Flaring Brass For Lead Question

Squaregrouper · Apr 22, 2017

I'm going to start loading some subs to shoot .300 Blackout suppressed without breaking the bank. The bullets are polymer coated lead, and seem to be well received by users.
These are the projectiles I'm looking at.
https://palmettoprojectiles.com/products/300-blackout-projectiles?variant=34789294288

My question is this--- After flaring with a Lee universal flaring die, adding powder charge and seating the bullet, do I just crimp as normal? Will repeatedly doing this significantly shorten the number of loads per piece of brass?

kalister1 · Apr 22, 2017

Don't have a clue, I have never flared rifle brass. But, then again I have never loaded lead bullets into rifle brass.

iH8DemLibz · Apr 22, 2017

Those bullets have a boat tail.

That's your flare in reverse.

The boat tail taper will help guide the bullet into place.

No need to flare the brass.

Praeger · Apr 22, 2017

squaregrouper said:
My question is this--- After flaring with a Lee universal flaring die, adding powder charge and seating the bullet, do I just crimp as normal? Will repeatedly doing this significantly shorten the number of loads per piece of brass?

Yes, crimp after seating bullet.

No, it won't significantly shorten brass life. You only need flare/bell the case mouth a small amount to allow the bullet to be seated without shaving it.

John from MD · Apr 22, 2017

If you don't chamfer the mouth of the case, you must bell it or you will scrape the paint. As for crimping, if you crimp too much, you will scrape the paint. How much you scrape off depends on how hard the brass is, how thick your paint coat is and other factors. In my experience (approaching 5000 painted rounds), I have found that some scraping of the paint does not matter. I have pieces of paint come off from removing the bullets from the hardware cloth I use for cooking and have not experienced significant leading nor degraded accuracy (at 100 yards using a 4 power scope). I imagine if I used a 24X scope I might see some difference but I am not shooting bench rest targets.

For crimping, I close the case mouth enough to drop into the case length gauge and then stop. I have not seen any bullets pull in the magazine from not having a real tight crimp. I shoot supersonic only and am using relatively fast powders like Lil Gun and 4227.

Hope this helps, even though you are shooting suppressed.

Squaregrouper · Apr 22, 2017

OP here- Thanks for the advice.

Fox123 · Apr 22, 2017

http://leatherheadbullets.com/30-cal-220-grn-rn-blackout-500-ct/

I like these guys myself, but the flare is to keep from scraping the paint, then crimp just enough to remove the bell. The bullet is so long and enough is stuffed into the case that you don't really need to worry about having a real tight crimp.

John from MD · Apr 22, 2017

Those bullets look to be designed just for Powder Coating. I use a NOE rendition of the Lee 312-150gn bullet originally made for the 7.62x39 cartridge. I shoot them at about 1600FPS and, since I make my own bullets, tend to shoot the 300 BO more than my .223 AR's. If the war in the Middle East ever lets up and REAL surplus becomes available again, that may change.

outrider58 · Apr 22, 2017

Op, try it without belling the case neck. If it shaves the coating, start belling ever so slightly. Less is more in this case.

Melnic · Apr 22, 2017

Fox123 said:
http://leatherheadbullets.com/30-cal-220-grn-rn-blackout-500-ct/

I like these guys myself, but the flare is to keep from scraping the paint, then crimp just enough to remove the bell. The bullet is so long and enough is stuffed into the case that you don't really need to worry about having a real tight crimp.

These are already powdercoated like in the photo or are just lead?

Squaregrouper · Apr 22, 2017

Melnic said:
These are already powdercoated like in the photo or are just lead?

Both Palmetto Projectiles and Leatherhead use a polymer coating called "Hi-Tek". All of my Google-Fu shows Hi-Tek to be far superior to regular powder coating. Most reviews say it gives copper jacket cleanliness at a cast bullet price point.

Sticky · Apr 22, 2017

squaregrouper said:
Both Palmetto Projectiles and Leatherhead use a polymer coating called "Hi-Tek". All of my Google-Fu shows Hi-Tek to be far superior to regular powder coating. Most reviews say it gives copper jacket cleanliness at a cast bullet price point.

I use both, hitek and powder coat for my casts. Both prevent leading, I dont' think either one is better, but I use both. Either can be damaged if you scrape while seating, so beware and follow Outrider's advice.. try it without flaring, if you see any coating scraped (it will be around the case mouth) then you should flare a bit to prevent it. Deburring the inside of the case mouth will also minimize this tendency. No, it won't shorten the life of your brass, it's no different than loading pistol rounds.

I use a Lee Universal expanding die but I use NOE's expanders, which are very specifically turned to give a base diameter and an expanded/flare, if you will. They work great for rifle loading of casts, as I do this for almost all of my rifle calibers.

edit.. Both work well to prevent leading, I have shot both at fairly high velocities in 223, x35, x39 and 308. The Hi-Tek is a little thinner of a coating than a typical powder coat, but I size all my casts after coating, so it really doesn't matter in the long run.

