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Thread: 350 Legend and Cast Boolits

  1. #41
    Boolit Master Oldfeller's Avatar
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    I am "jest guessing" that you are talking about the buckshot, if so they weigh 70 grains each or 210 grains for a full string of 3.

    If you are talking powder coated blue slugs pictured from up thread, the tall one is 200 grains and the other two are 158 grains.

    Like I said, I'm jest guessing here .....
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  2. #42
    Boolit Master

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    Years ago, I cast small wad cutters from a .358 mold by placing a gas check into a driving band. The size depended on which band used but I could cast 25 or 40 grain wadcutters. Several were loaded under a 105 SWC for a multi projectile cartridge. This was in the mid 1980 when ‘multi munitions’ rounds were advertised. Working up the load was done slowly as they went deep in a .357 case. They worked well.

    Nothing says the same thing couldn’t be done with the 350 Legend. The last hundred or so I had were given to a buddy but they were easy to make and not terribly labor intensive to cast. PCd and loaded under a suitable rn boolit might have merit.
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  3. #43
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    Fcvan, That reminds me of the button bullets we used to cast decades ago.

    I also seem to remember my grandfather doing something with gas checks in molds while casting. Ill bet thats what he was doing. I dont remember him making duplex loads but Ill bet he was doing exactly that! Thanks for the memory!

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    Last edited by cwlongshot; 09-17-2019 at 07:22 AM.
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  4. #44
    Boolit Master Oldfeller's Avatar
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    If you can't get a string of 3 triple aught balls to even make it out of the mold, then force loading the string of 3 multi-ball idea is certainly a bust.

    Shame, that. At least I didn't have to pay $60 to learn this little factoid.

    Still waiting on a replacement full length sizing die, so I started working on my lower, tuning the trigger mating surfaces and getting a spring kit started on the way.

    Having gotten that started on its week long trip to get to me, I am now gently cleaning the bore itself, getting a good feel for the barrel in doing so. I am using mild bore cleaning (copper removing mild abrasive liquid) on a tight patch so I can feel and "remove" any tight spots due to minor roughness in the nitride coating.

    "Fiddle work" is what I would normally call it, stuff that really isn't necessary but it fills up the time until other bits and pieces can arrive.

    Called LEE this morning about the die body, it comes out of heat treat today and ships by Friday. This smells like my long lead item now ......
    Last edited by Oldfeller; 09-19-2019 at 09:30 AM.
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  5. #45
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    I was talking with a buddy of mine and the 350 Legend came up. I had a thought for a "super" blackout. A 300 to 350 gr cast bullet, OAL would be about 1.25 to 1.375", so having never seen a sectioned case I did have a couple of question. 1) would the case need to be inside reamed to accept that long of a bullet. 2) would the twist be fast enough to stabilize a bullet that long at sub sonic velocities. The fastest twist I could find in a barrel blank was a 1 in 10. I found a couple of online calculators and I couldn't get an answer out of them as my velocity was "too slow". In a AR carbine or AR pistol with a suppressor either one should make a fantastic brush gun for hogs and just about anything else at reasonable range.

  6. #46
    Boolit Master Oldfeller's Avatar
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    First dumb sorta question / not a real answer is that I only have cases made from 5.56 brass. I don't have any 350 Legend brass at all.

    First kinda sorta answer, I could put about an inch of bullet inside the cases I have on hand right now with NOT MUCH ROOM FOR POWDER, so your 1.25" scenario sounds a good bit more reasonable than your 1.375" scenario.

    Your proposed long bullet won't go deep into the case in the existing LEE blackout format without over expanding the case to the point it won't chamber.

    Next, why in the world do you need a 350 grain bullet? You won't ever stop a streamlined 250 grainer unless you are shooting a fully armored 500 pound HOGZILLA himself, there just isn't enough pig to stop it as streamlined penetrates like nobody's business.

