lee Enfield).

Almost all of the rifles with supposedly poor headspace are within spec, and almost all have cavernous chambers. The casehead separations are not the result of poor headspace, but of repeated F/L sizing of a round from a rifle with a cavernous chamber. Neck size the bloody thing.

The other fuss is related to the supposed need to use flat-base bullets because of the Lee Enfields "rifling". No - boat-tails work poorly not because the rifling doesn't like them, but because LE bores tend to be large - 0.316" is not unusual, and boat-tails cannot "bump up" like flat-based can. Use a properly sized boat-tail and the rifling will be just fine with them. Now it's not easy to find a 0.316" boat-tail (I have to make mine from 8mm bullets), but they do work.
 
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sunray said:
For 14 pieces, I wouldn't bother with any of 'em. The top one looks like somebody thought they'd make some .30-30 or maybe some .30-40 Krag.
"...with a peace...". A what?
Click to expand...

Fixed it for you, sunray. You forgot the punctuations after pieces and peace. No thanks necessary. Apparently spelling and grammar count, but punctuation does not. Glass houses. Stop throwing stones, sunray. Merry Christmas all.
 
Thanks you guys, for usually agreeing with what I write. In this case it is a misunderstanding, more than anything else.
I am well aware of how a case is expanded on shooting in a Lee Enfield, which was designed strictly for military use, which precludes reloading of the cases and how one must keep the proper length (number) bolt head on, to control head space.
But, I was referring to the cases in the picture and to me they don't appear to have any excess head space, or other problem. And if the shoulder is not pushed back on loading, they should be fine to shoot with a normal load.
 
H4831 said:
To me they don't appear to have any excess head space, or other problem. And if the shoulder is not pushed back on loading, they should be fine to shoot with a normal load.
Click to expand...

Merry Christmas H, the cases don't look like they have excessive headspace, however the shoulder on the top case has been pushed back almost a quarter inch, so in this case the case need to have the shoulder moved back forward where it needs to be by fireforming the case.

Another approach to this is to load a starting load of powder in the case and seat the bullet long to engage in the rifling, this will keep the head of the case against the bolt face when the case fireforms luss leaving no headspace issues once completed
 
Merry Christmas to you, also.
No need to push the shoulder back, if it will go into your chamber. If it will go in the chamber, just size the neck and load it with a normal load. If it won't go in the chamber, push the shoulder back just a hair, to allow it to chamber, then load away.
 
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