reloading 303 with 7.62soviet

[BCrecce]

I have a whole lotta 2011 LCW 7.62 123g that measures out at .311 worth about 25 cents a pop that I would love to load into my 303 brass, I know it can be done but was wondering if anyone had experience dropping the 7.62 powder straight into the 303. The powder weighs in at 24.2g, Ive heard on the iterweb it can be done but.......any relevant experience would be greatly appreciated want to keep the little pills moving slow for some sub 100 yard plinking.

 

[Ganderite]

I did it. Mild ammo. fair accuracy. Good for plinking.

 

[BCrecce]

did you recycle the same small powder load? any idea what your COAL ended up as? 2.9 ish, pulled some other surplus russian and romanian 7.62 and they were long boat tails at .310 the LCW is .311 but a short stubby looking flat bottom bullet.

 

[leverboy]

I am doing it currently with 7.62x39... Works very well for me. Nice mild loads, as Ganderite said... I've not put mine on the bench to check accuracy, but I suspect that will vary depending on how big your 303 slugs out... This is a great way to get kids and new shooters enjoying a Lee Enfield!

 

[leverboy]

My Ukranian surplus is boattail bullets... I am just seating them back down to where the red sealant stuff is on the bullet...haven't even measured OAL to be honest.. I have just been dumping the powder from the x39 round in and calling it good for the sake of simplicity, but if you wanted to you could up the charge some... If you use x54R rounds you will want to reduce the powder charge...

 

[BCrecce]

I am doing it currently with 7.62x39... Works very well for me. Nice mild loads, as Ganderite said... Iand cheap plinking 've not put mine on the bench to check accuracy, but I suspect that will vary depending on how big your 303 slugs out... This is a great way to get kids and new shooters enjoying a Lee Enfield!

getting my youngest son to move up a caliber comfortably is one of the reasons behind this load, he loves his .22 but didn't like shooting the sks at all. Ill have to experiment and see if I can get the short flat bottoms seated far enough the have no sealant line like the surplus for refernce.

 

[sunray]

No grams in reloading. Or is that grains? 24.2 grains isn't enough for a 125 out of a .303 anyway. The lowest starting load is 39.0.
You have absolutely no idea what that powder is. Pitch it and use the bullets if your .303 barrel is close to .311".

 

[leverboy]

No grams in reloading. Or is that grains? 24.2 grains isn't enough for a 125 out of a .303 anyway. The lowest starting load is 39.0.
You have absolutely no idea what that powder is. Pitch it and use the bullets if your .303 barrel is close to .311".

That is interesting advice. You are aware that the lowest starting load is 39 grains but we have no idea what the powder is... It would seem you haven't worked with reduced loads a great deal. As far as bullet diameter and bore size, these are plinking loads...just isn't going to matter if the groups open up some...

 

[antiqueguy]

No grams in reloading. Or is that grains? 24.2 grains isn't enough for a 125 out of a .303 anyway. The lowest starting load is 39.0.
You have absolutely no idea what that powder is. Pitch it and use the bullets if your .303 barrel is close to .311".

39gr of what powder as the powder in the 7.62x39 is unknown its best not to screw around but I can say that it works well and is a nice mild load. btw my normal reloads for .303 British use red dot under a cast bullet using a very light charge

 

[BCRider]

Copper washed soft steel jackets on the bullets? If "yes" then watch for the copper fouling in the bore. From shooting that stuff in my Mosin I've come to realize that the soap bubble thin copper plating on the steel jackets strips off almost instantly and stays in the bore. The amount of blue that comes out even after a short session with milsurp ammo supports this.

So you may find that while the bullets load and shoot that you are not getting the sort of accuracy that the rifle can provide. It depends on how sensitive your barrel is to a copper buildup.

You state that it's a plinking load so you're not that concerned with accuracy. But after your son becomes OK with the recoil and begins shooting seriously if the accuracy is poor he's going to become frustrated that he can't hit what he's shooting at with any degree of consistency. So I'd suggest that accuracy does count. Maybe not right away but pretty soon after he transitions it will.

 

[Spawn-Inc]

39gr of what powder as the powder in the 7.62x39 is unknown its best not to screw around but I can say that it works well and is a nice mild load. btw my normal reloads for .303 British use red dot under a cast bullet using a very light charge

That is interesting advice. You are aware that the lowest starting load is 39 grains but we have no idea what the powder is... It would seem you haven't worked with reduced loads a great deal. As far as bullet diameter and bore size, these are plinking loads...just isn't going to matter if the groups open up some...

It's best to ignore sunray, he doesn't know what the hell he's talking about most of the time. He's just after post count. It's one of the reasons I think it's just a computer trying to post once in every thread started

 

[Andy]

That 24 grs of powder you're pulling behaves very much like H4198, 24 grs of which is a nice light load with the pulled bullet in the 303 Brit. But many people already know that.

 

[BCrecce]

That 24 grs of powder you're pulling behaves very much like H4198, 24 grs of which is a nice light load with the pulled bullet in the 303 Brit. But many people already know that.

Thanks thats more of the imformation I have not been able to cross reference what powder it behaves like, Ive got some imr 4895 but Im saving it for my 150 reloads which will be my go to for now. Trying to track down privi brass, to no avail.

The 7.62 powder is brand new and all from the same lot so I feel confident using it, if it were 30+ years old not so much.