    SWheeler shot a 1,100 pound bison cow and just barely stopped a medium meplat equipped 8mm Maximum bullet at 285 grains (bowed out the thick hide on the far side as I remember, but it did expand some along the way). Streamline that bullet and it won't expand and it won't stop either, unless ol' Hogzilla is wearing metal plate armor.

    There is a spin calculator on Beartooth Bullets that we used to do airgun pellet stability back when we were shooting armadillos at 900 fps, the calculator we used won't wuss out on you because you are shooting too slow. Can't say you can trust the stability results all that much when you get to the marginal side things, but it won't choke out on you.

    Also realize we weren't shooting streamlined conventional bullet forms at that speed --- you could design something that looked like a lawn dart that would stabilize naturally in the air as it loafed along. Go look at the current crop of high BC shotgun slugs for some good ideas. You need one of these tricks for what you are trying to do, I am afraid.

    Yes, I am saying that 16 twist is very likely too slow a twist to stabilize a huge streamlined bullet of a conventional format --- but it could toss a heavy slow low drag lead headed lawn dart like nobody's business.

    They are having some real issues with the 30 cal heavy Blackout bullet LEE sells because it doesn't stabilize very well at 10 twist driven at 1000 fps and less. Indeed, a lot of the terminal effectiveness of that bullet and round come from the long slug swapping ends inside the first 6-8 inches of penetration making a 2-3" swipe wound while doing so. Past that, the bullet just plows a somewhat straight meplat driven slightly bigger than caliber wound channel using the butt of the boat tail as the flat point.

    Rethink your approach some and simply say "I am going heavy and slow and the form of the bullet has to air stabilize itself like a lawn dart or a Brenike slug for me to have a thing that is sub-sonic and HEAVY and still always arrives point first accurately --- out of a 1 in 16 twist rate barrel anyway.

    Or build an unstable bullet that may swap ends in the air on the long shots ......


    ================================


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    DO NOT COPY ANY OF THIS


    New thoughts based on some new experiments --- you will have to go to page 3 to see this development of new stuff.

    You CAN do a very deadly subsonic based on loading 3 triple aught buckshot still on the string and a 9mm conical bullet on top of them, leaving just enough room for a moderate sub-sonic powder charge.

    Is this better than a super heavy single slug that isn't going to like being loaded that deeply into the tapered case?

    That is up to you ...............
    Last edited by Oldfeller; 01-05-2020 at 12:54 AM.
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  7. #47
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    Oldfeller, you can get the buckshot mold to cast all 3 balls at the same time no problem. You just have to run the lead real hot. And keep a good steady pace. It is not like casting with a regular mold. Just run them both hot. You have to figure out the right pace.

  8. #48
    Boolit Master Oldfeller's Avatar
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    Yes, Tomme that would help a lot -- something you can try that always seems to work once you get the mold really hot is to flux the pot good, then put the bottom pour nozzle into the cut off plate bevel and just open the valve all the way and HOLD everything tight for 10 seconds, then turn the lead off and pull the mold away from the nozzle.

    This offers maximum flow, perfect centering and "hot as possible" lead delivered at maximum pressure. What it also does is makes a strongly sticking bullet, every time.

    I used to do this trick when I was proof measuring runs of LEE molds, something I did several times when I was posting statistics on LEE manufacturing capabilities, back in my QC Engineer days when I had good measuring tools available to me.

    The trick works, but like I said -- a sticky bullet every time. Part of that is the molds were "as shipped" (not lapped or prepped) and any microburrs were going to get a chance to show their butts off first thing.
    Last edited by Oldfeller; 09-29-2019 at 01:12 AM.
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  9. #49
    Boolit Master Oldfeller's Avatar
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    I mentioned cleaning up the bore of my new gun as the required proof shots left the bore in a very messy condition.

    What I quickly discovered was there was residue in the bore, in the approximate center of the barrel. It wasn't leading, and it had some copper adhering to it, but it appeared to be a lump of hard residue left down inside one groove, looks like residue from the nitriding processes.

    I used to be QC Engineer over the Fayetteville Black and Decker plant that had Heat Treat Dept in it, so I am familiar with the nitriding molten salt baths, both the molten salt and follow up acid and alkali baths and then the hot liquid based black oxide bath systems that B&D used as follow up processes to molten salt bath nitriding.

