Sorry can't keep my forums straight.  One of these locks the original post once replies are posted.

Maybe I am not following but wouldn't the google doc take care of this? You could load it at the store and see what components guys are using?

A google doc is basically excel or word running in your browser and you can allow everyone to edit, or just certain people.

No I get it, but some forums lock the previous threads from editing after replies are made so that OP's can't change what they said with counter arguments (and worse) begin.  I erroneously thought this was the forum that did it.

Noticed on the 150 grain load data posted that they have them load to an oal of 2.22.  I'm loading mine to 2.07 because the bump hits correctly at that oal. Given the bullet is pushed back into the case further, should I not use their max load of 17.0 for fear of over-pressure, or should it be ok?

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If you are seating much deeper I would not use someone elses max load.

IIRC, set back in rifle cases doesn't effect pressures like it does in pistol cartridges. Either way, with those heavy/long bullets you don't have to worry about the "bump" in the mag. Just seat to the recommended depth, and everything will be GTG.

The only bullets I've worried about with the "bump" in the mag are the 110's, and a couple 125's. The biggest thing to worry about IMO is seating the bullets far enough into the case as to not effect accuracy.

Some of the 110's won't seat far enough into the case, and you end up with the bullet in the neck of the case only about half way. Even seating to the "bump" won't allow them to seat deep enough for good neck tension, and you end up with a crocked cartridge.

So should I pull the 5 I loaded to 16.1 grains at 2.07" to try out, or do you figure I'll be fine?  I know my 15.6 grain loads didn't show any over pressure signs at all.. primers were good, no splits, no ejector marks, etc...



I *really* need a chronograph...



 

http://www.ar15.com/forums/t_3_16/612490_OMG_bullet_setback___My_gun_blew_up_.html

If you set those bullets to a longer COAL, you will most likely start to see over pressure signs. You should really do a new work up for the different COAL if you choose to change it.

Thanks for the post.  That goes against everything I've ever heard/read about setback and overpressure...  Very interesting.



Looks like I'll be doing a new work-up.



 

Thanks, Dryflash.  I'm using Lil'gun in all my loads (bought 8 lbs of it.. gotta use it for something) ...  150 grain Nosler BTs, 110 grain Barnes black tips, and 230 grain lead from a Lee mould, so far...  Haven't had any issues with anything as of yet, other than not getting enough lube on the lead rounds and leading the barrel a bit.  That was fun to get clean.



 

I disagree with everything in this post. I don't find a single bit of it to be true in my experience. Maybe if "rifle case" means mid-to-large caliber rifle and "setback" is limited to an extent...otherwise, this is just a misconception. The argument many use is, "loading closer to lands increases pressure". Many of those claims assume the case is filled at every seating depth. While there is some truth in that, seating deeper with the same charge also increases pressure. It's basic physical chemistry. The gas law states pressure and volume are inversely proportional. I've spent hundreds of hours with reloading software and, depending on various things, seating deeper could make very little or very big differences.

The 300 Whisper was originally developed as a pistol cartridge, so calling 300Blk a "rifle case" is a bit of a stretch. Sure, you're loading it into a rifle, but you can also buy rifles chambered in 357 Mag. It's also hardly a "bottleneck" case.

The link a few posts later clearly states, "Even with all the setback the powder was not compressed." You can't use that post with setback in Silver Bear ammo as a general rule of thumb. If you're loading near max, setback will increase the pressure, as will loading right up to the lands. Just play it safe and do a new workup if your OAL is significantly different than the published data.

I have found, using long bullets, OAL absolutely effects cycling from magazines using both PMAG GenII and L5AWM. The published data stated to load to 2.26", but I found it had to be 2.235" or shorter. 2.240" would not feed.

Had some "interesting" chrono results from Lil' Gun today.   Reminds me of blue dot in 9mm. HUGE ES's

What barrel manufacturer and how long?

What powder charge?

What bullet?

Factory brass or your own?  Annealed?

Use a Lee Factory Crimp Die, or not?



What sort of ES values are we talking about here?  75 fps or 300?



 

Well to start out, I dont have many chrono readings because of my setup I was getting errors left and right*  But first they make no sense because the velocities are all over the place, and second the ES's are ridiculous considering I used a RCBS 1500 and each load was trickeled to the exact weight!

What barrel manufacturer and how long?  Rainier Match Stainless 10.5"
What powder charge? Varying amounts of LIL'GUN
What bullet? Nosler 125gr & Sierra 165gr Softpoints
Factory brass or your own? Annealed? Made my own out of LC brass, no annealing, the neck tension was very good.
Use a Lee Factory Crimp Die, or not? Yes, Light/medium crimp. Didn't want to damage the projectiles.




