Priorities

[TXGunNut]

I love working up loads for rifles I acquire, sometimes I wonder if I acquire rifles to work up loads for them. It seems that each cartridge takes a different approach and some approaches are more detailed than others. There are many tasks/decisions along the way and putting them in the correct order is essential to reaching the goal in a reasonable time. I think this may be a valuable tool for new casters/loaders. I know the end use of the rifle has a bearing on prioritizing so let's say the rifle will be used for whitetail deer out to 200 yards with most shots under 100 yards. To keep it simple let's assume that we're working with a bolt action sporter in 358 Winchester w/ 1:14 twist. (pls PM me if you have that rifle for sale ;-)) Most of us prefer to change one thing at a time so addressing things in the right order will greatly simplify things.
I'd like to know how you'd prioritize the following items:

Case manufacturer
Case lot
Case prep
Boolit design (bore riding, hp, fp, GC, PB, TL, etc)
Boolit alloy
Boolit fit
Heat treat
Powder type
Powder charge
Primer type
Seating depth
Crimp type-if any
Lube type
Lube application (TL, one groove, two grooves, etc)

Hmmm...should have made this about leverguns but that would muddy up the waters a bit.

[runfiverun]

milsurp 308 cases.
saeco #248
water dropped ww and soft mixed.
RL-19 48.5grs
no crimp
carnuba red will work in the summer. [the boolit only has one groove]
gator checks.
size to 358.

I neck size using a 38 special steel die and flair the case mouth with the same flair tool from that die set.
de-prime with a universal die.
[shrug] that's how I started with this rifle and never changed.
that load is the only one I ever tried too.

[dragon813gt]

I will just tell you what one of my loads is.

Converted 308 cases trimmed to minimum and annealed. NOE clone of RCBS 35-200. Water dropped 96/3/1. Lubed w/ CR and BLL. Crimped in the crimp groove over W748. There is a proper expander thrown into the mix. Mine is a lever so they are FL sized every time. If not they would be neck sized.

From there it's varied charges until I find the load. Don't really mess w/ seating lengths w/ designs that have a crimp ring. On ones that don't I typically load to mag length.

Honestly I make what I have on hand work. You can drown yourself in the minutia of this hobby if you want to. Lube, settled on two of White Labels offering and BLL for tumble. Case prep is important but I use the same steps for all of them. So basically, pick what you have on hand and work w/ it :laugh:

[popper]

chamber/throat/rifle (SAAMI specs for start)
Boolit design (bore riding, hp, fp, GC, PB, TL, etc)
Boolit alloy Heat treat (needed?)
Boolit fit
Case prep
Lube type (grease -wax/coated/LLA/BLL?)
Lube application (TL, one groove, two grooves, etc)
Powder type
Powder charge
Seating depth
Crimp type-if any
Case manufacturer
Case lot
Primer type

Re-ordered for newbies.

[Yodogsandman]

Boolit fit
Boolit design (bore riding, hp, fp, GC, PB, TL, etc)
Boolit alloy
Heat treat
seating depth
Case manufacturer
Case lot
Case prep
Powder type
powder charge
Crimp type-if any
Lube type
Primer type
Lube application (TL, one groove, two grooves, etc)

[runfiverun]

now that everybody has looked at my first post and is thinking 'he didn't even answer the question' what an idiot.

the question wasn't actually asked.
if the question had been.
I want to use this rifle to hunt with.
I would answer the question much differently than if he asked about matching jacketed velocity.
so I went with what I do to get both.
the load above is 2300 or so fps and I use it to shoot deer.

priority?
well,, boolit design and alignment in the throat are always the first considerations of any load.
get those two things right and you can easily figure out the other details.

