9 Attachment(s)
The myth of reloading the 7.62 Nagant M1895 gas seal cartridge - Try this at home!
So I kind of lept in to reloading some gas seal 7.62 Nagant M1895 revolver cartridges. I wasn’t really planning anything out, just messing with things until I figured out how to make it work. There really is NO black art to making these, in fact I think everything can be done with the Lee 7.62 conversion dies, almost ;).
Here is my reload (left, and the Fiocchi factory load, right) Attachment 202881 Attachment 202882 :)
Needed:
Factory case: Prvi Partizan, Fiocchi, or Starline.
Russian surplus I believe is Berdan primed so enter at your own risk. I used once fired Fiocchi brass.
Dies: Although there is a lot of myth and rumor, the Lee 7.62 Nagant conversion dies will work fine. They have a 7.62 decapper and resizer, 32/20 thru the top expander, and a 32/20 bullet seat. You need a shell holder. I had a #16 that I ground the opening a little so the Fiocchi cases slid in. Not the best, but it works fine. (The Russian factory ammo won't fit in this die and I can't confirm any other manufacturer's brass will, but it works for Fiocchi). That’s it, BUT, I also used a 30-06 decapper because I wanted a .308 expander before I went into the 32-20. It works, but the Fiocchi brass is robust and I could have made it work without. (hint hint).
Primers: Small pistol. I used Federal. But I don’t prefer them.
Bullets: You need to, probably, slug the bore. I understand that you may find that the grooves are .309. I dunno, I didn’t do it mostly because I felt the .311 would be fine. I went with a 110 grain hollow point gas check. Mostly because it is the only .311s I had. Everyone seems to like the 75 or 82 or 98 grain range, but I wanted something more significant. Attachment 202883
Powder: This is easy.
Unique: 3.0 grains of Unique seems to be a fine starting load. Mine averaged 844 FPS at 3 feet from the muzzle. Respectable, no pressure signs, brass fell out of the cylinders. I would push this because accuracy seems to improve with a bit more speed. Groups at 25 feet were about 4 inches, on a good day, with a tail wind, downhill. But Unique is a great place to start. Unique 3.0 target: Attachment 202884 I only loaded 2 x Bullseye cartridges.
Bullseye: I trust Bullseye a little less than others with pressure variables, so I used the Bullseye to build 2 32/20 conversion rounds. I went with 3.0 grains because of some other 32 S&W long loads and 32/20 pistol loads. The bullet was on the heavy side for this charge, however, average velocity was 714 FPS and accuracy was just under 2 inches. I think this is a good starting point. Little recoil. Attachment 202889
Titegroup: I should have started with 2.8 grains of Titegroup but I went ahead and risked 3.0. Velocity was 985 average and 1031 max. Respectable, but it was a bit sharp. Accuracy was not better than Unique, which was about the same as factory at 25 feet.
4227: Based on a mild 32/20 115 grain load, I went with 7.5 grains of 4227. I trust 4227 so I didn’t feel too bad about that. Avg velocity was 882, max was 933. Accuracy was OUTSTANDING, here is the 25 foot target. Attachment 202885 (Well, OUTSTANDING for a Nagant with a 9 pound trigger pull and a guy next to me hitting me with his .40 S&W cases ejecting out of his automatic ...) :Fire:
Reloading:
Decap: As usual, lube the cases because the resizing die is tight. I almost didn’t push the case all the way, but in the interests of science I went for it and it was fine. I used the 30-06 expander/decapper die to expand a bit more than the 7.62 did. But I don’t think it was necessary.
Recap, rinse, repeat ...
Expanding: Through trial and error I realized just slowly expand the case down to the cannelure on the case. Go slow until you feel the correct pressure to start the expander in the case. You can collapse the case if you get in a hurry or force it, but the Nagant cases are thicker and more robust than the 32/20s so they can take some more handling. About that point the die will sufficiently bell the case. Don’t over do the expansion, there is no value. Test with your preferred bullet and when you can get it started, you’re done – you know the drill…
Charging: Put a safe but useful amount of your preferred powder in the case.
Seating: Put the bullet seat all the way into the die. Seat the bullet until it is as far past the case mouth as you like. Probably seat the bullet down to the case cannelure, I know my bullets were big for the task, so I had to seat them all the way down. They should be somewhere between flush with the case mouth and ¼ inch. Don’t get them too deep, there is no need. Attachment 202886
Gas crimp: I tried a couple of different ways to do this. I took the bullet seat out and went with the bare seating die, which works, you have to mess with it to get the crimp deep enough. Again, between 1/8th and 1/4th. You can see from the pictures. On a whim, when I was about done, I wondered what would happen if I just crimped conventionally – seat the bullet and keep crimping. So I seated a bullet at the correct depth, and then I backed off the bullet seat. I pushed the cartridge into the die until the resistance and then adjusted the seat back down. I then pushed the round into the die and was able to form the gas crimp. After that, I just seated the bullets in the usual manner with one cycle of the ram and the bullets were seated and the crimps formed. Attachment 202887 You can see that these are deeper seated. I didn't mess with that and just did 5 or 6 with the same set up to see how they would come out. These were the Titegroup, so the deeper seating may have an effect, but I don't have a Titegroup control group to compare to. But this is definitely the way to go, since it is one pass through the die.
Conclusion: The 7.62 Nagant is really not difficult to load to close to service specifications. There is no real folklore or mythology to understand. It really comes down to the usual process: set up the dies, and then run the cycle – decap/resize; prime; expand; charge; seat; and, crimp. No need for extra dies or steps. I would anneal the cases before you start just to get more life out of the cases. I am on my third load with the original cases and I never annealed them, but I will from now on. Attachment 202882
Good luck with yours. For the next round we are going with 119 grain plain base at cast about hardball alloy hardness. Attachment 202888
