TexasAggie06
08-26-2015, 12:39 PM
"Never half-*** two things, whole-*** one thing"
-Ron Swanson
That can pretty well describe my mentality when it comes to projects and hobbies, so when the wife gave me permission and a reasonable budget to renovate my shop and invest in reloading gear I didn't waste any time and went to work. Within a month I went from having shed that could have doubled as a Halloween fright house, to having a legit shop with brand new casting/reloading gear. I also went from having a generally vague idea of what reloading was to, in my opinion, having just enough knowledge and experience to be dangerous.
So far I've cast, powder coated, loaded, and shot 500 rounds of .45 ACP with good success. All 500 rounds went down range safely and only two pieces of brass failed to eject properly, I'm not sure how you would rate that for a newbie, but I'll take those numbers. Now here comes the dangerous part...
I realize as a new reloader that the likelihood of making a dangerous error is now, I am finally ready to take my AR-15 along with first batch of 300 Blackout to the range and I'm honestly a little nervous. The lack of published data specific to what I'm about to send down range is what has me on edge. That being the case I would greatly appreciate your review of my process and verify that the ammunition I've loaded is safe.
Gun data:
CMMG RCE .300 BLK
18" Stainless medium taper barrel
1:7 twist
Boolit data:
Lee mold C312-155
sized and Gas Checked to .308 with Lee push thru die
Powdercoated with HF matte black
sized to .311 after PC
all boolits QC'd and weighed in between 154-156 grains
Brass data:
cleaned, trimmed, and prepd
CCI small rifle primer
Load data:
5 rounds each for testing
IMR 4227 powder
14, 14.5, 15, 15.5, and 16 grains
bullets seated to the top crimp grove giving them a COL of about 2.03"
lightly crimped
my major concern is seating depth and whether or not I've got those suckers stuffed in there too deep combined with too little/much powder.
-Ron Swanson
That can pretty well describe my mentality when it comes to projects and hobbies, so when the wife gave me permission and a reasonable budget to renovate my shop and invest in reloading gear I didn't waste any time and went to work. Within a month I went from having shed that could have doubled as a Halloween fright house, to having a legit shop with brand new casting/reloading gear. I also went from having a generally vague idea of what reloading was to, in my opinion, having just enough knowledge and experience to be dangerous.
So far I've cast, powder coated, loaded, and shot 500 rounds of .45 ACP with good success. All 500 rounds went down range safely and only two pieces of brass failed to eject properly, I'm not sure how you would rate that for a newbie, but I'll take those numbers. Now here comes the dangerous part...
I realize as a new reloader that the likelihood of making a dangerous error is now, I am finally ready to take my AR-15 along with first batch of 300 Blackout to the range and I'm honestly a little nervous. The lack of published data specific to what I'm about to send down range is what has me on edge. That being the case I would greatly appreciate your review of my process and verify that the ammunition I've loaded is safe.
Gun data:
CMMG RCE .300 BLK
18" Stainless medium taper barrel
1:7 twist
Boolit data:
Lee mold C312-155
sized and Gas Checked to .308 with Lee push thru die
Powdercoated with HF matte black
sized to .311 after PC
all boolits QC'd and weighed in between 154-156 grains
Brass data:
cleaned, trimmed, and prepd
CCI small rifle primer
Load data:
5 rounds each for testing
IMR 4227 powder
14, 14.5, 15, 15.5, and 16 grains
bullets seated to the top crimp grove giving them a COL of about 2.03"
lightly crimped
my major concern is seating depth and whether or not I've got those suckers stuffed in there too deep combined with too little/much powder.