how big is too big for Cal eg 308

[HD.375]

hey so i have a .30-06 , 20 inch stainless Abolt, an i have 400 or so .311 + 2 coating of Hytek which mics out about .3125 -.313 (i dont think they are perfectly round though LOL. (unsized??? perhaps)............its a commercial hard cast well up in hardness,

maybe they havnt been sized an were dropped an coated , the mic varies , it may explain why the Ruger 1 just hates them so far?
anyway, how big is too big to go down the 30-06 tube with a slow powder? its a 180gr FNGC thingy.. no gc.


or does it need to be sized down to 309 or so ? period.
due to chamber neck thickness to allow it to chamber anyway??

[Thumbcocker]

My default size for boolits in U.S. made .30 cal. Guns is .311.

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[HD.375]

My default size for boolits in U.S. made .30 cal. Guns is .311.

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Yeah true, So it is a Factory Browning Barrel, just shorter.... n fluted

which is miroku japan , i belive

[HD.375]

as is with leupold rings n 2-7

when had zeiss on but too heavy with QD steels.

[slughammer]

Does the boolit fit into the neck of an unsized case?

What powder and charge weight are you using?

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[sigep1764]

Outside of my Marlin that likes .313-.314, .311 should be plenty. Your gun prolly doesn't like that the gascheck has been left off. Try them with gaschecks. Bet it gets much better.

[Thumbcocker]

Agree. Use the gas check unless you are shooting 1300-1400 fps.

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[HD.375]

Outside of my Marlin that likes .313-.314, .311 should be plenty. Your gun prolly doesn't like that the gascheck has been left off. Try them with gaschecks. Bet it gets much better.

Agree. Use the gas check unless you are shooting 1300-1400 fps.

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yeah so ive been trying slow AF using 2208 /Varget u guys call it, might of even tried 4198 loads? an 2206h loads , but since then i did do a bit more reading on here about gas checks an whats happening at the end of the boolit that may of caused leading.

il look up the gas check method an see how that goes.

RE the chamber fit, I've not tried that, i know it wont go into a .308 case though, so im doubting it would even chamber- an im not going to go swaging them down .cbf.

the 3006 shoots Woodleighs, 130gr an mostly 150gr PPSN with varget 50 ish gr for both... but is pretty accurate with 180 PPSN just dont like the recoil

[HD.375]

like im talkin patterns not groups, similiar to readings on here about certain issues.

50 yards an its like a ft apart,..... almost worse than when i was trying out the 150gr FN for the 30-30 (.308) in the Ruger 1 303...... that wasnt even as bad

[Thumbcocker]

I would try a a light charge of a fast shotgun powder if you are shooting plain base boolits.

You can get surprisingly good groups just don't expect them to go fast. Think reloadable bigger .22 lr.


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[1hole]

For cast bullets, anything you can load, chamber and lock in an undamaged firearm is safe to fire. No soft (lead alloy) bullet can withstand very high pressures without fully conforming to the chamber and bore as it moves forward.

The late P.O. Ackley once oversaw a group of his young gunsmithing students experiment with a 7.7 Jap rifle that had the chamber successively cut to allow increasingly larger jacketed bullets to be fired. They got up to .35 caliber jacketed bullets before they quit, with no damage to the rifle. With or without powder coating, no lead alloy bullet could ever be more "unsafe" than that!

Fact is, ALL bullets are precisely bore diameter from one end to the other as soon as they enter the bore their own length so oversized cast bullets, as such, really can't contribute much for accuracy. So I have to wonder, what's driving the current "expert reloader" fascination with fat cast bullets anyway?

[HD.375]

For cast bullets, anything you can load, chamber and lock in an undamaged firearm is safe to fire. No soft (lead alloy) bullet can withstand very high pressures without fully conforming to the chamber and bore as it moves forward.

The late P.O. Ackley once oversaw a group of his young gunsmithing students experiment with a 7.7 Jap rifle that had the chamber successively cut to allow increasingly larger jacketed bullets to be fired. They got up to .35 caliber jacketed bullets before they quit, with no damage to the rifle. With or without powder coating, no lead alloy bullet could ever be more "unsafe" than that!

Fact is, ALL bullets are precisely bore diameter from one end to the other as soon as they enter the bore their own length so oversized cast bullets, as such, really can't contribute much for accuracy. So I have to wonder, what's driving the current "expert reloader" fascination with fat cast bullets anyway?

i feel that the last statement is in regard to some bore dimensions out there ? some 38-55s have 378, whilst some are 381 , that alone screams fat cast ?

on average though, it might be something between PO and the average joe that One finds their happy medium or maybe even more excellent results that they are wanting to achieve... thus being itty biddy groupings for the internet, yeah?

that p.o experiment is full on, up to 35 cal!! cool to hear though an gives me some food for thought.
thanks

[Winger Ed.]

Sized to .309 or .310 with a gas check is sort of the favorite, and what all the loading books date is based on
if ya want to gas 'em on up approaching max. loads.

Just a wild guess, but if they came without gas checks, It'd be a safe bet that they haven't been sized either

[Mike H]

It seems as if you are trying to drive them too fast for a non gas checked bullet,even with a coated one.
Depending on your loading dies and your methods of sizing,case neck expansion and bullet seating,it is possible to damage the projectiles when loading.
If it was me,the first thing I would do is make up some dummy rounds with empty unprimed cartridge cases to check chamber fit and seating depth.
It will be a lot easier if you remove the firing pin,spring and cocking piece from the bolt first,this will give a more sensitive feel when checking the chambering. I expect that you have champhered the mouth of the cartridge cases,a light flare of the case neck with a nail punch or needle nose pliers will help in lieu of neck expanding tools,such as the Lyman M die.