    This bore with a lump of centrally located foreign material in one groove is consistent with what can fairly easily happen in a nitriding or a black oxide process, the salt remnants left in the barrel tend to be in the middle of the item and adhere to whichever position was down when the parts were first racked horizontally (salt baths are generally done vertically if at all possible for drainage of the molten salt, but black oxide baths are generally done willy nilly due to packing considerations).

    Both processes will leave residues in gun bores, both residues can cause leading if not taken care of. Both processes leave hard salts as their residue, both types of residue adhere to steel very well as they are chemically one with the left over hard oxide layers on the outside of the steel that you call "black oxiding" or "nitriding".

    Most of the rough bores you hear about are really this sort of stuff left over from the processing of the barrels post rifling in the nitriding/black oxiding baths, and many times it gets confused with "rust lumps" which it can resemble (and it can fairly easily become that in humid climates because nitriding and black oxide salts are both very hydroscopic and a lump of such left over on an internal steel barrel groove is trouble waiting to happen)

    Anything that can strip this stuff away, be it physical or chemical is going to remove some of the desired black coating from the bore, leaving you exposed to rusting over time, so be aware your war with devil rust is just beginning, with ol' debb'l rust getting a head start in the first skirmish.

    (more later)


    THIS IS ME EDITING IN SOME INFORMATION FOUND SEVERAL DAYS LATER ABOUT THE LUMP While firelapping the bore I discovered a mild burr had been thrown up by the gas block hole drilling process. During nitriding, this burr had held on to some salt bath residues making the mystery lump I discovered while hand cleaning the bore.

    First 3 bore lapping shots broke up the lump gradually and the next 3 were enough to smooth out the original drilling burr which was actually pretty thin. 3 more lappers and I called it quits, leaving some minor rifling land top roughnesses with just their peaks lapped flat.

    Why did I stop short of "lapping perfection"? I was curious as to whether a powder coated lead boolit shootin' gun could run powder coat fouling free on a diet of powder coat bullets with a bore that would get copper fouled for certain and possibly get some leading deposited in it if shooting sized and greased plain lead slugs.

    If it doesn't work out, I have more lap bullets already charged and waiting to go.
    Last edited by Oldfeller; 09-29-2019 at 01:16 AM.
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  10. #50
    Boolit Master Oldfeller's Avatar
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    OK, it is 3:00 in the afternoon and I spent most of today trying to ship an upper back a big 15 miles away to Bear Creek Arsenal in Sanford NC.

    Bear Creek Arsenal dealt fairly with me and had a very good customer service attitude, but their business model is definitely breaking down on the UPS side of things.

    UPS has a skidillion little stores now claiming to be UPS Stores, but they are not, they are franchises that operate under local management.

    That local management can decide (and many liberal minded branch owners have apparently agreed to this mindset) that they 1) lack the knowledge to know if it is a barrel, an upper barrel assembly or if it is really a gun 2) and that being all "unqualified" they now can refuse to handle ANY GUN PART AT ALL.



    All gun stuff is now referred to the regional UPS HUB which is many miles away from most all of us civilians, or you can pay a gun store to handle it under the existing BATF completed gun rules, your choice.

    And the liberal person standing on the other side of the counter is quite smug while telling you this after they had called the manufacturer that issued the shipping label to have them to call you on the phone to tell you that you HAVE to immediately come back to the local UPS Store to pick up this "toxic package" that you dropped off on them.



    Where it gets bad next is that the regional UPS HUB has cut their regional hub hours down to half days because of all the new little UPS stores they put up all over ....... but their web presence still says they are open all day instead of reduced hours (extended lunch until 4:00 type hours).
    Last edited by Oldfeller; 09-19-2019 at 03:32 PM.
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  11. #51
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    Quote Originally Posted by Oldfeller View Post
    OK, it is 3:00 in the afternoon and I spent most of today trying to ship an upper back a big 15 miles away to Bear Creek Arsenal in Sanford NC.

