Reloading BS thread

An AR unless it's a match rifle is made to run that ammo, it's a battle rifle same thing with a FN or HK. Try Fed gold medal match or Blackhills in your bolt gun, Privi partisan match is decent as well.

 

So, the press and dies came in and I have loaded up about 200 9mm and some 357 and 38 special. All of the loads I have tested thus far have worked well, with the exception of a few light 357 loads that I tried with 124 grain 9mm plated bullets. Even though the bore on my revolver slugs at .356, they were just not as accurate as the actual .357 plated bullets.

What I have ran across is some conflicting information on a load that I made for 9mm. Tell me what you guys think:

124 gr X-treme plated round nose with CCI 500 primer and 5.4 grains of Unique at COAL of 1.0955. Alliant's web site shows a max load for a 124 grain jacketed bullet as 5.8 grains of Unique, CCI 500 and a COAL of 1.12. My Lyman shows a max load as 5.0 grains of unique for a Jacketed 125 gr bullet.

Initially, this looked like a safe load (7% below Alliant's max), Now looking at the Lyman manual, I don't know. I am not above separating the loads I made (about 30 of them), but I don't really want to if I don't need to. Anyone have experience with this or a similar load? Does it seem too hot?

 

Well, after some further research, I determined that while this load is a little hotter than what I had been shooting, it was not beyond any limits. I tested them this morning while sighting in my new adjustable sights, and they shot just fine with no feed issues or signs of over-pressure. They were no more accurate than my lighter loads, so no real advantage to loading them - just wasting powder.

 

Can we trade bullets in this thread or do we need to start a B/S/T Other thread for that?

 

Not sure, but I have 600 deprimed, full length resized and ultrasonically cleaned 9mm brass I am willing to let go for $20 + shipping. All different kinds of head stamps (Winchester, Federal, Aguila, Blazer, etc).

 

Y'all are welcome to post the items for sale in here but you might stay more organized with a dedicated reloading FS thread (like what the guys did with the AR FS thread).

So I bought some 308 dies tonight, hornady 2 die set (custom grade dies).
This is how the depriming/sizing die comes (I pulled the primer punch out).


I assume if I run it like this it'll resize the neck, correct?
I need to expand the neck to reload the bullets after I pull the bullet, measure powder, and download it some to see if my signs of pressure go away.

 

I was thinking about letting go of these 120 gr SMK's and getting some 123 gr instead, can't decide...

Also, the powder valley shipment came in today, use every ounce of that 48 pound limit!

 

I'm not sure exactly what you are asking, but yes that should work. Pull the bullets and resize the necks again before reloading. Why did you buy a new set of dies though?

 

Thanks, I'm pretty sure also but thought I would ask more experienced people.

I didn't have a set of 308 dies, I bought some surplus ammo that is giving my rifle (savage 10 FCP-sr) sticky bolt and i believe it's from hot ammo, I am going to disect a round, measure powder and download some and then reseat the bullet and crimp and see how it shoots.

 

Yes pulling the decapping pin out of the neck sizer will allow you to resize the necks with the primers in the brass. I do that all the time, I just resized a bunch of 308 to 708 that was prepped and ready to load.

With rifle cartridges there is no need to crimp. The bullet is held in by neck tension.

 

Cool, thanks for the reply.
Good to know, I haven't had a chance to read the instructions that came with the dies or watch any rifle reloading videos so I'm not 100% sure about reloading rifle rounds, I don't have school this friday so I should have some time to research it and get the dies set up.

 

Before you do anything, do a search on the headstamp on the cases. There was a huge amount of Israeli 7.62 ammo that was dumped on the US market that is unsafe. I ended up with some and just pulled the bullets and threw away everything else. If that is what you have I'd suggest salvaging the bullets and not shooting. Pretty sure it was mostly TZ80 but there are others.

Before messing with the powder in those cases, which I wouldn't do, I would break the lacquer seal and then shoot them to see if you have less bolt lift. All you have to do is run them into your seating die and move the bullet back around 0.002 inches. You should definitely feel the bullet being freed. Also do this before trying to pull the bullets.

If you end up reloading those cases, remember they are military cases and have less volume than 308 cases. Start on the low end and work up. Best to use a Chrono to really know when to stop. By the time you get signs of over pressure you are well above safe limits.

 

The ammo is Hirtenberger (Austrian) late 70's early 80's manufacture.
It has a reputation for being a little hot.

I'll try breaking the seal and see how that works.

If I have to de-load the cases I was just planning on measuring the powder and downloading by 5% or so and trying a few rounds to see if they're still hot or if they would be GTG.

 

Do you know what kind of powder is in these cartridges? Measuring the powder weight won't do you much good otherwise.

 

I found this thread on the M-14 forum from a couple years ago, sounds like that ammo was probably loaded to run in a machine gun.
Got a M-60 or 1919 A4 and a linker?

http://m14forum.com/ammunition/80170-hirtenberger-7-62x51-ammo.html

 

How so?
If I'm putting the same powder back in with just a couple fewer grains then why would I need to know the powder type/model?

From what I have read they are loaded with 45 grains of a ball type powder, they can be downloaded to 40 grains and safely fired.

Nope, I wouldn't mind a 1919 to mount on an old jeep though.

 

Oh, OK...I thought you were going to measure the powder weight and compare it with a load chart. Yes, it's fine to reduce what you have (whatever it is) by a few %. I wouldn't be surprised if it's IMR 4895, a very commonly used powder for military 308 and 30-06 rounds.

 

Need to get off my butt and get to work.

 

Downloaded 5 surplus 7.62 rounds from 45 Gr to 41 GR 2 of the 5 rounds still stuck and due to weather I didn't have a chance to fire any of the remington Core-lokt that I bought.

 

I might take those off your hands if you still want to get rid of them.