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Thread: 357 case in 38 special revolver

  1. #21
    Boolit Master
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    Quote Originally Posted by smithnframe View Post
    Trim it!
    smithnframe,

    +1!!! Of Course, JUST trim the .357 case .125" and WALLA, it works in a .38 Special without the need of a $700 lathe?

    Adam

  2. #22
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    Quote Originally Posted by Adam Helmer View Post
    smithnframe,

    +1!!! Of Course, JUST trim the .357 case .125" and WALLA, it works in a .38 Special without the need of a $700 lathe?

    Adam
    Silly person! The lathe is to make dies that will put a neck in the brass. EXACTLY the way you want it! And $700 is cheap for a lathe! Besides, once you have one, you will find many other things you can do with it.
    You can make brass that no one makes, and no existing examples remain if you have a lathe. You can make anything cylindrical, and any length you can get to fit in your lathe. And they make lathes that are 120' long. Not that you could get one of those for $700, but it's principle of the thing. ,)Need a washer exactly .0005" thick? Sure, you can buy them. Or you can take one that's not exactly what you want, and make it so it is. Need one that's .0782" thick and with a .875" inside diameter to set a die in your press exactly right for a cartridge you load a lot of, and don't want to fiddle with the setup every time you need to make more? You can do it. Broke the firing pin on your 1903 Springfield the day before hunting season starts, and you need one RIGHT FREAKING NOW!? You can make one. There are several threads on this board right now with people wanting to put a neck in cartridges. You can do it in a lathe, or use the lathe to make the tooling to do it in your press. Need to thin the neck for a cartridge you're reforming? Likewise.

    Currently, I need a Lyman 450 sizing & lubing die for .316 boolits for my 91/30. Shoots fine with boolits sized correctly for the bore. Factory ammo for it won't hit the paper of a full size silhouette at 50 yards. I can order a die custom-made, and wait for it. Or I can make my own.

    Bill

  3. #23
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    You don't need anything more than some 8 shot and some gaschecks, and elmers glue. You will get better patterns without a shot cup. I loaded .38 special with a fast powder, inverted gas check over the powder, filled it close to the top with shot and crimped another inverted gascheck, and covered the end with elmers glue. You can push the gas check over the powder with a dowel. The snakes I shot with this didn't twich. I shot the first one twice because he never moved. I loaded for velocity, rather than amount of shot, and you aren't going to be shooting more than a few feet.

  4. #24
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    Quote Originally Posted by Scrounge View Post
    IMNSHO EVERYBODY should have a lathe. You can get a small one from Harbor Freight for about $700. You can get a Monarch 10EE brand new for around $100K. You can get the modern version of the South Bend Heavy 10L for about $10K from Grizzly.com. You can get any random lathe-like object from Craigslist, and maybe even a real lathe.

    I got my first lathe, an HF 7x10 in 2008 for $369. 2016 I found an Atlas TH42 10x24 lathe, vintage 1946, for $750. They tend to be a little higher now, like everything else. About a year and a half ago I got a very used, and left in a leaky barn for 5 years restoration project SB Heavy 10L vintage 1941, for $950. One in good running condition on Ebay is closer to $3K last I looked.

    For reloading, the 7x10 (7"is largest possible diameter to turn x 10" between centers) will work pretty well. You can make small hardware, firing pins, peep sight apertures, washers, other small items. You can do some gunsmithing on it, Maybe ream a chamber, but it's pretty limited. The TH42 has many of the same limitations, though it's about 24" between centers. Both have about a 3/4" hole through the spindle, and use Morse Taper 3 accessories. Both have tailstocks that use MT2 accessories. I could turn a short barrel between centers, ream a chamber, and things like that on the Atlas. The South Bend has a 1-3/8" hole through the spindle, and about 30" between centers. It's bigger, heavier, and stiffer. In machine tools, this is good. Helps to be a fair mechanic if you're going to do stuff the way I did, but if you have $$ ( or are good at shopping), you can buy new & good and ready to go. And despite the other two lathes, I'm keeping the 7x10. It's handy size. Last I looked, there is nothing like it made in America for less than $10K. It won't handle a large project, but it will handle a lot of the small pieces that go in a large project. You can buy a lot of hardware to do almost anything. But sometimes absolutely no one makes what you need to do something. With the right tools you can make anything you can conceive.

    Hi! My name's Bill, and I'm a toolohaulic. Guns are tools, to, btw!
    Hi bill, I have been interested in a bench lathe for a while....I have a few business plans not related to firearms at all actually but being able to spool up a sizing die or various parts sure would be nice.

    Been looking at lathes from little machine shop...their 7x16 or 8.5x20. not sure if anyone here has any experience with the machines they sell or not. Pros/cons over a H.F? Obviously cost is a difference but not sure where the sweet spot lies for my expected use being pretty frequently (2-3 hours per weekend) and maybe an additional 2-4 hours through the week...and bells and whistles are ok but I'd never get the chance to use them until I get a couple years on the machine and learn the fundamentals really well...alot like reloading starting on a single stage and then seeing the advantage of a progressive.

    Sent from my moto g(7) power using Tapatalk

  5. #25
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    Quote Originally Posted by John McCorkle View Post
    Hi bill, I have been interested in a bench lathe for a while....I have a few business plans not related to firearms at all actually but being able to spool up a sizing die or various parts sure would be nice.