    Bear Creek Arsenal dealt fairly with me and had a very good customer service attitude, but their business model is definitely breaking down on the UPS side of things.

    UPS has a skidillion little stores now claiming to be UPS Stores, but they are not, they are franchises that operate under local management.

    That local management can decide (and many liberal minded branch owners have apparently agreed to this mindset) that they 1) lack the knowledge to know if it is a barrel, an upper barrel assembly or if it is really a gun 2) and that being all "unqualified" they now can refuse to handle ANY GUN PART AT ALL.



    All gun stuff is now referred to the regional UPS HUB which is many miles away from most all of us civilians, or you can pay a gun store to handle it under the existing BATF completed gun rules, your choice.

    And the liberal person standing on the other side of the counter is quite smug while telling you this after they had called the manufacturer that issued the shipping label to have them to call you on the phone to tell you that you HAVE to immediately come back to the local UPS Store to pick up this "toxic package" that you dropped off on them.



    Where it gets bad next is that the regional UPS HUB has cut their regional hub hours down to half days because of all the new little UPS stores they put up all over ....... but their web presence still says they are open all day instead of reduced hours (extended lunch until 4:00 type hours).
    I remember the one time I tried to ship some ammo. What a nightmare. Same story, only "UPS stores", no real UPS hub for 40-50 miles. Nobody would take it. What I ended up doing was scheduling a pickup. It took a number of tries as they NEVER show up when you schedule. One time I scheduled a pickup for the next morning, and the guy showed up at my door 10 minutes later. I don't own a printer, so I did not have the shipping label or anything ready. Then they didn't even show up the next day. After a few days of yellow "I missed you" notes, things eventually worked out.

    That said, you have no obligation to disclose what is inside a box if it's not considered dangerous. Ammo is, and has a heap of requirements. You don't have to say boo about an AR upper, or even a complete rifle. I shipped a few handguns, through Fedex, but the principle is the same. Hand them the box, and go about your business. If you are trying to send it in a box with lots of pictures, wrap it up. Nothing has to be on it besides the shipping label.

  12. #52
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    Set it up to have UPS stop at your house and pick it up. That is all that is needed to get it picked up.

  13. #53
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    Or don't tell the people at the store what is in the package. None of their business.

  14. #54
    Boolit Master Oldfeller's Avatar
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    Well, I told the nice lady I could fix the barrel, but she said it would cancel my warranty. I certainly am tired of messing with them, so, I went and began fixing it and am not sending it back to them to screw around with.

    Now, let's see if Lee can send me my full length sizer before somebody named Beto comes a knocking to get my AR gun.

    Do you suppose Beto would accept that this isn't an evil AR but is instead a mild mannered 10 round primitive season hunting gun as properly ordained by Indiana, Ohio and others using an approved primitive season straight walled cartridge? Stress the words ordained, approved and primitive --- point out that the military quit using straight walled cartridges well over 100 years ago and let the regulators in Ohio tell him why straight wall "old style stuff" is so much safer for their citizens to use ........ especially if you only shoot them poky slow lead boolits in it.

    Last edited by Oldfeller; 09-24-2019 at 12:52 AM.
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  15. #55
    Boolit Master Oldfeller's Avatar
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    New full length sizing die is in from LEE and as you can see from the picture it takes the oversized "straight wall with head area bulge form" left over from the long .355" pin insertion and puts it back into a proper tapered 350 Legend format.

    It also makes the fully formed case longer, now these are at 1.668"-1.669" which is just 32 thousandths below the trim length spec minimum. This is good news as I feared I would be having to use a 5.56 blank as my starting source in order to get a full length piece of finished brass.

    Fire these 32 thousandths short cases a few times in a grabby snatchy AR-15 action and the brass will need trimming back to spec due to case stretch. This is plenty good enough for me using mild cast loadings as the case taper will stop the brass from being driven into the chamber by the firing pin strike.