ToolAA · Apr 29, 2017

squaregrouper said:
I'm going to start loading some subs to shoot .300 Blackout suppressed without breaking the bank. The bullets are polymer coated lead, and seem to be well received by users.

These are the projectiles I'm looking at.

https://palmettoprojectiles.com/products/300-blackout-projectiles?variant=34789294288

My question is this--- After flaring with a Lee universal flaring die, adding powder charge and seating the bullet, do I just crimp as normal? Will repeatedly doing this significantly shorten the number of loads per piece of brass?

Sharegrouper have you had a chance to load and shoot these yet? I tried 3 15 rnd mags today and had 4 serious malfunctions in 45 rounds. In all four cases it seems that the bullet jammed in the throat and the round wouldn't fully chamber. The bolt was about 1-2mm from closing and locking. Worse was that I couldn't get the bolt to lock with the forward assist nor could I retract the bolt with the charging handle. 3 of the jams I had to put the rifle between my knees and really force the round to eject. The fourth time it happened I had to force the round out be slamming the charging handle with the heel of my boot.

Im going to inspect the rounds later and post a pic or two.

John from MD · Apr 29, 2017

The 300 BO is critical in the neck because it was designed for jacketed bullets. You need to drop your rounds into a case length gauge to see if they will chamber.

I size all of my powder coated bullets to .309 so that they will not have chambering issues. When I first started loading Lee 150gn bullets, I learned fast that the neck was critical. Now when I powder coat (the shake and bake way), it usually adds .002 to .003 to the bullet diameter. That's why I do the after baking sizing.

ToolAA · Apr 29, 2017

John from MD said:
The 300 BO is critical in the neck because it was designed for jacketed bullets. You need to drop your rounds into a case length gauge to see if they will chamber.

I size all of my powder coated bullets to .309 so that they will not have chambering issues. When I first started loading Lee 150gn bullets, I learned fast that the neck was critical. Now when I powder coat (the shake and bake way), it usually adds .002 to .003 to the bullet diameter. That's why I do the after baking sizing.

Does a soft lead projectile typically deform (get fatter) when pressed into the case? I can see that the tip is clearly deforming a little bit during bullet seating.

John from MD · Apr 29, 2017

ToolAA said:
Does a soft lead projectile typically deform (get fatter) when pressed into the case? I can see that the tip is clearly deforming a little bit during bullet seating.

Bullets made for rifle velocity should not deform when reloading. Some tips will get deformed by the seating stem if it is not profiled for the bullet. To avoid this, I buy extra stems and, using JB weld, make a custom seating stem for bullets that need them.

You should mike some of your bullets to see what their diameter is before going further.

Regards,

Fox123 · Apr 29, 2017

ToolAA said:
Sharegrouper have you had a chance to load and shoot these yet? I tried 3 15 rnd mags today and had 4 serious malfunctions in 45 rounds. In all four cases it seems that the bullet jammed in the throat and the round wouldn't fully chamber. The bolt was about 1-2mm from closing and locking. Worse was that I couldn't get the bolt to lock with the forward assist nor could I retract the bolt with the charging handle. 3 of the jams I had to put the rifle between my knees and really force the round to eject. The fourth time it happened I had to force the round out be slamming the charging handle with the heel of my boot.

Im going to inspect the rounds later and post a pic or two.

You need to learn how to mortar that bad boy.

outrider58 · Apr 29, 2017

The whole clue or secret to 300AAC is brass thickness, vis a vis, neck thickness...

sart here...

http://www.300blktalk.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=141&t=88599&sid=c86a2286869114986a7eac5bdd057f20

yellowfin · May 1, 2017

John from MD said:
If you don't chamfer the mouth of the case, you must bell it or you will scrape the paint.

Best practice in my experience is to both chamfer and bell.

Sticky · May 1, 2017

ToolAA said:
Does a soft lead projectile typically deform (get fatter) when pressed into the case? I can see that the tip is clearly deforming a little bit during bullet seating.

They can deform, but not get 'squashed' unless you have a serious amount of neck tension... When loading lead, preparing the case mouth is critical to ensure you don't reduce the diameter as you insert the bullet into the case. Soft, hard, coated, plated all need to be able to be inserted without distorting them (or scraping the coating or plating) and still have adequate neck tension when completed (and also crimped to remove that flare).

Check the diameter of the bullets being loaded and you can size them if needed, or use an expander to properly prepare the neck of the case for a given bullet diameter. I just got a couple hundred coated 9mm bullets from ACME, they state (right on the box) that they are .356 diameter... they are .358"... that could be an issue if you trust the specs.

Flaring Brass For Lead Question

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