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Posted: 7/4/2015 3:37:37 PM EDT
Recently I picked some lake city brass that will not chamber I have full length resized it and the bolt will not even begin to close on the loaded rounds. I actually turned down the die more and still no luck. By the way the winchester brass works great.
Link Posted: 7/4/2015 3:47:43 PM EDT
[#1]
did you trim it or check the resized length?
Link Posted: 7/4/2015 4:05:59 PM EDT
[#2]
over all length AFTER resizing is the number to watch ...ALSO GI brass is some thicker and a bit softer than commercial ...I find on GI brass that my RCBS dies actually needs to touch the shell holder at the sizing station to get the GI brass fully resized ...the GI brass will get longer in the resizing than the commercial brass all thing equal ...

Bear
Link Posted: 7/4/2015 4:11:05 PM EDT
[#3]
Interestingly enough the cases were just in speck took off a little bit more with the trimmer and that was it thanks

Link Posted: 7/4/2015 4:52:30 PM EDT
[#4]

What is the OAL of your loaded rounds?















 
Link Posted: 7/4/2015 6:15:08 PM EDT
[#5]
7.62x51mm I presume?

A lot of the surplus 7.62x51mm Lake City NATO brass has been fired through machine guns and stretched because of it. MG's have loose chambers, longish headspace and are violently ejected causing resizing problems.

Turn your die down even more. Use heavier lube on the case body, none on the shoulder. Sometimes people mix brands of shell holders and dies which can cause tolerance stacking. Your die should be turned close to 1/2" past just touching the shell holder. This will allow the press to cam over getting every bit of slop out of the mechanism.

If all else fails you can remove metal from the top of the shell holder.
Link Posted: 7/4/2015 7:47:17 PM EDT
[#6]
When I resized the pile of surplus 7.62 Nato brass I had, each piece took two trips through the die to get down into shape and fit my chamber gauge, there was no more room to bring the die down, I was already cammed over as far as I dared.  So, I just sized them up, and made two sizing passes before they went in the bin to be tumbled clean.
Link Posted: 7/4/2015 9:32:00 PM EDT
[#7]
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Quoted:
When I resized the pile of surplus 7.62 Nato brass I had, each piece took two trips through the die to get down into shape and fit my chamber gauge, there was no more room to bring the die down, I was already cammed over as far as I dared.  So, I just sized them up, and made two sizing passes before they went in the bin to be tumbled clean.
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My experience also.
Link Posted: 7/5/2015 4:39:23 PM EDT
[#8]
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Quoted:
Interestingly enough the cases were just in speck took off a little bit more with the trimmer and that was it thanks

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This is common as a chamber reamer nears the end of it's usable life so don't worry about it ...short of shooting for -zero minute groups .... on a field gun ammo I will generally trim to just short of Min specs so I do not have to trim at every reload ...yes opens up groups slightly ( ideal of course [most times] for accuracy is bullet olgive just engaging or about to engage rifling with case length cut to cannalure matching length IF cannalure is used [also note cannalure typically LESS accurate than civillian friction only fit] ) but for semi auto I really recommend cannalure for safety reasons ...many will argue how they shoot 1000,s of non canalure rounds  in their autos but I submit that the violent chambering action of many autos is nothing but an inertia bullet puller ..so one loose neck can be castrophic any number of ways if not cannalured.

Jusssssst my opinion

Bear
Link Posted: 7/5/2015 5:15:28 PM EDT
[#9]
Discussion ForumsJump to Quoted PostQuote History
Quoted:
7.62x51mm I presume?

A lot of the surplus 7.62x51mm Lake City NATO brass has been fired through machine guns and stretched because of it. MG's have loose chambers, longish headspace and are violently ejected causing resizing problems.

Turn your die down even more. Use heavier lube on the case body, none on the shoulder. Sometimes people mix brands of shell holders and dies which can cause tolerance stacking. Your die should be turned close to 1/2" past just touching the shell holder. This will allow the press to cam over getting every bit of slop out of the mechanism.

If all else fails you can remove metal from the top of the shell holder.
View Quote


This was an issue way back in the day with M60s which did not allow an easy headspace adjustment.

But it was never the major issue with using surplus 7.62mm NATO brass in a .308 Winchester chamber, so let's put this BS to bed right now.

The external dimensions of both .308 Win and 7.62x51mm NATO cartridges are exactly the same, however the chamber dimensions are significantly different, and not in a friendly .223 vs 5.56x45mm NATO way.    The datum point on the shoulder of the 7.62x51 NATO chamber is .013" farther forward than it is on a .308 Winchester chamber, which means sports fans, that a 7.62 NATO or .308 Win round fired in any 7.62 NATO chamber is going to stretch .013" more than it would in a .308 Win chamber.

Consequently, when reloading military fired brass, you can expect to have to bump the shoulder back.
Link Posted: 7/5/2015 7:49:46 PM EDT
[#10]
Discussion ForumsJump to Quoted PostQuote History
Quoted:


This was an issue way back in the day with M60s which did not allow an easy headspace adjustment.

But it was never the major issue with using surplus 7.62mm NATO brass in a .308 Winchester chamber, so let's put this BS to bed right now.  

