Subsonic 303 loads

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vstarclassic

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Hi All, Just found a bit of 303 fun ( cheap fun) I had an old Ideal 32 Colt reloading tool with bullet mold etc. The mold drops a nice little 90 grain pill at .313 or so, Me thinks what can I do with this. Alox coat on the bullets, 2.0 to 3.5 Unique experiment at .5 grn intervals in a 303 case. Getting cute little 1 inch groups with both the 3.0 and 3.5 grns( just have a aim point on my 303) at 25 yards. Great way to play with your milsurps at a pennies load. Anybody else have a pet load like this for the 303. Love to hear. Cheers Greg
 
Hi vsc. When I was young I took every .303 rifle I bought over to my mentor's house. If the bore was a bit frosty or needed a really good
clean and shine he used to do similar. Take a cast bullet and put some grease on it and then sprinkle with emery powder. Put in a fire formed case with a light load and let 'er rip into a stump in the basement. Surprising clean results after a run through with a 4 X 2. Reduced loads worked at the indoor 25 rd range as well when the outside weather was inclimate. JOHN
 
Years ago I found a rusted cut off Lyman or Ideal 323470 2 cav mold. I adapted a cut off plate from scrap and cleaned mold with rust-out.
Bullets are not perfect but perfect enough to make a great 25Y plinker for kids. Later on I found a single cav mold with handles marked "32 special". It makes really nice .325 PB bullet that's super for 50Y plinking.

Both prefer alloy on soft side but any unknown WW mix seems to do the trick. I shot a lot of both when 22LR was in short supply.
 
I use copper plated lead balls from 00 buckshot shells.

Pushed through a .314 dia steel ring they seal well, and the butter-soft lead is easy to push down the bore.

A few grains of blank powder makes it just subsonic, and uncorking is as loud as a hand-clap.

I put a little groove in the neck of the case with a pipe cutter so that the balls don’t go in too far. The case needs no resizing.

Quite civilized, but still powerful enough to splinter out the back of 3/4" plywood.
 
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Right on. That sounds like what I do with 30-30 plinker rounds. 93gr LEE WW on top of 5gr 700X. No need to resize them.
 
I have used two bullets for subsonic loads in the 303 Brit:

90 gr Lee Cast

3.5 grs Trail Boss - 750 fps
4.0 grs Trail Boss - 925 fps

174 gr Hornady Jacketed RN

10.0 grs Red Dot - 950 fps
11.0 grs Red Dot - 1100 fps

308 Winchester Subsonic Loads (of which there are many) can be used in the 303 British.
 
>3.5 grs Trail Boss for 90gr

That's not too far off what I found my way to.

For the little 54gr ball, with more than 2grs of blank powder the uncorking sounds started getting uncomfortable for shooting without ears on, and at 3gr the ball had an angry crack-zip sound.
 
Another approach is using a .32 acp to 303 Enfield adaptor. Works quite well. What doesn't work is a .32 to .303 savage adaptor in an Enfield, since it leaves the case unsupported. Two grain of powder is still enough to blow the case apart.
 
Rayleigh_Scattering said:
>3.5 grs Trail Boss for 90gr

That's not too far off what I found my way to.

For the little 54gr ball, with more than 2grs of blank powder the uncorking sounds started getting uncomfortable for shooting without ears on, and at 3gr the ball had an angry crack-zip sound.
Click to expand...

I love shooting Round Balls! For the 303 Brit, I used #0 Buck sized to 0.313" which weighed about 50 grs.

I cover them in Alox before sizing, but I've also just tapped them lightly into the neck without pre-sizing.
 
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#0 to .313 isn’t much off the diameter. Makes sense that you can push them right in.

Here’s one w the copper plated ball.

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The groove stops them from going down too far, so they look nice and even.
 

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Rayleigh_Scattering said:
#0 to .313 isn’t much off the diameter. Makes sense that you can push them right in.

Here’s one w the copper plated ball.


The groove stops them from going down too far, so they look nice and even.
Click to expand...

You've come up with some good ideas there - both using a copper plated ball so that lube is not an issue, and the (careful) use of the pipe cutter to place a "step" in the neck to maintain desired depth. You want the ball to be seated so the "flat" that's established is just captured by the neck. I too enjoy the fact that with pressures as low as they are, full length sizing seems to never be required and neck sizing is perhaps after 4-5 firings. Thumb seating is a nice to have as well.

The only caution I offer to people wanting to do this is that when the tiny ball leaves the neck upon firing, for a diameter or so it's moving loosely through the generous Lee Enfield chamber before it engages with the rifling. If you go too low with your load of the required fast pistol powder trying to obtain very low MV's, the ball can stop for a moment when it engages wth the rifling and act like a bore obstruction. With that you risk misfires or hangfires as I've experienced. Aim for 1000+ fps is my recommendation.
 
Rayleigh_Scattering said:
Yup. I’d be leery of trying this with a jacketted projectile, or with anything slower than blank powder.

Even laying loose on the table that stuff burns with a bang.
Click to expand...

Yes - the big differences between round balls and the typical bullet are that they are much lighter, have a tiny bearing surface by comparison, and typically have a large jump to the rifling, hence a very small charge of a fast pistol powder is best.

"Someone" should do a write-up on the Joys and Tribulations of shooting Round Balls. ;)
 
I checked and I was mistaken!

For the 303 and 308 I used these:

Hornady 0.315 Round Balls.jpg

The nice thing was that no resizing was required - just lube and press it lightly into the unsized neck of previously fired (in that gun) 303 Brit. For the 308 I had to size it down to 0.311" first.

For the 8X57 I used Hornady 00 Buck sized to 0.326" in my custom push-through die. 0.323" might have worked, but you'd have to size the neck first.
 

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