[Wayne Smith]

Why not invest in a Lee size die, you can seat gas checks in it as well. I have read that Titan ships to Australia.

[1hole]

i feel that the last statement is in regard to some bore dimensions out there ? some 38-55s have 378, whilst some are 381 , that alone screams fat cast ?

Like fat women, "fat" bullets don't have engineering specifications; pick whatever amount of fat you like.

Anything much over the actual bore diameter quickly begins to be too fat for the bullet to easily enter the chamber & bore without undue force. I call any bullet more than one thou larger than the bore it will be fired in "fat". IMHO, fat bullets are not conducive to small groups but peak accuracy doesn't come from anyone's blanket rules of thumb, not even mine.

Bullet sizer dies are much better tools for making bullets fit than just loading and firing them. Seems IF cast bullets fit their intended chamber first - meaning neither jammed hard in the lands nor sloppy loose in the chamber throat - they will usually seat and chamber more consistently straight and THAT does reduce group size!

...on average though, it might be something between PO and the average joe that One finds their happy medium or maybe even more excellent results that they are wanting to achieve... thus being itty biddy groupings for the internet, yeah?

No. First, home cast bullets are inexpensive projectiles for fun shooting; at their very best they cannot be as precisely accurate as much more costly factory target grade jacketed bullets.

Fat cast bullets are simply not conducive to making smallest "groupings" and bullet sizer dies do a more consistent job of fitting cast bullets that may go straighter into the bore. BUT, it's much easier to get itsy-bitsy web groups the way I believe most web guru guys do it; I think they hopefully lie ... a lot!

Anyway, happy mediums are not part of my reloading vocabulary. In my limited experience, there is one best shooting bullet diameter for a given firearm (AND the lube and the load) for any firearm. That's usually at bore size or 1-2 thou over, but no more. Thus, any "fat happy medium" from that would have to be some point between best and something that's not the best. In some 60 years of shooting my own cast rifle and handgun bullets I've never seen any positive results directly attributable to using fatter ones.

... that p.o experiment is full on, up to 35 cal!! cool to hear though an gives me some food for thought. thanks

I'm an old guy. I take anything said (in print) by the late Mr. Ackley to be the final word. In my mind, NO ONE else has ever come close to being as broadly knowledgeable about experimental sporting rifles and ammunition as he.

Let's go Brandon!

[414gates]

+1, everything 1hole said.

Limit is at what will chamber in your rifle without forcing it.

[10x]

Several Lee Enfield No. 4 rifles have taught me to load the largest cast bullet that will chamber easily. Some of these the bullet is 0.314 or larger.
The throat of the chamber is the best resizing die there is.
I have also gone to powder coated bullets in all my rifles, not for an increase in velocity, but most powder coated bullets will equal the groups or give small groups compared to alox based lubes.

I tend to shoot the largest diameter cast bullet that will chamber easily in any of the 30 caliber rifles I use. Group sizes tend to be smaller than bullets sized to 0.001" over bore diameter.
This has been my experience, other folk may disagree.

[Rapidrob]

How far are you seating the bullet from the origin of the rifling? Some bullet nose shape do not like to "jump" into the rifling and will produce very poor accuracy.
A trick I leaned from an old Schuetzen Shooter in the 1970's was to seat a cast bullet into the lead by hand and load a charged fired case where the neck was opened up larger than the bullet and fire it. As long as you seat the bullet well centered in the throat ( I used a wood dowel ) This showed if the bullet was going to be accurate out of that rifles bore as there was no "jump". This has saved me $$ and aggravation over the decades as to which bullet will shoot the most accurately by buying / begging a few cast bullets from friends or manufactures of molds to try out their projectiles.

[1hole]

Ref. the supposed purpose of loading fat bullets for better accuracy, it's rarely mentioned these days but any slightly under size bullets with any load near max pressure WILL expand and obturate (totally fill) the bore so starting oversized boolits to insure that the bore is sealed isn't the real issue. Of course shooting very light powder charges or a too slow burning powder for the load or shooting light-for-caliber bullets are less likely to reliably obturate.

All powders burn rate can be erratic, even between seemingly identical rounds, due to very high OR very low chamber pressure. Fact is, all powders burn best - i.e, they burn more consistently - within their designed pressure range.

I believe it can be proven that reloads that shoot oversize boollits better are due to a too light charge and/or a too slow burn rate powder. IF so, and if using fat bullets can raise the pressure even slightly, that difference can make the burn rate and accuracy more consistent.

Meaning, yeah, fat bullets CAN, or at least MAY, shoot better but it's not directly because the bullets are oversize; fat boolits simply slightly increase the burn rate for any given powder charge. However, slightly increasing the powder charge OR using a slightly faster burning powder seems more controllable and better for obtaining peak cast accuracy than just hopefully using fat bullets without actually knowing what they're doing.

Finally, in my opinion, if simply shooting oversized cast bullets was the better method of boolit sizing then everyone would be doing it and there would be no meaningful market for lubrasizers and their various diameter dies. (Other's opinion may vary of course.