Originally Posted by
Alan in Vermont
SUCCESS!! I test fired four rounds yesterday morning, they fed and cycled the gun flawlessly.
I had to drop the shot charge back to 130 grs., at 140 there wasn't room enough for the overshot wad.
Had issues getting the crimp to work. The RN seater was coming down right on the case mouth instead of just outside it. I ended up using a powder drop tube I made years ago and it has a an internal taper on the end that screws into the measure. The taper started large enough to turn the case mouth in, whack-a-mole style, enough for the RN seater to roll it in further.
I'm starting a batch of 50 now. I had 14 cases formed in the initial experimenting. No more 308 on hand but had 7mm-08 and 243 cases enough to make a full box.
Even got a pic of the forming in progress. Left to right, an original 7mm-08 case. A 243 case with the shoulder formed and set back, this case seats flush in my cartridge gauge and barrel. A fresh case, trimmed to length and primed. Lastly a fired case, It shows faint rifling marks on the neck but didn't grad the rifling enough to hinder extraction.