I’ve previously used the “cleaning rod down the barrel” method of measuring the overall cartridge length, with the bullet’s ogive just touching the lands. I found the major weakness to this system was the fact that having a recessed muzzle crown limited the ability to accurately draw, and measure the precise distance between, the relevant lines on the rod. Consequently, I would greatly appreciate any advice or opinions from the readers in relation to the following alternative method :

Method used for seating a bullet off the lands :
1. Partially insert a bullet into the slit neck of a properly sized, unprimed case.
2. Insert the dummy cartridge into the chamber and exert light pressure with a finger against the base of the case so that the bullet’s tapered nose or ogive makes contact with the barrel rifling grooves or lands.
3. Then, fully insert the case into the chamber.
4. Carefully extract the cartridge from the chamber – use wire hook in primer hole.
5. Measure the length of the cartridge, from the bullet’s tip to the base of the case.
Note : This measurement should be the maximum cartridge length for that bullet in that rifle, with the bullet’s ogive just touching the lands of the barrel.
6. Seat the bullet in a properly sized, primed case to a depth that results in a cartridge with an overall length 0.5 mm shorter than the maximum cartridge length – resulting in the bullet’s ogive being 0.5 mm short of the lands.
7. Test fire several cartridges – check the PRIMER pressure levels etc and overall grouping size – further reduce the cartridge’s overall length if required.

Note : 1. Use a fine hack saw to cut the slits and remember to remove any burrs. The slits reduce the frictional force on the bullet, allowing it to easily slide into and out of the neck. There is also less chance of the bullet being tightly jammed in the lands when the case is fully inserted into the chamber.
2. Drill the case’s primer hole out to about 3mm.
3. Shape a small hook at one end of a thin, stiff piece of wire – to be inserted into the enlarged primer hole and gently pulled to extract the cartridge from the chamber - rather than using a rifle’s more forceful ejection system which will possibly change the bullet’s precise position resting against the lands.
4. Using the above method, I recently loaded a batch of Hornady 65 Gr V-Max bullets for my beautiful old Browning B 78 High Wall .243 Win single shot rifle – resulting in a very respectful tight group. In the process, I’ve seated the bullet 0.6 mm short of the lands, resulting in only 2 mm of the parallel sides of this boat tail bullet making direct contact with the case’s neck. Could someone possibly inform me if there is any absolute minimum length for seating a bullet inside the neck of a case, and if there are any associated safety & performance issues. I’m conscious of the fact that, with such a small contact area, any rough handling might easily put the bullet out of alignment in the case’s neck. I’m new to reloading and often search such forums on the internet for helpful advice, one being the suggested starting point of seating a bullet about 0.5 mm short of the lands. My sincere thanks for any feed back.

I have used a simpler version of your method for years and it works fine for me.

The ogive to bullet point dimension can vary a good bit depending on the bullets. Be sure to use the very same bullet you measured with to set your seating die.

Why not just use the rifles extractor to remove your test cartridge from the chamber?

Measuring to the bullet tip is worthless, as KenK says. The proper way is to measure from cartridge base to the point on the ogive that is bore diameter. After you have that length, you can quickly set the seating depth for ANY bullet and achieve the same "to-lands" distance every time. (Magazine fit is a separate issue, and must also be considered.)

Set your calipers to bore diameter. (.300" for a .30-cal; .220" for a .22-cal, etc.) Gently rotate a bullet in the caliper jaws so you scribe a thin line around the bullet.

Using your method, find the seating depth where the bullet just touches the lands. With the case/bullet extracted, measure the distance from the cartridge base to that scribed line. (Repeat two or three times to be sure.) That's the "zero clearance" distance. Subtract any amount you choose to get an exact "off lands" distance.

When you change bullet styles, shapes or even lot numbers, scribe one bullet with the bore diameter line, and seat it until you achieve your desired "off lands" distance, and lock your seater. Done.

Your proceedure will work, personally i use a guage for more accurate measurement.

My guage is homemade roughly using Stoney Point's as a pattern. The body is made of 5/8 alum. bar and the slider is 5/32 drill rod. There is a couple radiused set screws at different locations to lock the slider. The threaded end that holds the cases is 5/16 fine. I used a lathe and mill but could be easily done by hand.

The cases are fire formed from the rifle I'm loading for. I used a wilson case holder from my trimmer to mount in a lathe collet to drill and tap the case head and to hone the case neck for a slip fit on the bullet.

As KenK mentioned use the same bullet for setting over all length as what you used when measuring. Use a bullet seater that goes from the ogive rather than bullet tip.

You might want to try closing down your jump distance. I have two rifles that shoot best with the bullet sitting on the lands. Usually set the bullets back .010" (.25mm) to avoid having a bullet pull from the case when unchambering a loaded round.

Great tool, Monty. But not many reloaders have machine tools to make one. ALL of us have a caliper.

