Weigh charges or caseful?

Gatehouse

Gatehouse

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Are you the type that weighs each and every charge, or are you one of those guys that says "I haven't weighed a charge in 20 years- All my loads are a "casefull or IMR ### or a casefull of HYYYY"

Or are you somewhere in between? :D
 
I only load for one rifle - my .308. I weigh each & every charge and trickle to finish. This gun is my paper-puncher and I don't like to punch too many holes on one target. For the others, I shoot factory.
My pistol reloads come from a progressive - weigh 1/500 just to confirm.
 
I set up my scale and powder thrower and when its throwing what I want, I load a bunch of shells. There is just not enough time for weighing every charge if I want to load up a whack of shells to keep up with the amount i shoot.
 
Weight every charge, mine too is for poking holes in paper. I would rather just use the center of the target instead of the whole thing :wink:

I shoot about 1500 a year through my target rifles and take the time to weigh everyone.
 
since im new to reloading.... i weigh ever one till i get the hang of this :D
this leaves me with a question to ask here :oops:
after i reloaded 50 cartridges :D weighing every one for powder..
now the big question.....why after the finished product is made...can i pick up a cartridge shake it ,and hear the powder shake in some loads and not others?
thanks for any help here
cheers all
Don
 
I weigh each and every charge but I shoot only rifle.

I also don't use a powder measure as I found that with a full set of the Lee powder spoons I can usually find one that gets very close to my load and trickle up to final weight quicker than using a measure, either electric or manual. (I just loaded up 50 rounds of .300 Savage for a budy and the total time to prime, charge and seat bullets in all 50 cases was under 40 min.)
 
i set up using the scale, then weigh every tenth just to be sure the measure hasn't drifted or something- +_ 1/10 - it's usually right on- i usually do batches of at least 100
 
I weigh each charge when working up loads. When I have settled on a load for a given firearm I use a powder measure to throw the charges--check weigh every 20 rounds. Same routine for rifle and pistol. I do not shoot precision rifle and for most hunting/varminting loads/rifles I found AFTER running comparison tests in my equipment it made no practical difference on target to weigh each charge. I have no problem with those who weigh each charge, I just can't be bothered to spend the time.

44Bore
 
It all depends on powder specifics (shape of the kernels, burn rate, etc..).
Some powders work well with a caseful, some others would make a massive overcharge.
Dropping charges with dippers or a powder measure usually works well once you've established an all-day load by the standard method and chronographed the results.
If a powder has good flow characteristics it can lend itself easily to a volume type metering.
The regretted 47SL was one of the best for this.
PP.
 
I use a redding powder measure, for almost all my reloading, with several checks to the scale. I will weigh each charge when I'm messing with maximum loads and such.

Fogducker, don't worry about not hearing the powder rattle. Sometimes you just don't.
Did you load all the cases with powder in the reloading block, and check that each case was charged with powder, and that they were all at the same level? BEFORE you seated any bullets? If you did that, you shouldn't have a problem.
 
Fogducker wrote

now the big question.....why after the finished product is made...can i pick up a cartridge shake it ,and hear the powder shake in some loads and not others?
Click to expand...

Sounds like something is different. Is the brass all the same headstamp? Some have diferent internal capacities. Is some brass once fired and others new? I presume the bullets are all the same and are seated at the same depth.
 
Sounds like something is different. Is the brass all the same headstamp?
Click to expand...
Just the headstamp will tell you nothing. Brass from the same Lot# can differ 5 grains. As all the outside dim are the same from case to case, this can only mean that the internal capacity is different. This could be a thicker web or it could mean thicker brass on the walls of the case.
Winchester in one of the thinner/lighter cases, while milsurplus like IVI is thick/heavy.
Unless you weight all your brass and batch it, you will have different pressures and the SD in velocity will be greater from shot to shot.
 
I'm afraid to do anything but weigh them. I use one of those Lee scoops to get in the ballpark then use a trickler to get the weight as close as I can. I must get a digital scale soon as I no longer have the patience to watch my teeter-totter Redding bounce around unable to decide what it wants to say.
 
I weigh every charge loading centerfire rifle and check the throw weight on my shotshell reloader every couple of hundred rounds.
 
I put on a blindfold, reach into the vault, grab a can of powder and sprinkle it over my case block. then I randomly grab bullets and seat them with a hammer. then I prime the cases and head to the range.

Ok the above is BS, but it sounds good right? In actuality I set my RCBS Uniflow Powder Measure using the Micrometer Metering Screw to whatever weight is desired, since I really only use Ball C2 for my .308, and it flows great, I am not too worried. I weight out about 10 or 15 sample charges to make sure it's what I want then I just put the case under the measure and throw away. Sometimes every 100 rounds or so I'll check, and it's always dead on. Even using powder lots that are 10 years apart I haven't yet had to change the setting.
 
The only charges I weigh are those being used in long range competition. [1000 yd] Life is too short to be spending time trickling up every charge to exact weight, since out to 400 yards, the difference .2 grains of powder makes in any hunting cartridge cannot be seen. I use the scale to set my measure, and recheck every 30 rounds or so, look inside the cases with a decent light before seating bullets, assemble the ammo, and shoot away!! Comments that have been made about variances in brass are valid. Different makes of brass can be a lot different in weight. EG. My 8x57 mauser brass varies 35 grains from lightest brass to the heaviest. Have to watch that, since a blown primer can be the result of dropping a charge developed in a lighter case into a case with a lot less capacity. Regards, Eagleye.
 
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