The external dimensions of both .308 Win and 7.62x51mm NATO cartridges are exactly the same, however the chamber dimensions are significantly different, and not in a friendly .223 vs 5.56x45mm NATO way.    The datum point on the shoulder of the 7.62x51 NATO chamber is .013" farther forward than it is on a .308 Winchester chamber, which means sports fans, that a 7.62 NATO or .308 Win round fired in any 7.62 NATO chamber is going to stretch .013" more than it would in a .308 Win chamber.

Consequently, when reloading military fired brass, you can expect to have to bump the shoulder back.
View Quote View All Quotes
View All Quotes
Discussion ForumsJump to Quoted PostQuote History
Quoted:
Quoted:
7.62x51mm I presume?

A lot of the surplus 7.62x51mm Lake City NATO brass has been fired through machine guns and stretched because of it. MG's have loose chambers, longish headspace and are violently ejected causing resizing problems.

Turn your die down even more. Use heavier lube on the case body, none on the shoulder. Sometimes people mix brands of shell holders and dies which can cause tolerance stacking. Your die should be turned close to 1/2" past just touching the shell holder. This will allow the press to cam over getting every bit of slop out of the mechanism.

If all else fails you can remove metal from the top of the shell holder.


This was an issue way back in the day with M60s which did not allow an easy headspace adjustment.

But it was never the major issue with using surplus 7.62mm NATO brass in a .308 Winchester chamber, so let's put this BS to bed right now.  

The external dimensions of both .308 Win and 7.62x51mm NATO cartridges are exactly the same, however the chamber dimensions are significantly different, and not in a friendly .223 vs 5.56x45mm NATO way.    The datum point on the shoulder of the 7.62x51 NATO chamber is .013" farther forward than it is on a .308 Winchester chamber, which means sports fans, that a 7.62 NATO or .308 Win round fired in any 7.62 NATO chamber is going to stretch .013" more than it would in a .308 Win chamber.

Consequently, when reloading military fired brass, you can expect to have to bump the shoulder back.


Even military M14 rifles stretch the crap out of brass compared to M1-A's. I used to pick up lots of brass at Camp Perry in the 80's and the stuff that wasn't fired through my rifle was hard as hell to resize.
Link Posted: 7/5/2015 10:38:40 PM EDT
[#11]
Using a .400 case length gauge from the Hornady Headspace Comparator system, I measured the brass to be 1.640 from base to datum line.  This was once fired LC brass, which I'm guessing is from a machine gun.

Resizing from 1.640 puts a lot of stress on the brass, and it is probably springing back to greater than your chamber can handle.  That would cause it not to fire in your rifle.  Resizing a second time would probably get it to a point to fit your rifle.

As a note, SAAMI specs are 1.630 from the base to datum for a .308 rifle, and factory ammo is often shorter to make sure it fits.  

Try resizing it twice like it was mentioned earlier and see if that helps.

Link Posted: 7/6/2015 1:48:57 PM EDT
[#12]
Discussion ForumsJump to Quoted PostQuote History
Quoted:


My experience also.
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Discussion ForumsJump to Quoted PostQuote History
Quoted:
Quoted:
When I resized the pile of surplus 7.62 Nato brass I had, each piece took two trips through the die to get down into shape and fit my chamber gauge, there was no more room to bring the die down, I was already cammed over as far as I dared.  So, I just sized them up, and made two sizing passes before they went in the bin to be tumbled clean.


My experience also.


Same here.  I did 500 7.62 the other day.  Lubed them heavily with lanolin spray, double struck them without the expander ball in the sizing die.  Put the expander in and ran them all again.  So 3 sizings on those cases.

Was some tough stuff.  I wonder what the life span on the brass will be?  May have to look into annealing after I fire them the first time.
Link Posted: 7/6/2015 6:41:56 PM EDT
[#13]
I am going to get one of the Hornady gauges as I have similar issues with my Bushmaster ORC 308 with Lake City brass that was fired in the rifle.  Even after using a small base die and being trimmed to the correct length they don't want to chamber but Winchester brass works great just using the FL die
Link Posted: 7/7/2015 12:52:31 AM EDT
[#14]
I've used a lot of 7.62x51. I used to get it for free back in the late 80's. I'm using it once again in a M1A.

I use a standard RCBS full length die. RCBS case lube (the foam pad) and of course my 30 year old Rockchucker II.

With the die set for a "good" cam over I never have to size more than once. You can definitely tell though that you are doing some work and if the lube gets thin you can tell right away.

It seems to me good equipment, good lube, and good procedure will get the job done the first time every time.

Motor
Link Posted: 7/7/2015 11:05:03 AM EDT
[#15]
Almost all of the Lake City brass I use in my rifle has to be run through a small base die  Use a good micrometer and measure the base to make sure it is less than .470, other wise it will not chamber. Some of the resized once fired, you will not be able to save.  It just will not go back to less than .470 and will need to be scrapped.
Link Posted: 7/7/2015 6:54:57 PM EDT
[#16]
One step I do on once fired .308 Brass, MG or whatever fired is to run them through a 30.06 Die w/o the Decaping /expander rod.
Then size them in a .308 Die, works like a champ, I get consistent Headspace readings, in my Case gauge.

The base on a.308 shell is a bugger to size the first time, this works.

Out
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