If you were out to design an orphan cartridge, the 280 Ross would be it.

[AbitNutz]

I've been looking at a beautiful Ross in 280 Ross. If you were going to make a cartridge that could not be made out of another cartridge, the 280 Ross is right up there with the best of them. I like to shoot my guns, I'm funny that way. So no matter how odd or out of production, I have always found a way to shoot them...not this one.

Base diameter .534
Length 2.590
Rim diameter .556
Bullet .287

If you turn the rim off an H&H case or swage down an Ultra Mag case, you still have that .556 rim. Even if you started with a 50-110 case, squeezed it down from .550 to .534, then turned the rim down from .607 to .556, it's only 2.40" long...Argh!

Is there nothing that can be turned into this cartridge?

[Ola]

Someone has used .375 Ruger..

http://forum.nosler.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=22869

[Ballistics in Scotland]

The obvious way, although not cheap, is to use .450 Nitro Express, with a .545 head. Or .400.450 would reduce the forming job if you can get it. Size it just onto the beginning of the solid head and turn down what remains. You could do this with a mandrel made to fit an electric screwdriver, and files or a well sharpened carpenter's rebate plane. It's a nuisance, but when it's over, it's over. I think the broken die mentioned in Ola's url would be due to trying to force the H&H case all the way in. It shouldn't take that much force if you don't.

It is worth trying whether the Ross action actually needs that wide a rim. Perhaps it doesn't, and then the choices widen considerably. Have you made a chamber cast? A slight deviation from that .534in., well within acceptable manufacturing practice, might change which method you find best.

I would use some RWS 6.5x68R brass which I bought a long time ago for a 7mm. project, in the ridiculous belief that the world needs more cartridges, but have only ever used for making 7.7x60R. It measures at .520 head and .586 rim, and is about as strong as brass gets. It wasn't cheap, but might be cheaper than Bertram etc., and an easier forming job.

But the head is about .014in. undersize. Actually I am pretty sure this would be all right if you fireform it before using a full power charge for this rather powerful rifle, but "pretty sure" isn't quite what I would want. One solution would be to get some K&S 17/32in. OD brass tubing and ream it to 13mm. or 13/64in. Then I would slip a short collar over the solid web of the case. After the first firing it would be there for keeps. Easier and perhaps as good would be to use the adhesive copper strip people use to make reproduction Tiffany lampshades, but I bought for my copper bottom, on my model Victorian naval brig. I can't quite make my mind up yet.

A final option for which you do need a lathe and something more powerful than a reloading press, would be to add a rim to a Ruger case. I know of this only from an article I read long ago, and it was for a double rifle, which exerts longitudinal pressure on a greater part of the rim's circumference than a bolt action. The author turned down the rear of a case to a very slight reverse taper, a little deeper than the rim thickness. Then he pressed on a turned brass rim by hand, and squeezed it in a fly-press using a slightly cone-shaped die to swage it inwards onto the reverse taper. Then it had to be turned, front, back and diameter.

[AbitNutz]

Can you really swage the head of a brass case from .550 or so down to .534? I have a corbin swage press and I can only imagine what kind of force you would need. What are the odds of getting a case stuck in the die doing this?

I've formed cases before but only the likes of 357 Herrett and 300 GNR...What's it like to smoosh a case like that? What happens to the case? It must grow a tremendous amount.

[Ballistics in Scotland]

Basically you can't, and don't have to. I am pretty sure some people do it, with the right equipment, which is likely to be expensive. There would have to be some sort of plug to preserve the diameter of the primer pocket. What I meant is that you must reduce the hollow part of the case, right up to where, with less than enormous force, the solid head stops you, and then turn down the outer diameter of that unreduced head. The idea is to avoid having a thinning of the body wall right in front of the head. A case separation there is much more dangerous than an ordinary separation due to excessively frequent reloading of brass, since there isn't a little cup to preserve the seal.

What you do with that last quarter-inch or so won't lengthen the case enough to notice. It is forming the length of the body that will do that. Yes, the .450 Express will lengthen considerably, and also thicken up a little.

Any ambitious forming job needs careful application of the best lube you can get. I still use STP oil treatment, but if you swage bullets you probably have other lubes which will be just as good.

If you can get a .375 Ruger case or can turn a metal dummy, you would find out if the Ross will feed it, with that smaller rim. It will save you a lot of trouble if it doesn't. If that doesn't work, please understand, any sequence of dies and annealing anybody tells you might prove wrong, even if they have made it work - and with this one I haven't. What follows is just my guess.

With the Ross I would make a simple cylindrical die if I wanted to reduce the .450 or similar. If you have a .375 Ruger die, or if they are cheap now, it might make a pretty good intermediate die. I would anneal, run the case up to the shoulder in the Ruger die, and anneal again before trying for the neck. Then I would do it over again with the .280 die.

