Dies for precision 308 rounds

[troyboy]

Good quality new brass.Lee collet neck sizer,Redding body die,Forster seater.Lee trimmer.Quality bullets.Concentricity gauge to check your product.

[Doc Highwall]

For my 308 I have the Redding competition bushing neck sizing die, and the full-length bushing die. For expanding the necks I modified a Forester seating die that has the sliding chamber to use a floating expander. I have a Redding competition seater die for jacketed bullets and a modified Forster seating die for cast bullets.

[silverjay]

Take a look at Whidden Gunworks. They don't make as many calipers, but what they make is excellent. Priced very competitively as well. I run them in a 6.5 creedmoor and find they produce straighter ammo than my Forster 308 dies.

[Gliden07]

Take a look at Whidden Gunworks. They don't make as many calipers, but what they make is excellent. Priced very competitively as well. I run them in a 6.5 creedmoor and find they produce straighter ammo than my Forster 308 dies.

This looks like nice stuff!! Thank you for the info!!

[Whiterabbit]

The Lee Classic Cast press from what I read is a very good press? I'm sure there are better ones but this should work fine.

There is a simple test to see if your single stage press is good or not…'Does it flex? No. Then it's a good press.
"Yeah but…mine can hold a .50 cal!"…"So what…Mine doesn't flex."

Its the best Lee makes. I didn't care for it. It will handle dies up to 1-1/4".

Take care

r1kk1

All great points. I own the classic cast and it's a GREAT press. I wouldn't ever buy a lee turret or any other lee press (except the hand press for re-seating rounds at the range, or other remote loading needs, but that doesn't count due to the specialty nature...) but the classic cast does not flex and manages primers excellently. Bonus for flipping it upside down for push through bullet sizing.

These days it sits on my bench more often than my also-great RCBS press.

[Gliden07]

All great points. I own the classic cast and it's a GREAT press. I wouldn't ever buy a lee turret or any other lee press (except the hand press for re-seating rounds at the range, or other remote loading needs, but that doesn't count due to the specialty nature...) but the classic cast does not flex and manages primers excellently. Bonus for flipping it upside down for push through bullet sizing.

These days it sits on my bench more often than my also-great RCBS press.

I did a lot of research prior to buying the Lee. Other presses I considered were the Forster Coax and RCBS Rock Chucker. I saw no real advantage of the Rock chucker over the Lee, and at the time of purchase no one had a coax press in stock!! I think I'll be fine with the Lee just trying to decide on Dies now!! To many choices and I don't feel I have enough experience to make an informed decision right now so I keep reading!!

[EDG]

Dies are only half of the issue. If you have huge sloppy factory chamber dies may do very little for you.

If you have a chamber in which the brass only expands the neck .002 to .004 when fired then you have the beginning of a chance at top accuracy.

I think a Forster FL die is probably the best deal because Forster will hone the neck out until you have the amount of neck sizing in the die without the need for an expander.

If you have a truly tight neck chamber L E Wilson hand dies will do a good job. They are pretty much standard bench rest equipment but they require a small arbor press since they are
not threaded.

If you have some other die that you want to torture you can lap one out using this process to get a precision fit neck.

https://rickaverill.com/projects-pas...eloading-dies/

[W.R.Buchanan]

I have read all of this, and I have read just about everything pertaining to loading Super Accurate Ammo. I have a friend who is a very highly place BR shooter in CA. Won several State Championships.

The technology of barrel making and the machines involved and the Technology of Bullet making and the machines involved have evolved dramatically in the last 15 years. We are now seeing very inexpensive rifles that are capable of delivering sub MOA Accuracy with Factory Ammunition. This is solely due to vastly improved Manufacturing Techniques and Machinery.

What dies you choose are way down the list of things that really matter in loading ammo. A really good barrel is by far the most important factor, if you don't have that it really doesn't matter how you load your ammo. Bullets are next but I have to say they are less responsible than the barrel. I would say with confidence that you couldn't tell the difference between 2 batches of ammo with exactly the same components, loaded with either Redding Dies or Lee dies.

What is important is consistency in your loading. I have used the same 100 Federal .308 Cases in my Ruger Scout for all my shooting. They have been loaded 13-14 times and have been trimmed once The load is 45 gr of IMR 4895 with a pulled M80 Ball 147 gr FMJB,,, .13 cent bullets. It is my most accurate rifle delivering < MOA groups consistently. Some day I want to load some Berger Bullets and see what the gun is actually capable of. I'd bet with good bullets it would be 1/2MOA easily.

I use a RCBS X-Die to F/L Size them in the Rockchucker, and an RCBS Comp Seating Die to seat bullets, and an RCBS Seating die with the stem removed to crimp. All these bullets are shot from the magazine so that is why I crimp.

Point being: Nothing I am doing is Bench Rest Quality,,, tooling, components, loads, or even the gun, and yet excellent results are there.

There are so many variables here that singling out one factor is mute. If you are going to be a real live Bench Rest Shooter and you actually want to win, then you need to do everything, but you need to do them in an order of importance and you need to keep track of everything you do down to the last IOTA.

For anything less you need to address the primary components of accuracy first, IE: the barrel on the gun and bullets and find a load that works pretty well,,, and then pick away at the nitts until you get to where you want to be.

Pretty good idea to shoot a lot too, since it doesn't matter if your ammo is capable of all going thru the same hole at 1000 yards if you can shoot in the first place.

Randy