    Details of the head zone are as follows:

    If you go to the SAMMI chamber drawing for your support data, you will find the case head dimension is taken .200" in from the start of the chamber -- this is to allow for a loading zone radius at the chamber mouth which for ease of feeding which is a very good thing.

    If you look at the formed cases (complete with tiny micro scratch marks which will tumble out in case cleaning fairly easily) you see numbers start at the solid head web section at .3735" which move out from the solid web to .3910" at the start of the formed micro scratches.

    The case wall section in this area is .025-.030 thick and is only "unsupported" over a .010" linear zone of air distance, this is the zone that will get fire formed by case pressure. This area can only move out in a tapered range of .0005" to .005" before it takes on the full "rebated head" case form. Once again, this possible fireforming movement is only 17% of the wall thickness at that area, so as far as fireforming goes it is pretty much completely supported and fairly safe.

    I made up enough cases to do the fire lapping operations on the barrel, which is what I am going to be busy doing right now.

    More later ......
    Last edited by Oldfeller; 10-01-2019 at 10:38 AM.
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  16. #56
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ID:	248794Trim length recommendations are 1.710.

    Altho I have seen many factory well short and even longer.

    I have good luck with 1.700. Your shorter cases will work if your extractor is tight.
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  17. #57
    Boolit Master Oldfeller's Avatar
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    Sorry about the poor quality of the picture -- my phone doesn't like close ups of shiny objects very much it appears.

    Rod on the left is used to tap seat the lap round in the chamber, the rod on the right has a somewhat used firing pin form cut into it and the tape is to hold the round centralized to the primer so I can get a clean hit on the primer.

    I guess I wasn't very clear, the cases I have made are a slip/will barely rotate fit into the SAMMI spec. chamber (of which I have one). The 350 Legend case is TAPERED .010" for ease of extraction and upon the fall of the firing pin the firing pin strike from the lower cannot move the case forward the entire full trim spec distance before the case taper from my full length sizer stops all movement.

    NOTE PLEASE: Normally, the bullet diameter must not exceed the .357" SAMMI spec bullet size or the over-expanded, out of round, irregular and flared case mouth really doesn't want to fit in the case mouth area.

    Charged lap rounds ARE strongly over-sized and they do have this issue strongly and I would have to tap seat the lap rounds into the case mouth area with a separate tap rod (.3725" aluminum stock) to get them to go in completely as they do not wanna go right now.

    My guardian angel started telling me TO NOT DO THIS ...... so instead I took the lap rolling plates and flipped them over and used the smooth side to roll the assembled "lap charged bullet installed in the case mouth" round until it finally showed an assembled diameter that could allow the brass to spring away from the lap bullet in my stock 350 Legend chamber using the SAMMI spec numbers from the drawing.

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    The "open up during firing" clearance numbers will not be large, .001 to .0025 of case expansion clearance is about all I can get using rolling the assembled round on the backside of the lapping plates. But hey, clearance is clearance ..... and I also have me a brand new fix it trick for when a straight wall case round comes up a wee little bit fat or a wee bit bent and doesn't want to chamber correctly.

    I have another rod made from the same stock that has a firing pin form cut into the end of it, and a firm rap with a 32 oz brass hammer sets the primer off nicely (the 32 ounce brass mini sledge has enough inertia & mass to keep the case in the chamber during ignition). My smallest 0.3cc LEE dipper holds enough WC820 powder to drive the lap bullet down the barrel and into my catch rag bundle. I use a sheet of toilet paper folded over once and rolled up to keep the powder up near the primer, then I put a completed lap round in place in the chamber and smack the firing pin rod to set it off.

    SO TO RECAP THIS AFTERNOON'S EFFORTS: Strong second thoughts happened to me about tap seating a lapper into a throat under interference conditions -- seems like a clear recipe for a pressure spike event to me using good ol' 20-20 foresight.

    Then I will clean the bore and the chamber free of grit and trash after each lapper and do it all over again. Batches of 10 lappers are made up at a time, it will take a while to do 25 of them.