KenK, my Browning B78’s spring activated extractor removes the bullet from the chamber with considerable force – the sudden rear ward thrust causes the bullet to move slightly in the case’s slit neck, resulting in an inaccurate measurement of the cartridges overall length – thus my reason for using the hooked piece of wire inserted into the enlarged primer hole to gently extract the cartridge. Sound advice regarding the use of the same bullet when setting the seating die. However, that particular bullets ogive position might be slightly different compared to that of other similar bullets. Therefore, a fairer alternative might be to calculate the AVERAGE overall cartridge length using five randomly chosen bullets (with their ogive resting against the lands) and in turn, select the bullet which matches the AVERAGE. Thereafter, seating each bullet 0.5 mm short of the AVERAGE overall cartridge length will hopefully account for any slight variations in the ogive position of other similar bullets. The notion of reloaders discussing and sharing their collective knowledge and experiences certainly engages the thinking process in relation to how we can refine or simplify the various reloading procedures. In short, a very worthwhile teaching / learning experience for all.

I should have thought of the spring actuated ejector, my Ruger was the same until I disabled it.

To be clear, when I say use the same bullet, I mean use the very same bullet. Not another one out of the same box and certainly not another model, even if it looks the same.

I also think this measurement needs to be repeated for every different type bullet that you use, possibly even different lots of the same make and model.

If you used your "measuring bullet" to make a dummy round you could repeat fairly closely that seating die adjustment after you changed your die for another bullet.

Not to sound petulant about this, but when exactly does the tip of the bullet touch the bore?

Answer: it NEVER touches the bore.

So I cannot see the point (pun intended) of measuring to the tip of the bullet - except for magazine clearance. Magazine clearance is the only reason OAL is mentioned in the load books. It has nothing whatever to do with the distance from the lands.

What DOES touch the bore (and does so first) is the bore diameter ring on the slope (ogive) of the bullet. If you measure anything at all for "off lands" distance, it HAS to be to that spot on the ogive.

If you establish an optimum distance of cartridge base to that bore-diameter ring, you can seat ANY bullet of ANY weight, ANY shape and ANY tip style to PRECISELY the same off lands distance. And that's the ONLY way to do it.

I've used the split neck bullet seating method for some years now and am happy with the results. Always take more than one reading to verify results. Several in a row with the same dimension usually works for me.

Again, since all mine (except a target .223 Rem) are meant for hunting and the cartridges are magazine stored. This means the magazine maximum length for proper functioning is the real controlling COAL for me.

And that's the ONLY way to do it.

Not to sound argumentative, Rocky, but no, it is not. No matter how ill formed or inconsistent a given lot of bullet's points may be, the point of one particular bullet will serve as a datum for measuring to the rifling and then setting the seating die.

Also not argumentative, my friend. But please explain how one can measure from the bullet point to the rifling. The bullet point never gets closer than one-half caliber to the rifling, and (as you mention) points can be ill-formed. As we are commonly talking about measurements to the nearest thousandth of an inch, how good is a datum that varies from bullet to bullet? If we use that one particular bullet to set the seating die, is the next (differently shaped) bullet seated to the same depth? How?

If you think your extraction method may pull the bullet, start the bullet into the split case, and smoke it all around. If it tends to pull out, you will see a copper band cleaned of the smoke just above the casemouth. Pushing the cartridge out with a brass rod or a wood dowel pushed slowly down the bore works if the case isn't too tight in the chamber.

I modified an old illustration of bullet parts to add a round-nose bullet and some red lettering to point out the touchdown point of the rifling. It is on the ogive immediately ahead of the bullet shoulder. I also but some read arrows to indicate the difference in seating depth required to put both bullet touchdown points the same distance off the lands. It gives you a basic idea why measuring cartridge overall length to the tip isn't really useful.

I've measured up to +/- 7 thousandths variation of bullet length in Sierra match bullets, all due to tip variation. That translates to a minimum guaranteed error. I've also noticed that measuring ogives from the bases of bullets shows lot-to-lot variation. Sierra separates its lots by tooling and machine operator, so you are good to go within a given lot number of Sierra’s. The more massive bullet producers, though, will mix bullets coming off different tooling, and so the only way to be sure of maintaining the correct seating depth with these is to measure the location of the bullet ogive location with respect to the headspace determinate on the case for every round. Redding makes a tool that does this.

Also, when a cartridge fires, unless it is fireformed, as Monty mentioned, and neck sized only, the firing pin pushes it forward until the headspace determinate stops it, and the bullet shoves forward with it. For that reason it is the headspace determinate you want to measure seating depth with respect to in a full-length resized case, as the Redding tool does, and not the back of the casehead. The fireformed case starts out touching down as far forward as it will go, and so, measuring the ogive to the caseshead is OK if you are neck sizing only; just not if you full length resize.

