What did you do at your reloading bench today?

Cool_Moo5e said:

Had to pull some bullets today, made a few high charge CFE 223 loads that were too hot for my gun, I shot 1 round and it ejected about 8 feet from 1 o'clock and the bullet tumbled

Click to expand...

How much CFE 223 did you put in there? That's a powder that likes to be driven hard.

erwos said:

How much CFE 223 did you put in there? That's a powder that likes to be driven hard.

Click to expand...

27.4 which is the max that Hornady says to load 55gr FMJBT, it's a 18" 1:8 223Wylde using Win 5.56 primers in an AR, but now that you are saying that it could just be the powder, I've never had brass eject at 1 o'clock so it made me put that mag on the ground and move on to the next one real quick.

Cool_Moo5e said:

27.4 which is the max that Hornady says to load 55gr FMJBT, it's a 18" 1:8 223Wylde using Win 5.56 primers in an AR, but now that you are saying that it could just be the powder, I've never had brass eject at 1 o'clock so it made me put that mag on the ground and move on to the next one real quick.

Click to expand...

This puts me in a minority, but I don't GAF what the ejection pattern looks like. Unless you are see pressure signs in the case, it ejects how it ejects. CFE 223 book max is still well under what your gun can deal with (52k vs 61k PSI).

The bullet tumbling is pretty weird, though. Did it actually go sideways?

erwos said:

This puts me in a minority, but I don't GAF what the ejection pattern looks like. Unless you are see pressure signs in the case, it ejects how it ejects. CFE 223 book max is still well under what your gun can deal with (52k vs 61k PSI).

The bullet tumbling is pretty weird, though. Did it actually go sideways?

Click to expand...

The bullet looks like it went over under on the paper at 50 yards but I've always associated 1-3 o'clock being over gassed 3-4 being just right and 5-6 being under gassed but then again I am still learning so it could be nothing. I saw that and thought "oh shit that's way too much, put that mag down before you Scott your self"

Cool_Moo5e said:

The bullet looks like it went over under on the paper at 50 yards but I've always associated 1-3 o'clock being over gassed 3-4 being just right and 5-6 being under gassed but then again I am still learning so it could be nothing. I saw that and thought "oh shit that's way too much, put that mag down before you Scott your self"

Click to expand...

The amount of gas rolling through your gun is a combination of the gas port size, how much the block lets through, and how much actual pressure being produced by the round. A gun could be "over-gassed" with one hot round but perfectly fine with other less-stout loads. Unless you're tweaking your adjustable gas block (or buffer?), this isn't a thing to get worked up over.

If you think they're too hot, they're too hot, but I really would have been curious to see the bullet impacts otherwise.

2500 pieces of once fired LC 5.56 brass ready for the XL650
.

Set up my Mark7 Evo for 300 BLK (200gr subs, 11.1gr CFE BLK), and loaded about 50 of them. More priming failures than I'm used to; I suspect the hold-down die needs to be dialed in further for the swage, because I really didn't experience this many priming issues with .223 (didn't touch the shell plate or the swage setting). I'm also using some American Reloading mixed headstamp brass, so who knows what the brass history is there. I decided to roll the die and not trim, and simply one-pass the brass for loading. So far so good.

Decapped and sized ~500 pieces of 308 brass, and trimmed it with the mark 7 express trimmer mounted on a lee pro 6000 press.

Something is iffy with either the 308 brass or 308 lyman trim die. First, it was trimming unevenly with a noticeable amount of flashing along one side of the trimmed neck. It seemed it was out of alignment somehow, and that re installing the end mill bit back into the collet fixed it. Another issue I was having was some brass was getting seized along the trim die more than usual, despite being ran through a FL sizer. My guess is some of the brass is overly expanded, possibly shot from a wide chamber. Had some cases were the brass seized so much that the whole shellplate carrier came undone from the ram on the upstroke. Full disclosure, this was on a reconditioned lee 6 pack pro press. I guess they didn't tighten the collet far enough, which begged the question; at what torque spec was this collet supposed to be tightened to?

