Advice of the More Experienced Need

[Pirate69]

I have a Winchester 94 that I want to cast load. It is a 30 cal WCF. I bought a Lee C309-170-F mold. It is dropping a 0.311" boolit. I think this is good for my situation. Loaded a couple of test rounds this afternoon. COL was set to 2.50". Max COL is 2.55". Tried a throat fit. The two rounds chambered with minor resistance. Not enough to worry about any stress on the lever. Upon ejecting each round, I could see the rifling lands very clearly on the boolits. They were almost as clear as you would expect on a barrel slug. I measured the length of the lands showing and they are about 0.27". Yes, over a 1/4". I think the resistance was from the lands rather than throat fit. However, the bullet was not seated any deeper in the case as a result of contact with the lands; I measured.

Obviously, this qualifies as a JAM fit. Is a JAM fit acceptable with a cast boolit. My initial plans are to shoot only 8.0 grains of Unique with the 170 grainer; but I may go up in charge. If my math is correct, I would have to seat the boolit with about 0.25" of bullet showing to get it off the lands. What am I missing here?:?

[Shiloh]

I have the Lyman version #311041. I get engraving as well in my sons '94. I seat a Lyman 314299 for the Krag and '03 to engrave. I have never had any problems. I am however using slower powders. SR 4759 Clone and AA 5744

Shiloh

[beagle]

They'll probably shoot well like that. I have a 311291 that does that and it's very accurate. If hunting, I'd use another bullet but for plinking and targets and varmints you'll be fine./beagle

[Larry Gibson]

Does your COL allow a crimp in the crimp groove? You will want a mild crimp at least with those loads. Besides recoil the force of the magazine spring can drive bullets back into the case of rounds in the mag tube if they are not properly crimped. I would also suggest 10 - 11 gr Unique with that bullet, you may find it more accurate. If you want a good hunting load use 28 gr 4895 under that bullet.

Larry Gibson

[geargnasher]

Like Larry said, give them a bit of a crimp (either roll just under the front step of the crimp groove, or use a Lee FCD) and the COAL should be fine.

I'm a little curious about the engraving, I would expect the test cartridge to debullet upon extraction if that much engraving was occuring. How does a boolit fit if inserted into the muzzle nose-first? I'm not clear whether the engraving was on the nose (the part that "should" be about the size of the bore, i.e. lands) or on the driving bands. I know much less than 1/4" of boolit body is exposed when seated to the crimp groove, but I don't know your trim length, either. How about a picture?

Gear

[Pirate69]

Thanks everyone. Seems like this may not be an issue. I will see if I can get a photo this weekend and post it.

[Bret4207]

You should be fine. Start low and work up and realize cast is generally much more forgiving than jacketed regarding pressure build up from things like this. I don't think you'll have any problems, but it always pays to be observant and err to the side of caution.

[Pirate69]

Hope this shows well enough. Look at the round on the left side. You can see the 1/4" tracing in the middle of the boolit.

http://i718.photobucket.com/albums/ww187/Pirate69-photo/016.jpg

[Cactus Farmer]

They look fine. The real test is in the shooting.
Is the "ring" on the nose from the mold or your nose punch? If it's from the nose punch you may be swelling the nose a touch. Try to find a better fitting punch or send me a boolit and I can make a punch that will be an exact fit. Make 'em hollow and fill it with epoxy putty and with a boolit in the sizer and the punch in place,hang a weight on the handle till it's hard. It's harder to explain than to do. Remember to put release agent on the boolit nose.
Try an unsized boolit in the muzzle and then try a sized one. Do they go in the bore the same? If not the boolit is being squeezed a little while sizing.

[HORNET]

That ring could also be from the seating punch. It does look like it's bulging the nose a little.

[Larry Gibson]

Pirate69

The problem no doubt is from the nose distortion caused either during sizing or during seating. Suggest a proper nose punch or seating stem as already mentioned. Also the problem may be exasperated by seating and crimping at the same time. You might try backing the die out so it isn't crimping, seat the bullets to the proper depth and then back off the seating stem and adjust the die so it crimps only. Yes that's an extra step but most of us learn to do it that way, especially with soft cast bullets.

