ar15 loading issue

.. the fact it has a shoulder means you can size them as if they were rimless bottle neck cases . I'd think neck only sizing would extend life considerably which I guess double is but would think 4 or 5 times that would be possible .
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That it, essentially what I do with neck sizing. I don't try to get a "perfect" fit to the shoulder, as I have a couple .303s and they're slightly different. I don't shoot .303 that much, so I don't have any brass I know I've loaded more than 4-6 times, might get more loadings if I was more precise, I don't know.

One thing about the .303, even "once fired" brass could be on its last legs. Usually isn't, but "usually" isn't "always".

One bag I got had a case head let go on its first firing (by me), and that's when I made up my mind about two things. "Once fired brass" gets FL sized, once, and if it survives the next firing, gets neck sized after that until the fail (or I see they are about to fail) usually its partial case head separation.

The other thing I decided was that when I felt I needed more brass, to spend the $ and buy NEW brass. And when I do, load that with all the tricks I know to maximize case life.

Military rifles (and machineguns) are the worst platforms for case life. Some, like many Mausers are fair to good, like sporting rifles, but many are not. The description one usually reads is "generous" chambers so they will function in dirty combat conditions. Good for the military, bad for reloaders, but then, the military only cares about a case going into the chamber (and coming out) ONCE.
 
Tell us of your experience with an AR. You mentioned that "cheap factor ammo" did the same thing. Past experience would indicate that the gun is in need of a good cleaning and greasing with red grease on the wear spots.
 
Hey all.

Just received the giraud tri trimmer.

So i'm cleaning the brass with tumbler; waiting for the FA wet tumbler.
Deprime and resize on my dillon 550b.
Swaging using the dillon 600?
Using a drill in bench vise to trim brass to 1.750.

Thanks for guiding me in this hobby.

John

*Coal is 2.236" Not too short?
 
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Whether that is short or not depends on the bullet nose profile. Short ogive bullet, and that's fine. Run a match bullet and it can well be on the short side. It's usually best to start with the bullet maker's recommendation and experiment from there.
 
2.240 is to short imo . 2.250 minimum . At 2.240 that bullet is just so deep in the case I can’t think of any powder you’d want to use wont be highly compressed. Maybe to the point of not being able to seat that deep consistently with out a long drop tube .
 
I seat several loads at less than 2.240”, specifically I do:
LT-32 powder, Hornady 75gr OTM BTHP at 2.221”
LT-32 powder, Hornady 70gr GMX BTHP at 2.200”
LT-32 powder, Hornady 53gr OTM FBHP at 2.210”

All those seat with simple powder thrower, slight crunch for the 75gr and 70gr, but not significantly compressed, still rattles inside afterward.

All feed very well in M4 feed ramps and magazine fed (I have no M16 feed ramps) except the 75gr which is single loaded.

And both 73gr ELD and 75gr ELD seated at the same effective depth as the 75gr OTM (basically base aligned), so different COAL but the same powder volume use (and the same powder weight/charge works fine).


Andrew - Lancaster, CA
NRA Life Member, CRPA member, Calguns.net contributor, CGF / SAF / FPC / CCRKBA / GOA / NAGR / NRA-ILA contributor, USCCA member - Support your defenders!
 
OK , here's a 77gr smk seated to 2.240

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This is 23gr AR-comp one of my best loads for my AR with that bullet .
That's filled to mid shoulder , my 23gr of IMR-4895 fills it just a tad more . Compare that filled to mid shoulder with pic above .
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Not sure what powders you all are using but the standard stick powders like AR-comp , Varget , IMR-4064 , H & IMR 4895 fill the case up .
 
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Max length (nominal) to fit a magazine is 2.260. That should work fine.

I load 2.250 just to have that .010 extra clearance for reliability.

As far as powder compression....if .010 is the difference between "go" and "no go"...I don't know what to tell you.

In my 1 in 8 twist barrel,I don't even load 69 gr bullets anymore. I load 77 gr MK's or Nos Comps,or I load Hornady 75 gr BTHP Match. The Hornady's are cheaper and advertise a better BC. I mostly use them. Note the 75 gr AMAX will not load to 2,260. The ogive will enter the neck.

For myself,the powder of choice for the 75 gr Hornady is RE-15. See the Hornady load manual,the AR-15 match load page.
I have no problem loading it to 2.250
 
I’ve loaded enough compressed loads to know that .010 can be all the difference . I’ve came across it several times where the most I could seat is X amount and not .010 more . If you’ve never come across that , then you haven’t loaded enough in small cartridges with Long bullets and slow powders .

I’d also like to add that I hope my comments aren’t taken as carved in stone . I was quite clear in my original post about seating depth 2.240 is too short . Why ? because you don’t need to it’s that simple there is zero reason to seat that deep and take up more room in that little tiny case . Can you , sure but why would you . I also load the 77’s with a crimp groove and I seat to 2.250 Which crimps into the top center of the groove .

Again I’m not saying you can’t just asking why would you ?
 
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Yeah IMR 4320 is a real case filler , 55gr bullets can be slightly compressed at 5.56 pressures . It’s really about stick powders and how they may bridge in the case when you drop the powder in quickly . I’ve been loading IMR 4895 and I thought seating was going well but several bullets were seated .010+ longer then what most were or intended . Turns out the powder was bridging just right and not allowing the bullet to seat to the intended depth .

I had to go to a solid seating stem when seating my 162gr AP 308 bullets because my floating seater stem die like Redding comp seater die would not seat them deep enough do to the compressed load .

It’s not a daily thing but I do shoot a lot of heavy/long for cartridge bullets so compressed loads are not uncommon for me . The ball powders that are compressed are the worst IMO because the powders settles in the case well and there’s not much allowable space left for the powder to compress into . The bullet almost feel like it hits a stop and the bullet just pushes back out what ever amount the powder wants it to . To be honest I don’t know if the bullet gets pushed back out or the press just flexes similar to When sizing a case and the bullet just stops being seated deeper even though the die is set up to do so . In those circumstances you’ve got to be careful because you could bulge the brass by overly compressing the powder .
 
Accurate LT-32 is an extruded powder that is chopped about 1/3 the length of H4895 and Varget. Similar in appearance but shorter, and fills cases less because there is less wasted volume, more similar to ball powder.

9f7d7021c3ea5804a7f86cb7878100a6.jpg



Andrew - Lancaster, CA
NRA Life Member, CRPA member, Calguns.net contributor, CGF / SAF / FPC / CCRKBA / GOA / NAGR / NRA-ILA contributor, USCCA member - Support your defenders!
 
That’s a real nice size powder should be really good for metering and as you say fill rate . It appears to be a relatively fast buring powder for the cartridge , somewhere in the IMR 4198 / H-322 area . Which is fine in general but may be a bit fast for the 77gr bullets . Not that you can’t use it just that it’s not really optimal.
 
I had the same problem as you. Some times the bolt would not go fully into battery. Try loading a resized case with no bullet and see if it will chamber. If resized cases will work but loaded ones do not you have a bullet seating problem. Probably the shoulder collapse pointed out by others. Flat based bullets can be hard to start some times and are more prone to this. I invested in an RCBS Precision MIC. Used properly it allows you to see just how the chamber of you gun allows the cases to lengthen. The RCBS Mic allows you to see just how much you are setting the shoulder back during resizing. My goal is to size to give me 0.002 to 0.003 clearence.
 
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