[AbitNutz]

If it wasn't a sin I would either re-chamber or re-barrel the rifle...What would be a good cartridge to go to? Is there another that uses a .287 bullet? lol...

[dtknowles]

Can you really swage the head of a brass case from .550 or so down to .534? I have a corbin swage press and I can only imagine what kind of force you would need. What are the odds of getting a case stuck in the die doing this?

I've formed cases before but only the likes of 357 Herrett and 300 GNR...What's it like to smoosh a case like that? What happens to the case? It must grow a tremendous amount.

I think I read in a book by Nonte that you can do it using an hydraulic press. You don't have to go past the pressure ring because since the head is solid you can just turn it on a lathe. When designing these case forming dies you should have an appropriate body taper so the die will release the case more easily. You blow the case back out when you fire form the brass.

Tim

[Ballistics in Scotland]

If it wasn't a sin I would either re-chamber or re-barrel the rifle...What would be a good cartridge to go to? Is there another that uses a .287 bullet? lol...

Well it is. But if it wasn't, or if you found a lesser rifle someone had built for the Ross cartridge, I think just about every combination of 7mm. case and chamber allows at least .003in. clearance when loaded with a .284 bullet. So any of them will respond to change of diet if you can get the bullets. Swaging existing .284 bullets up to size should be a very simple one-die job when you have the Corbin press. There is the 7mm. Remingon Ultra Magnum if the rebated rim will work.

But a powerful iron reloading press would be enough for reducing a case down to the solid head but not the head itself, as dtknowles and I have described. You don't need an expander button for that job, so if you omit it, you could press or knock out the case with a brass rod. An improvised die as a first stage, .535in. cylindrical, would permit a wider rod.

[AbitNutz]

weirdly enough, Woodliegh makes .287 bullets that are readily available. So I'm sure they could be used in any 7mm with a bit of care.

[rr2241tx]

I'm betting 280 Ross ammo and brass is available in Canada. Might be easier to drive up there from Ohio than to try making your own.

[Red River Rick]

I'm betting 280 Ross ammo and brass is available in Canada. Might be easier to drive up there from Ohio than to try making your own.

I can assure you..............it's not!

RRR

[B. Lumpkin]

Have you tried Bob Hayley in Texas? He is a pretty common name when it comes to making odd ball cases.

[Artful]

http://forum.nosler.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=22869
seems fairly easy


1. Use a .348 Win. sizing die with the stem removed, adjust the die until it sizes the neck just down to the shoulder junction. The purpose of this is to reduce the neck diameter in two easier steps and prevent collapse of the shoulder.
2. Use a .280 Ross sizing die backed off 1/16" from the shellholder and resize the case.
3. Use a .280 Ross sizing die adjusted down to the shellholder and resize the case again.
4. Trim to 2.600 and deburr.
5. Full length resize again with the stem and expander ball in place.
6. Check to see if the cases chamber in your rifle

Other case I've heard of using was 348 WCF

[koehlerrk]

My Handbook of Cartridge Conversions says can be made from 300 H&H cases.

Turn the belt 0.525" dia, anneal case, f/l size and trim to length.

[AbitNutz]

My Handbook of Cartridge Conversions says can be made from 300 H&H cases.

Turn the belt 0.525" dia, anneal case, f/l size and trim to length.

Getting the appropriate head diameter can be gotten to in a couple of ways. Turning the belt off an H&H case is one. However, that leaves you with the problem of the 280 Ross's rim of .556. The rim you end up with on an H&H case is then only .532. That's a pretty big difference. Most extractors will slip off a rim that small.

It seems you can get the base diameter or the rim diameter but not the length or the length and base diameter but not the rim. Unfortunately, there very few parent cartridges where you can get all three, the rim diameter, the base diameter and the length. That's what makes it such a difficult or impossible case to replicate.

The best candidate would be something like a 450/400 Nitro Express. Start by swaging down the base from .544 to .534. Then turn the rim down from .614 to 556 and then cut the length down from .325 to 2.6. However, the 450/400 NE has a weird rim thickness that could be a problem, .040 instead of the more common .070 or so.

There is no doubt that making a 280 ross case that conforms to all aspects of the Ross dimensions is quite a chore.