Your loaded bullets should not show any deformation at the nose or at least very little.

Larry Gibson

[Pirate69]

Lots of good advice and information here. Now I need to sort it out and make sure it is clear what I am doing. First of all, the bullets are not sized. The mold is dropping them at 0.311". I am tumble lubing them, sticking a GC on the bottom and seating. The first time I checked the rounds for fit, I had not screwed the die down far enough to crimp the bullet. These rounds were crimped today while I was loading a few more at Larry's 10 grain Unique suggestion. I believe I saw the ring at the top prior to the rounds being crimped. I will load a few more tomorrow and verify. In the meantime, I will be shooting some tomorrow morning.

[Cactus Farmer]

You might look at a bigger expander ball to releave the tightness in the neck. The crimp will keep the boolits in place from recoil. PM me and we'll talk about a seater stem and nose punch. Might need a Lee factory crimp die too.

[canyon-ghost]

You might be fine in a lever gun but, if it wants to kick too hard you can always turn the seating die another 1/8 of a turn. I use a dial caliper, the best measurements to reduce pressure are .005" to .020" from the lands. A lot of loads I run as close as possible to the lands, then seat another .005" deeper. Just to be clear, it's only 5 one thousandths deeper. That gives me accuracy with a hair-width throat clearance. And, that set of specifications comes straight from Lyman Cast Bullet Handbook #3.

Good Luck,
Ron

5 to 20 thousandths

[Pirate69]

Heck with waiting until tomorrow to check. I backed the die off enough that it will not crimp. The seated bullet still shows the ring. Looks like I either need to size the bullets to relieve some of the neck tension or install a larger expander plug; which I have (303 British). Something to play with anyway.

[Larry Gibson]

Heck with waiting until tomorrow to check. I backed the die off enough that it will not crimp. The seated bullet still shows the ring. Looks like I either need to size the bullets to relieve some of the neck tension or install a larger expander plug; which I have (303 British). Something to play with anyway.

Are you using an M-die? Doesn't sound like it to me. If not then I'd suggest the Lyman .31 with cast bullets of .310 or larger. That's what I use with my .311 bullets in all of my 30-30 loads.

Larry Gibson

[Pirate69]

I am using Lee dies.:oops::oops:

[canyon-ghost]

Heck with waiting until tomorrow to check. I backed the die off enough that it will not crimp. The seated bullet still shows the ring. Looks like I either need to size the bullets to relieve some of the neck tension or install a larger expander plug; which I have (303 British). Something to play with anyway.


8-) Now, that's a handloader for ya! :veryconfu

[blackpowder man]

The Lee universal case expander has worked great for my .30 caliber stuff. I shoot that same boolit over 16.5 grains of 2400 in my 94 and my old marlin sized .309 with the lee push thru and crimped with the factory crimp die a litlle deeper than what you've done and they shoot great. The marlin has a short throat but the 94 is longer.

[geargnasher]

The Lee universal case expander has worked great for my .30 caliber stuff. I shoot that same boolit over 16.5 grains of 2400 in my 94 and my old marlin sized .309 with the lee push thru and crimped with the factory crimp die a litlle deeper than what you've done and they shoot great. The marlin has a short throat but the 94 is longer.

The Lee Universal expander will work IF you are only using .309" boolits!

Standard Lee dies (I have three sets in .30-30) all have .307" expander balls and the neck-sizing portion of the die is .321-4" which with most brass gives you about .005" total "bullet tension", which really means that you take a .311" boolit and seat it and when you fire it, you get a .308-9" boolit and split case necks in about two reloads.

Gear

[geargnasher]

I am using Lee dies.:oops::oops:

Nuttin' wrong with Lee dies, great product, just not correctly sized for what you're doing. If you use the Lee factory resizing die and the Lyman expander "M" die that Larry mentioned, you'll kill your brass in very short order with those .311" boolits. What you need to do is hone out the neck portion of your Lee sizer die until it sizes the case necks to .327" or so, you should have a loaded diameter of around .330-1" with .311" boolits. THEN, take your .303 Lee expander plug, turn it down to .310" with a drill and some 400-grit emery paper, and use IT in your .30-30 sizing die just like you said yourself. OR, after fixing the sizer, get a Lyman M die and a Lee universal decapping rod at the same time (straight one, no ball, just a pin) and use it in your sizing die, then expand with the M die as a separate step.