Apparently, through trial and error, it's exactly the torque spec of a dealer mechanic installing a plastic oil filter housing, which is a 3/8s breaker bar with a 3 ft jack pipe handle as a leverage extension, wrenching it down at full body force along a fixed, metal frame work bench. I had a field day with undoing stuck 308 casings along the detached collet in between trials. Aside from those two hurdles, the trimmer and pro 6000 got the job done.

Loaded up 9x39 test rounds. 5 different powders, each with 5 different charge weights. Using 286 gr Hornady Interlock bullets. I have 3 other .366" bullets to develop loads for later.

Intent is to find a load for each powder that gives a velocity between 1000 and 1050 fps (phase 1), then for each of these 5 loads, load up 5 of each and have a "shoot off" to find the most accurate load with an acceptable standard deviation (phase 2).

Similar to load development I did with 450 Bushmaster Sub-X:

erwos said:

This puts me in a minority, but I don't GAF what the ejection pattern looks like. Unless you are see pressure signs in the case, it ejects how it ejects. CFE 223 book max is still well under what your gun can deal with (52k vs 61k PSI).

The bullet tumbling is pretty weird, though. Did it actually go sideways?

Click to expand...

This.

Also make sure you are looking at 5.56 maxes also. Despite them supposedly being "identical" other than the leade of the chamber, every reloading manual I have, has 5.56 loaded close to 10k PSI higher.

I mostly go for loading between .223 and 5.56 book values on my ".223" loads.

I did have a funky ladder for 62gr GD. I knew I'd loaded up one round wrong (light) in the string because of a scale zeroing issue. I didn't bother pulling it apart, because it wasn't THAT far off. And yup, cross the magneto speed about 150fps slow.

What was odd is I had a round in the hotter string do the SAME thing. I didn't think any of those were mess up, but I had an ES of 156fps and one round that clocked over 100fps slower than all the rest.

No pressure signs, everything seemed fine on accuracy. Though oddly it was on the lighter end of things that was the most accurate (one large hole at 50yds) and the hotter end accuracy was falling off. Though again, the two hotter rungs had a bad velocity flier (subtract the one, and ~1MOA). So I guess I need to redo it.

My 120gr Grendel GD testing went well. I think I'll push it to max, though if I have the time, I might play with COAL as my Howa can chamber these puppies out a lot longer than 2.260 which, my limited experience with other bullets, means I can likely load them out around 2.300 and likely up the charge half a grain, get another 20-30fps, and stay in a good accuracy node. At max charge, accuracy dropped off. Though it went from 30.7gr and 2370fps in my Howa 20" and .7MOA 5-shot group to 31.2gr and 2401fps and 1MOA 5-shot group. I doubt the slight difference in accuracy or velocity really matters for deer, likely within 100yds. But hunting loads, I like loading them as warm as possible if accuracy is good and no pressure signs. If brass life is lower, well even with zeroing and testing, I doubt I am going to run more than 40 rounds a year of hunting handloads through the gun. With ~800 pieces of brass, even if brass life is half, that is a long time to wear out the brass that gets loaded too hot.

Fortunately, most of my loads with CFE223 like being loaded hot, but almost always about .3-.5gr off max is the most accurate load. And anything, except, hunting I'd rather load for maximum accuracy.

Anyway, if I have the time for two more range sessions before early gun season, I'll load a test ladder long and more powder. If I don't, I'll just load a bunch at 31.2gr and 2.260" and zero with my suppressor on the rifle. Or if I am not sure, I might load a test ladder long, and a box at 31.2gr and 2.260". I can always test the ladder AND zero the rifle with the suppressor on in one session. At worst, I know what the new loading does, but I don't zero the rifle for it and I don't take that other loading hunting and I just have to deal with a box of slightly less ideal hunting loads that are still going to kill a deer real dead for this season and I'll re-zero and load some of the longer, more ideal (in theory) hunting loads for late season.