Your method of pushing the case as far forward as you can with your finger gives you a good worst case of the sized case being as far forward as it will go, but only provided you resize all your cases no shorter than the one you use for your test case. The worst situation is to use a fireformed case to determine seating depth, then applying its casehead-to-ogive length to cartridges with heavily resized cases. These cases will be shoved forward by the firing pin on firing, and the bullet will shove forward with them, possibly jamming into the lands and raising pressure. Mostly, this is not fatal to the gun, but can screw up accuracy big time.

http://img512.imageshack.us/img512/4449/bulletnomenclatureandsexw4.gif

Here is the way I do it Rocky. It may not be the only way, may not be the best way, but it seems to work for me.

I have a new box of Sierra bullets. I want to seat them X distance from the lands.

I take one bullet out of the box. I put the box with the other 99 back on the shelf.

I then go through the well outlined method above to find out what the overall length of a case and that bullet is when the bullet is touching the lands of the rifling.

I subtract X from the overall length I just determined.

I take a ready to load case and seat that very bullet (that I just used to measure the overall length with) to the overall length I just determined.

My seating die is now set. I do not measure length again so long as I'm using that same box of bullets and have not moved my seating die.

Hmmm.

I've heard complaints about the RCBS Precision Mic tool, but found it pretty easy to use. As Ken mentions, you just have to make sure you get several measurements in a row that are exactly the same. Fiddling with how tight it is helps. In fact it's vital, but once you get that right, it is very consistent.

Write down the numbers in your loading notes, and you are good to go.

I'll take that over smoking case necks, and whatnot, any day....

Good explanation / graphics, Nick.

Rocky Raab, the purpose of measuring from the case’s base to the bullet’s TIP is initially to determine the precise O.A.L. of the cartridge when the dummy bullet’s ogive has made direct contact with the lands. In turn, if you elect to seat the ogive say 0.5 mm short of the lands, simply SUBTRACT your chosen seating distance from the cartridge’s initial O.A.L.
Eg. Cartridge’s O.A.L. with bullet’s ogive touching the lands = 70.5 mm
If you elect to seat the bullet’s ogive 0.5 mm short of the lands then the cartridge’s new O.A.L. is then calculated and measured as follows : 70.5 – 0.5 = 70.0mm

Unclenick, reading your extensive input makes me conscious of the fact that the art of reloading is somewhat of a Science in itself; the more you know the more you realize how much you don’t know. For example - thanks to the shared ideas and experiences of others on such reloading forums I have progressed from full length resizing fireformed cases to neck sizing them, and from using a RCBS Trim die to an electric drill driven LEE Case trimmer. I’m not a bench rest shooter, rather a keen recreational hunter who has elected to take on the challenge of reloading following the recent purchase of my first centrefire rifle – an old Browning B78 High Wall.
In short, I’m sincerely grateful for your contribution – such as taking into account that we need to make allowances for bullet variations arising from the use of different tooling and machine operators, to headspace differences between fireformed and full length sized cases. What have I got myself into ……a fantastic learning experience!
Note, the notion of using a brass rod or a wood dowel to gently push a cartridge out of the chamber, would in fact, be unsuitable in this instance because as I mentioned previously, a case with a slit neck would offer far less frictional force on the bullet – resulting in the bullet being pushed deeper into the neck by the rod.

Ken and Ross, your method only works if the bullets are all precisely the same. What if the one you select is the shortest one in the box, or the longest?

The problem is that the tip-to-bore diameter point changes from bullet to bullet. And therefore, if you are setting OAL by measuring to the tip, so does your off-lands distance. As Unclenick mentioned, that can be several thousandths of an inch for bullets from the same box.

But, if you stop to think about it, there is one and ONLY one place on the curve of the bullet that is exactly bore diameter (bore diameter is also the tops of the lands) - and that one point on the bullet is what you are trying to set from the lands a given distance.

So why not use that one and only one point as your measuring spot? That's what my method does.

The tip method is made even worse by the design of many or most seating stems. Many of them bear on the bullet's tip, or slightly behind it, so no matter what you do, a bullet with a bent or rounded tip will be seated farther out than one with a sharp point. BTW, I hollow my seater stems so that the bullet tip does NOT touch inside the stem, but only on the ogive.

No, bullet tips are simply too imprecise for setting seating depth or off-lands distance.

Lastly, what Unclenick says about headspace, sizing and the off-lands distance is valid. I've found, however, that firing pin effects are (or seem to be) pretty consistent. Once I find a seating depth that proves accurate, I can repeat that seating depth precisely using my method. No matter what the sizing is or what the firing pin does to move the case, if it is all consistent, so will the accuracy be. In other words, I don't really care what the actual measurement of the off-lands distance is, as long as I can repeat a precise seating depth to achieve consistent accuracy.

Make sense now?