Your fired case necks should be about .334" outside diameter, .330-ish loaded with .311 boolits, .327" coming out of the sizer, and .328" after being dragged back over the expander ball, leaving you with about .002" neck tension on the boolit when it's seated.

What's going to happen with what you're doing: Sizer crushes case neck to .322", expander brings it up to .325", boolit crams down in there with .005" interference fit, the expansion goes two directions (boolit gets longer and thinner, case mouth stretches) to get you about .327-8" loaded case neck diameter. Your boolits are probably at most .309" at this point, which may be fine for your gun, but you don't want to deform them that much while seating if you can help it. This is fired in a .334" chamber, where the neck blows up twelve thousandths over what the sizer squeezed it down to. Then you size the case again, shoot it again, and it splits!

Hope that wasn't too confusing, I think you get what you're trying to do. Just use some sort of case mouth flare to help get your boolits started and protect the driving bands during seating, even a tapered steel punch works just fine.

Gear

[geargnasher]

I just looked at the photos, tell me three things:

What kind of alloy are you using?
When did you cast them (exactly)?
What are you using to flare the case mouth?

The noses are obviously squished, which will make them fat and cause the engraving. I suspect the alloy is super-soft or it would debullet upon extraction with those kinds of engraving marks.

Gear

[Pirate69]

Not sure if I followed what geargnasher is telling me. I do however use a Lee Universal Expander.

I am unsure which Lee expander I should be using. The barrel slugs at 0.309" and the Lee mold drops a 0.311" boolit. The 0.002" oversize seems about right. The Lee resizing die currently has a 0.307" expander ball. That gives me 0.004" of bullet tension. I do have a 0.310" Lee expander ball I could install. Is the 0.001" enough tension if use a mild crimp?

Edit: Did not see page two until just now. geargnasher is clearer now.

Second Edit: Alloy is recovered range lead (good call gear....). The boolits were cast one day before being loaded, no time to harden. I do use a Lee Universal Expander. I am wondering if I can get by with resizing the boolits to 0.309" and using them in the 0.309" barrel with the GC. Wish I had an additional 0.001".

[DLCTEX]

I have that same mould and the nose does cast oversize. My Marlin rifle also engraves the nose and is not a problem, although I am not pushing the boolit too hard. I'd have to check, but I think that is the Lee seating die that I reversed the seating stem to use the flat base to seat the boolit with to avoid deforming the nose. As to resizing the case I use the collet neck size die (Lee) and adjust the die to size down the neck just enough to give a little neck tension. This does require sorting the brass by maker's headstamp to get a consistent tension. A good crimp has not failed to extract loaded rounds successfully and some slight pressure is required to chamber a round. Good accuracy and no leading.

[Pirate69]

Thanks DLCTEX,
That sounds encouraging.

Since you are only neck sizing, does that give you any problems in leveraction rifle?

[jimone]

Looks like the nose is larger than bore dia., sizing will not help that part. I use Lee collet dies and seat .311 Ranch Dog TLC311-165RF with no problem, bell cases by hand after trimming, chamfering,and deburring with a 3/8" bolt ground to a point.

[canyon-ghost]

:coffee: Pirate, Jimone has a good idea, the way you work brass can make a difference.
I start new brass with a Full Length sizing die (they size the outside of the case to chamber dimensions and de-cap)
Then, I chamfer both the inside case neck and the outside with a tool steel chamfer.
The last step is to run all the cases through the expander die, you only want about 1/16th inch flare on the case neck. Done very lightly, so that the crimp removes the sharp edge sticking out, it makes the bullet base easier to insert. You really shouldn't feel any pressure from it, the expander should just 'kiss' the brass.
This seems labor intensive but, if you infuse pressure or force on some of my smaller caliber cases, they'll collapse. A 22 Hornet or 32-20 WCF case is very thin. I'm also using ground mica as a lube absorbent to keep bullets from sticking together. Mica will crush under pressure and is a lube itself, a bit like the 'white graphite' the auto stores used to sell.