Loaded out a hundo or so of 45 AARP to clear out the large pistol primers from my large primer 650, and then swapped it over to 308. Got the trimming head set up... looks like it's running at about 1.995, which is reasonable as a trim length. New plan will be to prep some mixed headstamp brass and then load it (recipe TBD).

Going to have a range session today to verify my new .300 BLK subs for velocity/function, chrono my 45, and maybe do a little practice work with 5.56, If the 300 BLK subs work out, it'll be mass production mode for those.

ETA: I also just found out I have no 7.62x39 conversion, trim die, or spare toolheads, so it looks like Dillon is going to be getting some cash money pretty soon.

erwos said:

The amount of gas rolling through your gun is a combination of the gas port size, how much the block lets through, and how much actual pressure being produced by the round. A gun could be "over-gassed" with one hot round but perfectly fine with other less-stout loads. Unless you're tweaking your adjustable gas block (or buffer?), this isn't a thing to get worked up over.

If you think they're too hot, they're too hot, but I really would have been curious to see the bullet impacts otherwise.

Click to expand...

So over gassed is not anything to do with hot loads?

I bought a prebuilt upper so chances are the gas port is the max size for spec so the gun cycles almost/all loads

I used my Dillon case tumbler to clean my shell holders, some parts of my stove top and a couple other non gun related parts like those thin plates that hold brake pads. Never thought of it before.

Cool_Moo5e said:

So over gassed is not anything to do with hot loads?

Click to expand...

Your gun determines a certain baseline. The "symptoms" of over-gassing may appear when you run hotter loads in that gun. Of course, it's possible that you gun is so wide open that all ammo appears over-gassed, in which case... not much to be done.

Cool_Moo5e said:

I bought a prebuilt upper so chances are the gas port is the max size for spec so the gun cycles almost/all loads

Click to expand...

Ultimately, this is kind of the trade-off. If you want a gun without a lot of excess energy in the system, this basically means you're running ammunition in a certain velocity/weight range and a gas port/block tuned to such. But that inherently runs up against reliability across ammo types. No free lunch.

erwos said:

Your gun determines a certain baseline. The "symptoms" of over-gassing may appear when you run hotter loads in that gun. Of course, it's possible that you gun is so wide open that all ammo appears over-gassed, in which case... not much to be done.

Ultimately, this is kind of the trade-off. If you want a gun without a lot of excess energy in the system, this basically means you're running ammunition in a certain velocity/weight range and a gas port/block tuned to such. But that inherently runs up against reliability across ammo types. No free lunch.

Click to expand...

Within reason. Now if tuned to the absolute minimum, sure. My AR-10 runs anything. With real light .308 loads, it doesn't eject with much authority, but it runs reliably, even in bone chilling cold (probably not when filthy). But even with hot 168/175gr loads, it doesn't send the cases to orbit. Much less ejection force than the thing had pre-adjustable gas block and light loads.

Heck, even with a suppressor on and hot loads, it has a little less ejection force than it did pre-AGB and light loads. It could for sure be tuned down a few more clicks to get it dribbling brass out for the least recoil/action energy possible and then it definitely won't run unsupressed light loads. But it operates in a wide enough range and suppressed with hot rounds, the cycling force is not high enough I see any reason to adjust the gas block between suppressed and unsuppressed and the gassing in the face is minor enough, the same there.

erwos said:

Your gun determines a certain baseline. The "symptoms" of over-gassing may appear when you run hotter loads in that gun. Of course, it's possible that you gun is so wide open that all ammo appears over-gassed, in which case... not much to be done.

Ultimately, this is kind of the trade-off. If you want a gun without a lot of excess energy in the system, this basically means you're running ammunition in a certain velocity/weight range and a gas port/block tuned to such. But that inherently runs up against reliability across ammo types. No free lunch.

Click to expand...

in the end, I will have to get used to it being that way, when I buy a gun I want reliability, and if its a semi-auto I will have to get used to brass flying forward then, it's just odd that it's CFE223 that's done it, I have run PMC, Winchester, AAC, and IMI through it and never had brass go forward but then again they probably use a different brand of powder, I still have lots to learn about reloading for this gun.