Ross,

Glad you're having fun with this. There is a bunch to learn about and try out. As I mentioned, the Redding Instant Indicator tool (http://www.redding-reloading.com/pages/rickjamison.html) (expensive) makes genuine ogive-to-headspace measurements, but at $72 per chambering, is pretty pricey. About three years before they came out with their tool, I had the same idea, but made my own design that lets me change chamberings in the one tool. In mine I use the same chamber reamers that chamber my rifles to cut the plunger that touches the bullet and presses up on the dial indicator. Also, I use the same reamers for the removable shoulder bushing (knurled surface in image below) that locates the headspace in the cartridges I use.

http://img504.imageshack.us/img504/8343/seatingdepthgauge2zs8.gif

For much less money than the Redding, and if you are willing to make two measurements, you can get the Hornady (formerly Stoney Point brand) Lock-N-Load Overall Chamber Length Gage and chambering adapter case, a caliper adapter of either the Hornady or Sinclair brand, and the headspace and bullet comparator inserts that go into the adapter. I would use the Sinclair bullet comparator inserts. They are stainless steel instead of aluminum and are tapered to mimic chamber throat angles. The Hornady aluminum inserts are fine for headspace gaging off a case shoulder. Sinclair inserts and their own caliper adapter (which is interchangeable with the Hornady) are here: Adapter body (http://www.sinclairintl.com/cgi-bin/category.cgi?category=RESDTCO&item=09-1000&type=store), and SS bullet comparator inserts (http://www.sinclairintl.com/cgi-bin/category.cgi?category=search&item=09-0XXX&type=store). Midway carries the Hornady versions and the gage. Sinclair seems to have some of the gages left under the original Stoney Point brand.

Sinclair’s hex bullet comparator is also made with actual chamber reamers, but takes more skill to use and doesn’t work with the chamber comparator, which requires an offset as the linked tool has. In practice, you use the gage and adapter case to put an actual bullet in to touch the lands, the bullet comparator to measure its ogive to casehead length, and the headspace comparator in the caliper adapter to measure the headspace of the gage’s adapter case. You subtract that last reading from the bullet comparator reading to get the ogive distance from the headspace point. That becomes the dimension you need to match on your actual cartridges, whether full-length resized or fireformed.

My description of pushing the cartridge out with a rod presumes your case does not stick at all in the chamber, but can fall out. It works with full-length sized cases, but your fireformed cases can indeed be too firmly fit to fall out without resistance. In that case, other than going to the Hornady system or using smoking or some other approach to check that the bullet doesn't move during extraction, you will have to fish it out from behind as you are doing now. If you already own a caliper, I think the gages and adapters above are easier to use.

Unclenick, bear with me on this one. As a student my old school motto was, “do what you do well”. As a teacher, my school’s similar philosophy is for everyone “to strive for their personal best in all that they do”. My School Principal once told the staff that a Rolls Royce assembly worker was sacked when a foreman overheard him say, “that’s close enough”. I hear and read of reloaders who obsessively make numerous different measurements of just about every case, bullet, seating depth, grain of powder used etc. I’m thinking, where do we draw the line. A professional hunter who puts bread on the table for his family through the use of his firearms, or a bench rest shooter who wants to be top dog in his field may very well strive for such perfection.
However, I’m sure that like myself, many “average shot” shooters who tinker with the process of reloading are in reality, somewhat like the sacked Rolls Royce assembly worker. When it’s all said and done, a fox shot in the head at 150 metres won’t die thinking about possible 0.002” variances in the length of similar bullets. Sure, the perfectionist reloader and skilled marksman might very well be able to put one smack between the eyes but, given the size of a foxes head, I’m sure the fox will be just as dead when shot by the average “Rolls Royce” reloader/shooter. Reloading is a time consuming task, repetitive in nature, with a strong emphasis on being clearly focussed. Sure, I can reload a cartridge for roughly half the cost of one bought over the counter. However, the initial purchase of “essential” reloading equipment is quite substantial. Being a relatively low volume shooter I might very well be a Grandpa by the time I break even. In the meantime, the more I learn about the art of reloading I realise there are even “bigger and better” tools out there to do a particular job. Yes, the additional purchase of a rather costly pneumatic wheel nut remover will get a nut off faster than the Rolls Royce worker’s regular wheel brace but, like humanely killing the fox, the same task is basically achieved. I love the investigative nature of reloading but, in light of the fact that I currently do not have the dedicated time, money and absolute need to heavily invest in this hobby, I’m going to be practical and largely improvise with the “essentials” at hand. In the process, thanks to you and others on the forum, I will consciously take into account much of the shared ideas and in particular, the need to make definite allowances for variations in the length of bullets, seating depths etc. Like most reloaders who largely learn through trial and error what works satisfactorily in their particular rifle I’ll note the “sweet spot” for each type of bullet tested and thereafter, enjoy the fruits of my labours. Once again, my sincere thanks for your valued time and advise

Cheers for Ross. Loud ones.

I've long preached the philosophy of "simpler is better" in reloading. I think we are chronically infected with "technicalitis" and "perfection syndrome" when it comes to this hobby.

Not that many years ago, a rifle that delivered two-inch groups out of the box was normal. People bragged endlessly about one that gave reliable one-inch groups. But today, a one-inch rifle is almost scorned. "Not good enough."

Not good enough for WHAT, exactly?

