Sizing or Not Sizing

[terryt]

Hi:
I have always sized my boolits and I would like to know how many of you do not size and if so do you use a special mold for it? Any difference in accuracy?

Thanks,

Terry

[bstone5]

A lot of the pistol bullets made in Lee molds are often close enough not to size. Lee even indicates this in the written material that comes with the mold. A little bit larger bullet will shot fine with regard to accuracy. The larger bullet will help in keeping lead out of the barrel.

[tazman]

A lot depends on whether this boolit is for a rifle of handgun.
For best accuracy in a rifle, sizing is pretty much essential unless you are lucky enough the boolit drops at exactly the diameter you need. There are numerous threads on this site concerned with finding the correct size for your rifle.
For handgun, you can get by with oversize boolits as long as they will chamber and feed properly in your handgun. Most people will not notice the difference in accuracy if any from not sizing handgun boolits.
I tend to run oversize in my handguns to save steps in the process, but my chambers are a little on the loose side so I don't have feed problems.

[dtknowles]

I tried some unsized bullets in my .22 Hornet as they were a snug fit in my fired brass. They worked fine with one lot of brass. NOE 45 grain plain base RNFP bullet. They dropped at 0.226 and I finger lubed them with 50/50. They did not work with other lots of brass with thicker necks. Not enough difference in accuracy to stand out. Lee made moulds for tumble lube bullets meant to be used unsized, I bought some already cast and lubed and shot them .357 mag with medium loads and was fine.

Tim

[RogerDat]

Tumble lube and shoot them for revolver. I size for rifle but that is partly because I use the Lee push through sizer to seat gas checks. I have also sized for 45 acp because of indexing on the case I want to avoid the case being forced large to accommodate the bullet.

A Lee push through sizer is inexpensive and fast so skipping it doesn't save much time.

[runfiverun]

size,, I size everything.

I think I got everything in one thread now.

[TXGunNut]

For me, sizing is more than sizing. It's a QC and uniformity measure as well. Strictly speaking it may not be necessary in all situations but I'll do it anyway.

[MT Chambers]

Some bullets will not chamber when loaded, sizing makes all bullets the same width.

[dtknowles]

size,, I size everything.

I think I got everything in one thread now.

Thanks Five, sorry everyone if I came off like a grump.

Tim

[GhostHawk]

I started out sizing everything but then I was also using gas checks. Over time I tried not sizing pistol boolits and those seemed to work fine. Then I started slowing my loads down so I could stop using gas checks. And as a result have slowly drifted from sizing everything.

I think it depends on how perfect you want your loads, and at least somewhat on how fast you are pushing them.

I've had pretty good success as long as I keep speeds below the 1400 fps mark. Above that I plan on gas checks and sizing.

[robg]

Size all GC boolits with Lee push through sizers. pb boolits I just tumble lube And shoot ,I'm defnitly trying too use the ( kiss) system on my reloading.

[buckshotshoey]

One more thing not mentioned. Speed matters, but so does the hardness of lead. You might get away with a larger boolit if using a soft alloy, and a smaller one with a harder alloy. Or possibly vice versa. Depends on throat, barrel, and rifling.

[Jniedbalski]

My pistole boolets I usually don't size.i tried it each way and it really didint matter. They all shot good. My 308 i size them because Iam using a .314 noe mold and lee sks boolet 160 grain .313 a little tight for the 308 chamber. The boolits sized .311 work great in the 308

[fredj338]

Some bullets will not chamber when loaded, sizing makes all bullets the same width.
^^THIS^^^ I load for several diff guns in each caliber, often mixed brass. Sizing bullets means more uniformity, less issues feeding in semi autos.

[DougGuy]

They don't say "fitment is KING" for nothing. I size everything. Every time. Brass, boolits, chamber and barrel throats, etc.. I like to eliminate variables and things just work better when you have proper fitment.

[terryt]

Hi:

Thanks for all of the help.

Terryt

[runfiverun]

no problems Tim.
It took me a bit to get it all in one place and looking like a thread.