Neck up/ down

S

shooter177

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I am on the hunt for 260rem brass for a new build, while I am waiting for them, what is the best way to make them out of another cal? I have lee dies in 308/243& 260 can I just run the Brass in my fl 260 die and use it? What other steps should I do? Is it Easyer to neck up 243 or 308 down?
Sorry lots o questions
 
I have found going down easier, but either will work. Lube the inside of the neck well and the body as usual. Run them through your 260 die and voila. Your overall length should also be checked after resizing. Once you seat a bullet in a dummy resized, measure the outside diameter of the neck to be sure it is within spec. If too wide you may have to outside turn or inside ream the neck. In most cases you should be good though. Give it a try, it is not rocket science.
 
When I started loading for my 260, I used Lapua 243 brass. It did the trick nicely. It is best however to turn the necks after because it gets a "donut" where the shoulder meets the neck. This is caused due to part of the shoulder (which is thicker material) is pulled into the neck.
 
I might be inclined to go down in a couple of steps .30-.28-.26, or perhaps start with 7-08 brass. If you prefer to go the .243 route, RCBS makes a neck expander die in 6.5 that increases the neck diamter from smaller bore cartridges more gradually than the expander ball in a .260 Remington full length sizing die.
 
up/down

If you start with 7-08 you do nothing different than if you were loading 260, full length size and carry on. 308 can be done down in 1 go as well but usually you end up having to thin your necks out after.
I do not like necking up unless abolutely necessary, necks never come out true, huge variances in neck thickness side to side, only solution is to outside neck turn and then they come out too thin and don't size correctly and hold bullet properly.
Word if caution, if you are going to neck down new brass, say 7-08 to 260 make sure the case mouths aren't dinted, or folded in as they will usually collapse. True them all up prior to down sizing.

Douglas
 
Yup, with the right amount of lube, 308 can be run into your 260 die without any other steps being needed. From what I have read, trimming may not even be neccessary afterwards.

Running them through a 7/08 die first will make things easier as it would make it a two step necking down process - probably save you a few brass as well.
 
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