Yes, I know, it's nice to have something a little bit "better" whether that means smaller groups, more muzzle velocity, flatter trajectory or whatever. But why is "better" what we call standard, average, usual performance? Where does that stop? Perfection can't be standard; it is and can only be, unique.

Remember this: No matter how much we fiddle with the minutiae of this sport, we still miss things we shoot at. Is it somehow better to know that the cartridge we missed with was absolutely concentric, measured to within angstroms of perfection in seventeen different ways, every component weighed to within a molecule and sorted down to samples of one?

Not for me.

Would tend to agree with RR's philosophy on normal reloading practices. Some folks tend to get bogged down in the grass roots of the process to a degree that borders on separating the fly specks from the pepper.

You need to re-read the reloading preamble of most manuals to refresh on proper loading techniques. Straining at gnats is not recommended.

I DO clean cases prior to running through a die (inside necks as well), clean primer pockets before seating new ones, check for trim length and uneven neck thickness, look for splits or wall thinning, throw each powder charge with a digital scale (unless loading reduced charge handgun loads) to within +- 1/10th gr, rotate the case 1/4 turns while seating the bullet and then check the OAL from base to bullet ogive with a collimeter. That seems to produce very acceptable target and hunting ammo for my needs.

Other than trying to keep all the cases and bullets from the same brand/lot, I don't go into weighing individual cases or bullets.

Getting down into the frog hair is just too time consuming for the minute fractions of improvement they may, or may not, provide.

If I were a competetive shooter, then my attitude would probably be different.

Thanks, kdub. I'd say that most of your practices ARE fairly basic. Not much sifting of frog hairs there at all.

I'd love to discourse on your powder charge parameters being a bit tighter than required, as well as the need for cleaning primer pockets - but those are **** near nits, too.

For any others who agree, my upcoming reloading book will be devoted to the basics: no benchrest techniques, no laborious makework, no weighing of fly specks.

Nahh. Youse guys is all wet. It all about perfection! ;)

Like every other reloader I know, I started reloading with simple tools and basic methods. There is nothing at all wrong with that, since you almost always wind up improving on both the cost and accuracy of factory ammunition, even if just by trial and error. Nonetheless, I never think it hurts to know about additional possibilities. They can suggest new avenues to explore if you have a problem, or just the next place to go when you find you have the time and inclination to play with further improvement.

As a rifle instructor, I regularly encounter the middling shot who says his gun "shoots better than I do," but who also complains he isn’t improving with practice. If lent a good match accurized rifle of his same model, and with matching ammunition, this shooter is just astonished to find his scores go up; sometimes dramatically. The problem is, sources of error mask not only what the rifle does, but what the shooter is capable of, as well. So, while I don’t think an engineering degree or employment by Rolls Royce are required for shooting well, neither is it always wise to dismiss something as “good enough” without clear evidence that this is so. Kdub’s response is notable in this regard: He’s simplified, but not 100%, as some of the extra bother has proved itself worthwhile.

A practical point:

Ross,

I don’t think you will have serious problems working on seating depth the way you are, as long as you keep using neck-sized-only cases and don’t try to get way up close, like 0.005” off the lands. That will get you into the bullet length variance range.

Where the headspace-to-ogive verses other seating measurements becomes more than academic is when someone tries to seat, say 0.010” off the lands, but is full-length resizing to SAMMI minimum, doing so with 0.003” headspace variation (owing to mixed cases), has bullets with lengths that vary 0.005”, and has a chamber 0.003” over SAMMI minimum. Using COL measurement only, this shooter can fool himself into thinking he is staying 0.010” off the lands, but when his tolerances accumulate unilaterally (as they randomly will) can actually touch down on the lands and garner an unexpected pressure rise. This rise is usually not enough to damage a gun, but can screw up the shot and, if the load was near maximum, can blow out a primer or separate a casehead. I also think one reason many report better results seating 0.020-0.030” off the lands than when seating closer is the greater distance renders their unidentified variance less significant.


Back to philosophy:

That I love the tech stuff is no secret. Having a number of patents, I have spent much of my life on improvisation and enjoy its challenge to ingenuity. However, I have also noticed improvisation involves extra time and trouble. Yes, I know how to make black gunpowder from scratch, starting with fermenting human waste for a year for making the saltpeter, but believe the time and trouble speak for themselves. :D You've got to pick and choose what is worth it?

From a totally scientific standpoint, the ideal situation would be to eliminate all variables but yourself, then see how you shoot? Then re-introduce these variables, one at a time, then in combinations, until your score, whether counted on targets or fox heads, starts to go down. That's when you know what you do and do not need to do with your routine loads. But that's just the Utopian ideal. As David Bergland points out: “Utopia is a place where everyone always has everything they want and nothing ever goes wrong. Utopia is not one of the options.”

Thanks, kdub. . . I'd love to discourse on your powder charge parameters being a bit tighter than required. . .