    Been looking at lathes from little machine shop...their 7x16 or 8.5x20. not sure if anyone here has any experience with the machines they sell or not. Pros/cons over a H.F? Obviously cost is a difference but not sure where the sweet spot lies for my expected use being pretty frequently (2-3 hours per weekend) and maybe an additional 2-4 hours through the week...and bells and whistles are ok but I'd never get the chance to use them until I get a couple years on the machine and learn the fundamentals really well...alot like reloading starting on a single stage and then seeing the advantage of a progressive.

    Sent from my moto g(7) power using Tapatalk
    HF buys what you could call "mill run" lathes. LMS buys lathes built to their specifications, and backs them. If a part or a whole lathe turns out to be bad, they'll repair or replace it. Mostly that's not a problem anymore. If you can afford LMS, I'd go ahead and buy it. Better fit and finish, upgraded components, and excellent support. I have bought chucks and some small stuff from them. Grizzly does much the same with theirs. When I got mine, it was $369 from HF, with a 20% off coupon. They no longer allow that for lathes. There is a support group for all the various brands of 7x lathes, https://groups.io/g/7x12MiniLathe. Bunch of good folks there, a few not so good. Lots of help available. My Harbor Freight 93212 7x10 is currently priced at $669, the 7x12 big brother to it is $600, and both of those are plus shipping, though they may have a 7x10 in stock. If you go HF, get the 7x12. I absolutely couldn't afford anything larger, or anything else when I got mine. In lathes, larger is almost always better. From all I've read, but not personal experience, I'd skip the 8" lathes, and go to at least a 9" lathe. Grizzly has some 10" lathes that aren't all that much more than the LMS 7x lathes. They also have lathes specifically intended for gunsmiths, but they're pretty proud of them! First, I'd join the 7x12 group, and while you're at Groups.io, I'd look at some of their other metalworking groups. Fair warning, I own a couple of the others. Look at the comments on the various types and brands of lathes, and figure out what you want to do, and what it takes to do it. Here's a link to some things you can do with a mini-lathe: http://www.packratworkshop.com/pdf/m...e%20rifles.pdf Go to his home page, and look at the firearms section, and this file is there, with some other useful stuff, too.

    A lot of the metalworking groups that were at Yahoo are now at group.io.

    HTH!

    Bill

    PS the 4-screw chuck that is mentioned in the mini-lathe rifles.pdf document is also that firearms section. You don't have to buy all your tooling. Some (quite a bit) you can make.
    Last edited by Scrounge; 07-05-2020 at 03:43 PM. Reason: added a bit:

  6. #26
    Boolit Grand Master In Remembrance
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    Trimming the 357 brass would be a waste. Just trim to cylinder length or barely under.

    The idea is to form the brass into a smaller sized cylinder that fits inside the area of the cylinder in front of the usual case mouth area. These rounds would look sort of like these examples -

    https://www.outdoorhub.com/how-to/20...ooting-snakes/ (On the rightmost shells, autoloaders need that ogive for auto-loading, revolvers / single shots don't though)

    You use a smaller die to reduce the diameter of the case up front to fit inside the cylinder, best to only reduce it JUST past where it's needed as the pressure of firing it can rework it, making more case cracks is unwise?

    If needed could go longer with a 357 max even, if the cylinder's THAT long.

  7. #27
    Boolit Grand Master In Remembrance
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    The whole idea in using a longer casing for a revolver or single-shot shot shell is to get more shot en route to the target, when you squeeze the trigger.

    .38 Special is a nice long size for a shotshell anyways, nice long case at 1.155 in (29.3 mm); 357 Mag at 1.29 in (33 mm), 357 max at 1.605 in (40.8 mm) so you can see that the extra 0.315" gives you a bit more shot volume.

  8. #28
    Boolit Master
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    I have used a steel washer placed over a hole in a board.
    Get a washer with a hole smaller than the case.

  9. #29
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    Or, if you're playing with sizing die adapters like some of us, choose a sizing die of the diameter you want and throw a neck on it until it chambers. Not sure how that would extract though./beagle

    Quote Originally Posted by Scrounge View Post
    Neck size with a die for a smaller case. 9mm might work for 357, though it won't be much of a neck. You can make sizing dies with something called a drill bushing. https://www.grainger.com/search?sear...=drill+bushing Bore out a socket in an old die, or a piece of allthread, or whatever, press in the appropriate size of bushing. Or bore your own. Lathe helps, but a drill press will work. Patient guy with a file can get there, too. If you want to do it badly enough, you can figure a way.

    There are books on forming brass for wildcats or obsolete cartridges. Considerable discussion right here at Cast Boolits.
    diplomacy is being able to say, "nice doggie" until you find a big rock.....

  10. #30
    Boolit Master
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    The best thing to do is hunt up some no.12 shot.
    Find some 12 ga.RIO shotshells with no.12 and disassemble those to get the shot.
    Then, no matter your caliber, the homemade shotshells will shred your target satisfactory.
    NO.¹2 SHOT is best.

  11. #31
    Boolit Buddy
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    This is way easier. I just took a 357 case lubed it up and crammed it into my 309 bullet sizing die. Makes a nice bottleneck and it'll drop into any 38 special chamber. It's really not a difficult thingClick image for larger version. 

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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