[Ballistics in Scotland]

Would you believe that Numrich Gunparts have extractors and ejectors for the MkII and MkIII Ross rifles? I don't know exactly what they looked like, but if they couldn't be copied, I am pretty sure you could weld or silver solder and reharden a spare to make it suitable for the Ruger cartridge, without de-originalizing such a cherished rifle.

http://www.gunpartscorp.com/Manufacturers/Ross-33466.htm

Double rifles, with their wide extractors, didn't need as thick a rim as bolt actions, but there was a thicker rimmed version, used by Jeffery if I remember correctly, which is available from Buffalo Arms. I don't know how good they are, for a higher pressure rifle. I have an even vaguer memory that Bertram used to offer this option, but their main UK dealer no longer lists it.

http://www.buffaloarms.com/450_Nitro_Express_Reloading_Brass_it-852785.aspx

Apart from the rim issue, I wouldn't feel very happy about expanding .300 H&H to .535in. Of course you must on no account anneal anywhere near as close to the head as would affect that part of the job. The 6.5x68R I mentioned (for which I would still prefer a thin brass collar), are quite a bit closer in body diameter. The RWS cases I used are available from Huntingdon's for quite a bit less than .450, and while there is some debate about whether limited-production brass can be as good as makers like RWS, I don't think anybody has suggested they could be better.

http://www.huntingtons.com/store/product.php?productid=17344&page=1

[2152hq]

Here's a long thread from the Ross Rifle Forum on reloading for the 280 Ross.
http://rossrifle.com/forum/index.php?topic=65.0

[AbitNutz]

Is this is just a giant pain or what? I can't think of a cartridge this modern that is this problematic.

[Ballistics in Scotland]

Is this is just a giant pain or what? I can't think of a cartridge this modern that is this problematic.

In a moment of sailing terror, cold and partial immersion in my youth, someone said "Never mind, think of all the fun you are having."

2152hq's link is extremely informative, and although some of the sources quoted are no longer valid, Bertram .280 Flanged brass from Grafs is, at a price. I think it was Burt Lancaster in the role of Elmer Gantry who said "You want salvation, and you want it cheap?"

http://www.grafs.com/retail/catalog/product/productId/1124

The .280 Flanged (the favourite of King George V) is very nearly the same as the Ross except for its rim. My Load from a Disk program's database makes them identical, but Barnes says the shoulder diameters are .422 and .406 respectively. That shouldn't matter on a first firing, but length to shoulder will need checking if the semi-rim you create doesn't support the case for headspacing purposes. You might even find it fits with the rim unreduced, but if not, you will probably have to cut a groove too.

I would be wary of shooting many .284 bullets in a larger groove diameter. My own experience is that thin jacketed .308 bullets do set up and give fairly good accuracy in a .312 grooved .303, but solid based boat-tails don't, and will tumble. If even one thin-jacketed bullet does that, it will be when the buck of a lifetime makes a rude gesture before departing. Besides, although byblow of gases won't materially reduce velocity, it may materially increase erosion of that particularly precious bore.

[AbitNutz]

In a moment of sailing terror, cold and partial immersion in my youth, someone said "Never mind, think of all the fun you are having."

2152hq's link is extremely informative, and although some of the sources quoted are no longer valid, Bertram .280 Flanged brass from Grafs is, at a price. I think it was Burt Lancaster in the role of Elmer Gantry who said "You want salvation, and you want it cheap?"

http://www.grafs.com/retail/catalog/product/productId/1124

The .280 Flanged (the favourite of King George V) is very nearly the same as the Ross except for its rim. My Load from a Disk program's database makes them identical, but Barnes says the shoulder diameters are .422 and .406 respectively. That shouldn't matter on a first firing, but length to shoulder will need checking if the semi-rim you create doesn't support the case for headspacing purposes. You might even find it fits with the rim unreduced, but if not, you will probably have to cut a groove too.

I would be wary of shooting many .284 bullets in a larger groove diameter. My own experience is that thin jacketed .308 bullets do set up and give fairly good accuracy in a .312 grooved .303, but solid based boat-tails don't, and will tumble. If even one thin-jacketed bullet does that, it will be when the buck of a lifetime makes a rude gesture before departing. Besides, although byblow of gases won't materially reduce velocity, it may materially increase erosion of that particularly precious bore.

Shockingly enough Woodliegh makes and has readily available .287 bullets...it's a $%@! cases that I can't get hold of.

[reed1911]

Okay, lets strike at it this way. How many cases do you need and what price would you pay? I think it can be done for 3.75-4.00 a piece if there is enough interest we can move forward.

[Yukoner]

Shockingly enough Woodliegh makes and has readily available .287 bullets...it's a $%@! cases that I can't get hold of.

I know this is an old thread, but just came across this thread. Looks like 280 Ross brass can be formed from 300 Win Mag..... https://forum.nosler.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=34393

Ted

[salpal48]

The 280 Ross rimless can be made from 375 Ruger. Three Forms and a Trim are needed .

[Yukoner]

Then it should be able to also be formed from 300 Ultra Mag, right?

Ted

[Kosh75287]

I was thinking maybe the 8x56 Mannlicher. It has the rim, but not the length.

If you want another orphan round, ALSO British, I was thinking of the 7x43mm round their Army developed for the "Bullpup" platform (and, if memory serves, the round for which the FN-FAL was originally intended). Mighta been a nice medium-range medium game round.