Rocky,

Have you ever looked over Dan Newberry's OCW (http://home.earthlink.net/~dannewberry/dannewberrysoptimalchargeweightloaddevelopment/) (optimum charge weight) site? It is devoted to identifying exceptionally charge-insensitive loads that work at least pretty well in a range of firearms without adjustment. In working up loads for my M1A years ago, I found one bullet/powder combination that would only group in a little knot over about a .3 grain span, but another that spanned a full two grains without the groups opening up. The midpoint of the latter would qualify as an OCW if it held up in other guns, too. I'd have to look up the eact data, but recall it was the Sierra 155 grain bullet over the no-longer-made Scot 3032. The touchy load was a 168 grain Sierra, but I dont recall the powder. It must have been a stick powder because I remember I couldn't get the measures I owned at the time to throw it consistently enough to use the load, and wasn't about to weigh every charge in the volume I was shooting at matches back then.

Rocky Raab, accurately determining a cartridges O.A.L. when the bullet's ogive is touching the lands and in turn, seating the ogive just off the lands appears to be a somewhat futile task because, according to a number of reloaders from other such forums there is apparently a recommended minimum depth of one calibre for seating a bullet inside a case's neck, which in my case equates to 6.17 mm.

Considering that the Hornady 65 and 75 Gn V-Max bullets are relatively short, they simply cannot be seated just off the lands. Armed with this new knowledge I'll load up several batches of cartridges at slightly varying depths to that recommended and trial them down at the rifle range - with the added peace of mind that I will have more than 2 mm of bearing surface.

Which leaves me with only the longer Hornady 87 Gn V-Max and 95 Gn SST bullet's to fiddle with in relation to their O.A.L. etc. Reloading certainly is an on going learning experience. Sincere thanks for your input.

Ross, that's yet another of the many "Yeah, but..." situations in reloading. For just about any "Always" or "Never" you'll find a matching "Yeah, but."

This is a fun hobby - if you wind up with any hair or fingernails left!

Rocky Raab, accurately determining a cartridges O.A.L. when the bullet's ogive is touching the lands and in turn, seating the ogive just off the lands appears to be a somewhat futile task because, according to a number of reloaders from other such forums there is apparently a recommended minimum depth of one calibre for seating a bullet inside a case's neck, which in my case equates to 6.17 mm.

Considering that the Hornady 65 and 75 Gn V-Max bullets are relatively short, they simply cannot be seated just off the lands. Armed with this new knowledge I'll load up several batches of cartridges at slightly varying depths to that recommended and trial them down at the rifle range - with the added peace of mind that I will have more than 2 mm of bearing surface.

Which leaves me with only the longer Hornady 87 Gn V-Max and 95 Gn SST bullet's to fiddle with in relation to their O.A.L. etc. Reloading certainly is an on going learning experience. Sincere thanks for your input.


It's not that big of deal.... if the cartridges won't be handled roughly, you can seat them with less than one caliber in the case neck.

This link (http://www.lima-wiederladetechnik.de/Englisch/Laddertest.htm) is to an article that describes seating depth as just another tuning factor, like varying powder charge. I wish it had more detail, such as how a test load was selected? You will find descriptions on these forums, such as some of Recoil Junkie's recent posts, where moving the bullet back finds a relatively deep seating depth "sweet spot" for the load. The implication is that a certain depth seems to lock in bullet alignment, but (you'll be relieved to hear) I have no theory to explain it. Just the observation that it is reported.

Yes, the "old rule of thumb" is to seat bullets with one diameter of depth. This is ideal for proper tension and alignment, but as stated above, not the ABSOLUTE rule.

The important thing is to assure enough depth for proper alignment with the bore and, if using the rifle's magazine for storage, proper feeding from the magazine. Also, as MikeG states, be able to take the handling. If carefully feeding by hand directly into the chamber, you can get away with less seating depth.

The IDEAL situation is to have the one bullet diameter depth minimum and yet be just a scooch off the lands, say .010" - .015" standoff. Unfortunately, in many cases you have to sacrifice one or the other. You have to personally determine which you are willing to give up. The use of a runout gauge is extremely helpful in this situation.

kdub and MikeG, I readily admit that being new to the game I am somewhat of a naïve student when it comes to the investigative art of reloading. Hence it is very reassuring to hear from apparent “masters of the trade” that you don’t have to abide strictly by specific rules, such as the "old rule of thumb" to seat bullets with one diameter of depth for proper tension and bullet alignment with the bore. Seating a relatively short Hornady 65 Gn V-Max bullet 0.6 mm off the lands in my single shot Browning B78 (which resulted in only 2 mm of bearing surface) raised my initial concerns about cartridge handling, safety and performance issues. Accordingly, I feel quite confident in further exploring the seating depths of such small bullets, and in turn, to consciously handle them with a little extra care. Thank you.

unclenick, thanks for the LOAD DEVELOPMENT link. I’ve printed off the article and time permitting I’ll endeavour to wrap my head around it.