    Tomorrow's progress -- Wednesday

    What isn't known to me is "Will powder coating the slugs then curing the coating and then sizing them give a good basis for a grit charged lap slug?"

    The answer is yes, properly cured Easton Ford Light Blue powder coat is functionally harder than simple air dropped WW lead and requires more rolling action to embed the grit to a given controlled diameter dimension.

    The lap slugs retain round form better, they cut steel better because each little grit is supported better. Friction apart from the grit cutting action (the lead dragging on the steel) is greatly reduced, so the slugs will go faster for the .03cc volume of powder you are used to using.

    Likely fewer lap slugs will be required as the grit over powder coated base lap slugs you use will do more cutting per lap that is sent down the bore.

    Next, you are wanting to just lap enough to be "good to go with Powder Coated bullets" a use situation that does not naturally tend to produce residue buildups anyway. What you are working towards is "smooth enough not to build up heavy bullet coating fouling residue lumps" ---- this is akin to the smoothness you need to shoot greased lead slugs with a small difference in degree. Leading with bare greased bullets will occur if you have high spots that are removed but the valley between the high spots is too open and too large (the lead accumulates in the valley and makes a drag spot). Powder coating is slightly different, the valley fills up with mushed mess of cured coating that has gone back to powder form and the bullet jest coasts over this interrupted surface very much like runners on a snow sled do in wintertime.

    Yes, it sounds like powder coating residue goes into the irregularities of the land tops and forms a usable surface. Is this shooting a powder coating fouled bore? Yep, just like we get to a "steady state" inside a lead and grease seasoned barrel and WE DON"T NEED TO CLEAN IT ALL THE TIME on purpose, the same thoughts may well apply to powder coated bullets.

    It really all comes back to how much lapping you want to do to a brand new barrel. You want the leading and trailing edge of the rifling to be smoothed, you want the groove surfaces to be trued up and you want the irregularities in the tops of the rifling lands to be smoothed up some and all the rough peaks to be removed.

    Minor rifling land top "valley irregularities" that would be bad for picking up copper if shooting jacketed bullets may well be acceptable to a Powder Coated cast lead boolit shooting barrel.

    I am suggesting that somewhat less fire lapping may be required on powder coated use compared to dealing with bare lead with grease in the grooves or with jacketed --- you may get to keep relatively more of your rifling life rather than fire lapping it all away at the very beginning of things.

    To test this theory, I have stopped lapping at about half of what I had to do for lead slugs and we will see if PC coated soft air dropped cast WW metal will powder coat foul badly or not at this slightly imperfect level of land top smoothness.

    If I am wrong, we can always go back to lapping some more.
    Last edited by Oldfeller; 09-30-2019 at 11:40 AM.
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  18. #58
    Boolit Master Oldfeller's Avatar
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    POST FIRING BRASS CONDITION

    Well, I know the sample size is very small, but did the theories work out OK? Did the full length sized cases load into the chamber OK and did they change much after firing a mild cast boolit pressure type load?

    Answers as follows along with a standard Your Mileage May Vary disclaimer ..... I told you all the little steps I took --- but already I see some folks cutting way way down on the case neck expansion steps. And let's face it, that last long custom built .355 expansion plug was very carefully hand tuned specifically by me to suit my gun's chamber and it only left me about 0.100" linear distance of super strong web that wasn't directly manipulated in die steel to conform to my gun's chamber.

    First, nothing cracked nor split nor vented gas using a low pressure load.

    Two primers backed up, the most moving .012" to .015" which says there was that much slop in the initial case taper to chamber taper lock up.

    The .100" long out in the air (hanging out over the chamber mouth radius) unsupported web area left over from my forming operations showed no affect at all from a low pressure load. Like the ramp area of a Glock .40 or a Colt .45 acp, this web area over the chamber lead in radius zone is something you need to watch out for as you go along. Higher pressure loadings will eventually show movement of some sort in this area, but for now low pressure cast loadings seem to be OK.