Cool_Moo5e said:

in the end, I will have to get used to it being that way, when I buy a gun I want reliability, and if its a semi-auto I will have to get used to brass flying forward then, it's just odd that it's CFE223 that's done it, I have run PMC, Winchester, AAC, and IMI through it and never had brass go forward but then again they probably use a different brand of powder, I still have lots to learn about reloading for this gun.

Click to expand...

CFE223 is a bit of a slower powder and produces a higher gas volume for similar muzzle velocities. So the gas port pressure is going to be a bit higher than other rounds in the caliber, using different powders, with a similar muzzle energy.

The upside to CFE223, is because it is a just a bit slower, it also means you can tend to get more total energy and stay within safe maximum pressures.

Still having primer smearing problems, but loaded and gauged 120 .300 BLK subs. I think I'm going to take a pause and tear down the press, make sure the primer guide is still where I think it should be. Tweaking the punch resting position helped a fair bit, but wasn't quite a panacea. Also probably wouldn't hurt to generally clean out the priming system in general.

The other theory is that the RBCS sizing die used for the priming hold-down is not quite as centered as I'd like. I run it without the neck sizing bit (since I decap in a different station and expand the neck in the next station). TBH, while I don't want to believe that's the problem, my 223 cases had absolutely none of these problems with the same primer and swage settings. Unfortunately, Redding doesn't make a 300 Blackout body die (boo) so I gotta figure out what my fallback is for testing that.

ETA: upon further reflection last night, I strongly suspect that the problem here may be the much shorter case size of 300BLK. The priming pin may be actuating the primer punch before the case is being fully captured and centered by the sizing die, and this is causing the smearing. I've ordered a Mighty Armory sizing die (which has a guide option instead of decap) to try to center the case a little faster in the cycle. That's expensive, but I think it will do the trick. It's definitely not the swage - I've used a small primer gauge to check the cases in question, and they were maybe some of the best swage work I've ever done on that press.

Alright, here we go:
1. Installed the MA 300BLK sizing die. While it is a serious improvement over the old RBCS in a few ways, it didn't resolve the primer smearing issues.
2. Ripped down the press (blargh) and cleaned it some. I'm getting good at this, but it's still a pain. Tightened up the priming system a lot. Mark7 changed some of their advice on how to configure the system, so I made use of that.
3. Still some sideways primer issues. Tweaked the primer punch resting position (which tends to be the culprit for that in my experience).
4. Now things are starting to look good. Ran off another five without babying the press, and zero primer problems, just perfect insertion. Not sure why 223 was more forgiving (longer case?), or maybe things just got loose, but I'm cautiously optimistic that things are where they should be.

The MA sizing die is pretty good, owner's questionable views aside. It's very nicely machined, it seems to be small base, it's super easy to pop the top to get access to the expander, and kind of like the FW Arms decappers, it is very easy to replace the pins. It also includes an expander guide with no decap, which ensures no under-sized case necks (unlikely with my once-fired brass, but I suppose you never know). I'm not sure it's $130 nice, but it's hard to argue with the quality and features.

ETA: ran another thirty through, and I'd say it's fixed. No problems at all. Finally.

Loaded ~300 9mm, and 100 .300BLK between the end of work and dinner. Reasonably happy with the Mark7's behavior now; it's not quite perfect, but it's probably as close as I'm going to get using once-fired mixed headstamp brass. Mighty Armory sizer continues to impress when the cases hit the gauge, so much so that I might give in and buy a MA sizer for my 223 loading head.

I also came up with a rather ingenious solution to mounting the Armanov primer catch bottle to my Inline Fab mounts - I just unbent the angle on the bracket and put it right between the twist nut and the mount. Way better position for the tube since it's captured the whole way.

I think I will load through the rest of my 300 BLK brass with subs, and if I run out of 200gr bullets, I'll experiment a bit with 110gr V-Max supers.