In the meantime, upon reflection, it sounds to me that you are somewhat like the Rolls Royce foreman, only a perfectionist in the art of reloading ! The world definitely needs people like you because you challenge people to rise to their full potential. I gratefully accept your advice to apply my bullet seating method to only neck sized fireformed cases – where possible, with the ogive seating depth in the vicinity of 0.020 – 0.030” off the lands – thus allowing for possible variances in the length of similar bullets.

The beauty of shooting is the complexity of coordinating numerous different fine skills – from proficiently learning how to reload cartridges to accounting for a multitude of variables associated with mastering things like; how to effectively maintain and use a rifle, judging distances, allowing for wind drift, knowing the trajectory paths of different bullets and the correct bullet placement for a lethal shot etc.

Success is undoubtedly linked with lots of serious repetitive practice coupled with sound advice and experience from people such as yourself. Whatever you do, don’t stop sharing your expertise and knowledge in this field because, through your unselfish efforts, people such as myself are enlightened and encouraged to explore beyond our known capabilities. In turn, as we grow, we can share the same with others.

Ross,

Thank you for the kind comments. I cut my working teeth as a production engineer in an electronics instrumentation company back in the '70's. All my production equipment designs had to be five times more precise than the instruments they calibrated for sale. So, I got hooked on precision early and have fun seeing just how tight I can make something. Not always for a practical reason; sometimes just for the challenge of doing it. The problem is, I have to be careful not to discourage anybody by making the detail or complexity seem overwhelming. I think you are taking it about right. Pick and choose what you want to play with. Know there is always more to try and there are even some new things waiting to be discovered.

I don’t know if this would be of interest to you? I was digging through a box of old Garand stuff in preparing for a youth clinic this weekend, and found a couple of homemade seating die standards for the 168 grain SMK. These were used to set up a seating die when I was alternating between loading magazine-fed rounds for rapid fire, and loading longer rounds for single-loading in slow fire. They are basically reference length dummy rounds with the bullets fixed permanently in position. They are put in the press, the ram is run up and the seater die stem is turned down until it contacts the bullet to find its setting. It is just a way to do a quick seater setup without re-measuring every time. These are only good for one bullet profile and one rifle, so unless you’ve decided what round you will shoot a lot of in a particular gun, it isn’t worth the bother.

To make these, I had worked out best seating depths for this bullet at the range. I was using a LEE Hand Tool and the same seating die I would later use in the bigger press at home. I seated the two samples into cleaned cases I had drilled out the primer pockets in and brought to the range with me. After seating, I brought these home and dripped about a teaspoon of liquid epoxy in through the opened primer pocket and let it set up with the dummy nose-down. The bonding could skipped altogether, but then it would be necessary to keep checking the bullets had never been nudged further in.

Incidentally, the Garand military barrels shoot well with bullets pretty far off the lands. My slow-fire dummy had the bullet almost 0.045” off the Garand’s original military barrel throat. That is about the length of the freebore in that barrel, which was 0.050” and a pretty typical military chamber. 0.020” is more commonly encountered in commercial chambers. In a gun whose freebore is nicely coaxial with the bore (perfectly so would be ideal), getting the bullet’s bearing surface into the freebore already buys you most of the alignment potential the front of the bullet can receive. This may be the reason seating 0.020” off the lands is a commonly encountered recommendation?

One more game to play, at least with longer bullets, is to use Middleton Tompkins’ method. He and his whole family of long-range champions use rounds that are slip-seated. He sizes casenecks so the bullets may be moved in by finger pressure, then seats them way out. They are all shooting tight Palma match chambers, so way out is not likely as way far out as for some rounds. The bullet is seated by the lands when they close the bolts, and of course the powder charges have been adjusted to match the situation. The main drawback is that if you have to unload one of these rounds without firing for some reason, you must tilt the muzzle up and extract the round slowly to keep it from filling the action with loose powder. Then you have to tap the bullet out with a rod. Not good on a range that doesn’t allow muzzle-up condition, as some do not. Not good for carrying loose in one's pockets, either.

Sounds good, Ross - especially for a single shot.

Still, first chance you get, might want to invest in a runout gage to check bullet/case concentricity of your chosen COAL.

unclenick, I like the notion of setting up reference length dummy rounds with bullets permanently fixed in position as a means of not having to re-measure a particular cartridge everytime.

I think your idea of dripping a liquid epoxy through an enlarged primer hole and allowing it to set against the bullets base in an inverted case would result in a more reliable setting compared to the following similar system which I found on another reloading forum – “ place a very tiny dab of epoxy on the inside of the cartridge neck, at a 90 degree angle from the cut slits, using a toothpick. Then insert the bullet and chamber the cartridge in the action and let it sit overnight”.

Using the latter method, the adhesive would be largely pushed into the case by the bullet as it is inserted into the neck – potentially resulting in a weaker bond, particularly when a short bullet (like the 6mm Hornady 65 Gn V-Max) offers minimal contact bearing surface when seated against the lands.