    Second, the case mouths only expanded temporarily to let go of the bullet. They require only very mild resizing after a low pressure firing. As is, they will accept the insertion of a new bevel based bullet "as is" and will grip it well enough to hold it in location for some sort of post assembly crimp operation. Three (3) thoughts come to mind for that taper crimping/post sizing operation.

    #1) a LEE Factory Crimp die is available for about $18 right now as LEE thinks you may need it for the Legend

    #2) use a 9mm resizing die to crimp very gently on the assembled round as the case body taper section puts a fine very slow taper crimp on the reformed cases if you use it very carefully, gently and very sparingly. And yes, you can taper crimp the case right into the powder coating layer with very moderate pressure on your press lever ...... going too far is the danger here as the case mouth is used as the headspace stop datum for the folks who are shooting normal 350 Legend brass.

    #3 simply use the 350 Legend full length sizer die. You will only get the assembled round about half way into it before you have very slowly taper crimped your case mouth into your coated lead bullet and re-straighten and put back on taper center anything that got deflected any at all during the bullet seating.

    There was enough gas pressure generated in this very moderate load to straighten up the case walls to exactly match the taper of my 350 legend chamber. The cases are dirty and have mild chamber scratches on them now (my gun was firelapped so my chamber wall has a crop of micro-scratches in it that are leaving tiny witness marks on the brass).

    So now I can currently see on the cases what had chamber wall contact or not --- I may diamond polish the chamber wall out later on if the micro scratches in the nitride coating don't self correct with some more extended use. Right now the micro scratches serve to give me some good "instant of firing retention" as the soft brass imprints a tiny bit on the scratch marks.

    OK, the gun moves along now to initial load development as there is a lack of Milsurp powder reloading data out there. So some ladder series using some common mil-surp powders seems to be indicated.

    Also note that I think I am going to experiment towards not resizing the brass between firings at all, since I can tumble them in walnut media for a few hours to clean and descratch the cases and then I can decap them in any universal decapping die (stick a straight decapping pin in any larger diameter caliber LEE die) then bell the case mouth with a LEE 9mm powder thru expander charging die while putting powder into the case.

    This "no resizing" experiment may fail at some point, but I am somewhat curious -- remember that the case taper hitting the chamber taper is what is actually stopping the case from moving forward during the primer strike on these too short reformed cases (and remember, I did mention that this action results in primer protrusion going on at the .012" to .015" level on the "as formed" first firings?)

    I think less to no resizing is better given the short nature of the cases ....... the tighter the fit of the case into the chamber the better it will work out for headspacing.

    Last edited by Oldfeller; 10-01-2019 at 10:39 AM.
    All retired now, just growing tomatoes and building and shooting my guns.

  19. #59
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    Looks great Oldfeller.
    Do you have Quickload? I came up with a powder profile for WC820 that seemed to be fairly close for handgun and rifle loads.
    I started with a#9 and ajusted it to fit my chronograph results, then saved it as Surplus WC820.pro . Afterwards, it would just come up in the list of powders.

  20. #60
    In Remembrance bikerbeans's Avatar
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    Oldfellar,

    FWIW, using the lee FC die to crimp the case mouth of federal 350L brass to 0.376" holds a 170g jacketed bullet in place just fine. My rifle is a RARR and loads are pushing upper end pressure limits.

    I am not resizing the brass but found I need to slightly bell the fired case mouth to start the 0.3575" bullet. I didn't open up the throat on this gun, large throat courtesy of Ruger.

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Abbreviations used in Reloading

BP Bronze Point IMR Improved Military Rifle PTD Pointed
BR Bench Rest M Magnum RN Round Nose
BT Boat Tail PL Power-Lokt SP Soft Point
C Compressed Charge PR Primer SPCL Soft Point "Core-Lokt"
HP Hollow Point PSPCL Pointed Soft Point "Core Lokt" C.O.L. Cartridge Overall Length
PSP Pointed Soft Point Spz Spitzer Point SBT Spitzer Boat Tail
LRN Lead Round Nose LWC Lead Wad Cutter LSWC Lead Semi Wad Cutter
GC Gas Check