[TXGunNut]

Hmm, I like yodogsandman's approach and popper's has merit as well. It seems I change my priorities with each cartridge but have found that if I try to nail down variables in the wrong order I find myself wasting time going down the wrong road.
One of my latest projects is the 300 Savage and the case (Hornady) and boolit (RD's TL 310-165) were all determined at the outset so the case, boollit and lube decisions were moot. Case prep also a moot point, Hornady cases need little or none for this application. Because of the target velocity ( >2200fps) HT'ing was selected. 3031 was the first powder tried and seems to be doing quite well, still working in that area. Thinking about LVR but will play this one out first. I only have a couple of LR primers on hand and since my standard 9 1/2 seems to be doing well I won't waste my dwindling supply of 205's here. My default seating depth with RD boolits is the top of the crimp goove, seems to be the way Michael designs them. Seems to be working, may adjust later. My default crimp for leverguns is a light crimp, will experiment on that later as well. I guess that's why I'm enjoying this project, most variables determined early and the rifle seems to like whatever I throw at it.
I suspect that will all change when (if) I find that theoretical 358 bolt gun. I have no shortage of .35 (kept typing .36 for some reason ;-) ) moulds and there are plenty more out there. Case selection is probably somewhat limited but the powder choices are mind-boggling, I probably have at least six on hand that sound good. I went through this process recently with my 35 Whelen project and I'm pretty sure I got my priorities out of order because it was a long, frustrating process. Somewhere along the way I learned that the 358W was a better cartridge so someday maybe I'll try it again.
Hmm....think I'll go ponder this some more in my loading room. Have some brass that needs my attention.

[Yodogsandman]

"My default seating depth with RD boolits is the top of the crimp goove, seems to be the way Michael designs them."-TXGunNut

TX, If you have a powder that's showing promise, the next step is to find your best seating depth. Optimizing the seating depth sets up your barrel harmonics and the jump to the lands. I'd want to find that sweet spot by working back in .010" steps from the boolit hitting the lands hard. Once best accuracy is determined by .010" steps, try .005" on either side of the best length to fine tune. The cases can be trimmed to reflect the most accurate seating depth in your rifle, if you want to crimp.

I'd bet good money that Ranch Dog gets that crimp groove location real close but, each rifle is an individual with individual needs.

[vzerone]

I like to have case all from one manufacturer, but that's more of a mind thing because if you have a tool to measure case volume it eliminates everything else you're talking about with cases. I have a groups of precision shooter friends that are far more anal about this then most of us. I brought up a discussion of what to do to cases that is the most beneficial. I told them about some of the benchrest things that many of us do and they laughed. The one friend, who shoots extremely small groups and has some of the lowest ES's and SD's I've ever seen said the number one thing to do to a case is measure the internal volume and sort them that way. That, he said, showed the most difference in accuracy. He mentioned that weighing cases is a joke. It doesn't guarantee same internal volumes.

If I were asked what are the most important things to shooting cast accurately I'd tell you to be able to assemble a "straight" cartridge, use a proper fitting bullet of the correct alloy for the pressure/velocity range, and ensure starting the bullet straight into the bore. All the rest of the things are minute. That means they only make very little differences.

Little about case volume. One of my friends visited the Hornady brass factory and paled around with an engineer there. He took him through the process. He pulled a good many cases off the stage where they were finished all except for the extractor groove and head stamp. He weighed them and they were remarkably close like to the right of the decimal point in weight. He told my friend "pretty good huh?". Then he said watch this and took some totally finished cases and weighed them and they were all over the place. My friend says "So, weighing cases to insure internal volume is a waste of time because the larger weight differences are in the extractor groove cutting and head stamping?" The answer was yes. I don't weight cases, never did before my friend told me that, and I never will.

[Blackwater]

My own experience would place them:

Boolit fit
Boolit design (bore riding, hp, fp, GC, PB, TL, etc)
Boolit alloy
Heat treat
Powder type
Powder charge
Primer type
Seating depth
Crimp type-if any
Lube type
Lube application (TL, one groove, two grooves, etc)

The rest get short shrift, except that whenever I get a new batch of cases, I generally deburr the inside of the flash hole, and I'll occasionally anneal the cases. Other than that, I think you pretty well summed up the process.

[TXGunNut]

I'd bet good money that Ranch Dog gets that crimp groove location real close but, each rifle is an individual with individual needs. -Yodogsandman

I generally do that but almost every time I'm pretty close to the top of the crimp groove, generally within .010". I don't think CB's are as picky about OAL as J-words were but I may be wrong about that. It seemed a bit odd at the time but I've had two Lyman boolits (375449 and 380681) where the OAL published in the Lyman manual was right on the money. Last few projects seem to work best with the nose of the boolit touching the lands of the barrel.
This whole load development process was a lot easier before I started casting my own, lol.