Middleton Tompkins’ method of seating longish bullets with a ‘slightly loose caseneck’ would result in the ogive actually making contact with the lands – giving rise to possible pressure related safety concerns …..!

In response to your following statements ; “The problem is, I have to be careful not to discourage anybody by making the detail or complexity seem overwhelming. I think you are taking it about right. Pick and choose what you want to play with. Know there is always more to try and there are even some new things waiting to be discovered.”

Yes, I honestly admit I am at times somewhat overwhelmed with the in-depth nature of your postings. The general knowledge and learning ability of students in my Science classes ranges from ‘A to Z’, with only a minority being ‘A’ grade students – no doubt much like that of reloaders on this forum. Consequently, in the classroom I consciously endeavour to use a variety of different teaching / learning strategies (including language levels) to both cater for and hopefully extend those in my care. Sure, it certainly is a challenge, but when the lights come on and the students start popping questions it is such a rewarding experience.

Crazy thought - anybody try soft-soldering the bullets into the necks of the dummy cases????

Ross,

Making an epoxy plug inside the case does work better. Most epoxies don't adhere well to copper and will kind of just peel off, but do better on brass. Making a bridge across the brass behind the bullet forms a good stop. I'm not sure why someone would go to the trouble of splitting a case specially for measuring, then glue it up? You probably want to use it later to find land touchdown depths for other bullets. Instead, just use your COL measuring method to seat that exact same bullet you made your original determination with into some other old case; one that has been sized by whatever method you normally use, and that has had a bore brush turned inside the neck to expose clean metal for the glue. That will grip the bullet well to start with. Then apply the glue.

Pretty much any slow-set epoxy will work. A filled epoxy, like JB Weld will likely do a better job matching the temperature coefficient of expansion of the brass, and be less likely to pull itself loose if exposed to temperature extremes. A brass-filled one would be ideal, but I don't know of any. Putting the epoxy in the corner of a plastic bag and nipping a tiny bit off the tip of the corner will let you use it like a pastry bag, twisting up the loose part to squirt the epoxy into your drilled out flashhole. Just don't use a quick setting epoxy. They adhere to metals much less well, generally.

Loading with actual land contact is done all the time. You just have to work your load up under that condition in the first place. You will wind up with less powder than a load just off the lands will result in, but the difference is consistent. Less powder means less muzzle energy, but the difference is on the order of a half a grain to a grain, depending on case geometry, so it is a trade of Mid Tompkins has been willing to make. As I said before, the pressure increase is not normally enough to harm a gun, but if you make touchdown with a maximum load not intended to touch the lands, then it is enough to start loosening primer pockets, reduce accuracy and put some wear on the gun. Kind of like shooting a proof load.


Crazy thought - anybody try soft-soldering the bullets into the necks of the dummy cases????

Yeah. As an electronics guy, of course I did. One of my Garand dummies is soldered, as a result. I didn’t recommend this because the best method is a nuisance, compared with epoxy. What you are up against is that you can't use an iron without getting solder stuck to the outside that you then have to file down. Using a torch easily gets it above 450°F, where the brass starts to anneal, and softening the neck and bullet jacket makes the dummy a lot less rugged. The soft solder will not wick into the neck unless you start with an extremely loose fit. Letting solder build up on the case mouth edge can interfere with seating if a bullet is being loaded with the shoulder at the case mouth (i.e., long bullet seated for magazine feed). So, you have to solder from the inside, and do it at low temperature.

What works is to use a bronze or SS brush inside the case and on the bullet base to expose clean metal, coating both with liquid rosin solder flux on a Q-tip (flux in a soldering wire core isn’t adequate to keep oxide off during the slow heat I’m about to describe), then putting in a small coil or ball of low melting point soldering wire (60:40 radio solder is OK (375°F M.P.); 63:37 Pb:Sn eutectic solder is better (361°F M.P.), or a low melting point bismuth-containing solder, etc—50:50 solder has too high an M.P. (427°F IIRC). You then seat the bullet, turning the dummy cartridge nose-down and tapping it lightly to get the solder coil against the bullet. Fine soldering wire can also be fed in through the flashhole, but this is clumsy and requires more solder, since it will also coat the sides.

You need to improvise a rack from wire that holds the dummy nose-down, then the whole assembly goes into an oven at 425°F or 220°C measured temperature for half an hour. Lower temperature alloys let you use a lower temperature, but you need it about 50°F warmer than the solder M.P. if you don't want to wait forever. A length of bare copper wire dipped in flux and put in the flashhole can be checked at the hour mark to see if it has wetted with solder at the tip? If not, go for another half an hour. This will depend on the bullet getting to temperature. In a small cartridge, half an hour total should accomplish the task.

Pull the rack out and let it cool. When you recover from the emotional abuse your wife subjects you to for stinking up the kitchen with the scent of soldering flux, you will have an oxidized exterior that you probably want to tumble clean. Brass annealing data is linked for the curious.

Annealing_brass.Pdf.Zip by Bigupload.Com (http://www.bigupload.com/d=6B1249E4)