I didn't have my tripod so my chrony was setup weird and I was having a hell of a time shooting straight and level over it without hitting it. Because I didn't have a bipod or sandbags for my rifle either.

Thanks for the info on the loads/velocity.  You're right... that's pretty much all over the place with velocity.  You might want to try annealing 10 or so and see if that helps you.  It's pretty easy to do.  I annealed around 150 or so cases a few weeks ago and it didn't take all that much time...  A deep socket that fits the brass, an extension on the bottom to keep the heat away from your hand, a torch, and a bucket of water gets you setup to do it.  
Just took some pics of these.  Factory 300 Blk brass is on the left.  The rest are LC, Winchester, Remington... whatever I pulled out of the bag.





ETA:  These were all trimmed with a WFT as well and have not been chamfered.  I don't think I've done that more than a time or two since I stopped using the Lee trimmer.  












 

 

See the thing is, is that I think those velocity issues are common. I remember reading a bunch of people bitching about these problems with LIL'GUN over at 300blktalk.

I've also read that several folks have had issues with velocity, and accuracy along with it. (I'd expect "shot-gun pattern" accuracy and velocity spreads to go hand-in-hand)  Some of those folks have said that going back and annealing the brass helped tighten the groups up a bit.  I can't say for certain since I don't have a chronograph yet, but I know my groups were tighter with annealed brass vs non-annealed.  Non-annealed brass was around 4" or so at 50 yards no matter the powder charge with 150 grain projectiles.  My annealed-brass groups using the same bullets and powder charges were 2" at the worst and about an inch outside to outside at the best using an Aimpoint Pro and 5X magnifier at 50 yards.  I didn't think the non-annealed brass would make that much difference, and if I'd known I wouldn't have loaded them up after shooting the annealed ones...  But, now I know that for my gun, I need to use annealed brass to get decent accuracy.



 

I will attempt to anneal, but I wont have time for 2.5 weeks. (leave for vacation Thursday ) With such small cases, do you let them sit in water when you apply heat? I was able to do 7.62x54R by hand, but those cases were huge.


My groups were not necessarily bad, but I cannot tell you the actual accuracy of the loads due to be stuck with iron sights.  Next time I get to the range the SWFA5-20HD and bipod are going on it, and I'm going to get a bunch of looks. I think the scope my be longer than the upper

I simply turned them by hand using the socket/extension within the propane torch's flame until they turned the color you saw in the pics (just started to glow a bit on the edge of the case mouth).  At that point I then dropped them into water and then pulled them out of the water bowl a few seconds later.  FWIW, the brass is noticeably softer after annealing according to my "rob-o-scope" measurements.
 

+1 doing the same thing.

Anything wrong with using one of these (does it get too hot or not enough) LINK

I also would like to point out to anyone using this picture as a reference.... All loads cycled my gun fine, just the 16.0gr load did NOT load the bolt back ONCE, the other 3 times it did.

Everything I have watched and read have said to heat up the neck area uniformly (all the way around) until you can just visibly see it's getting hot (pink/red), then stop.  I'm not sure a heat gun could do that, but I haven't measured how hot mine are getting before I quench them.

Between 650*, and 750* is optimal.

Yeah... butane is expensive.  Spend $12 and buy one of these  http://www.homedepot.com/p/Bernzomatic-Brass-Torch-329207/100079143#.UcuJkvmThyI  Actually, spend $24 and buy 2 of them.
 
 


















 
 
 

 

 
 
 

You can do this, but do it in a darkened room.  I used a desk lamp on my workbench, pointed away.  Heat the brass until you see the color change, just beginning to glow.  If you use the 750F Tempilaq, you will see the neck go through a series of color changes before it turns red.  



 

Permanent tag

Has anyone tried loading 240 grain SMKs? Especially with a 1/7" barrel? I have a 16" 1/7" Noveske barrel with an AAC 762 SDN just begging to be fed, and the cheaper 220 grain SMKs seem to be fairly elusive lately...

Just ran across these over at Grafs. Anyone think they would be good to load for .300BLK?

I don't see why not.

I don't either. The profile looks like it would work just fine. Just trying to get some thoughts on it before I buy some to try out.

It's the lighting, I think.  I compared them to some XM193 and 855 I have and the coloring was quite similar.    Maybe a little more purple, but not much...





I've shot several rounds out of the brass I've annealed and so far so good...  I seat them and then put a light crimp with a Lee FCD, and I can't get the bullets to push back using my hands afterwards.  I've done a few tests of loading/ejecting a complete round to check OAL before and after loading, and they have all been the same length from initial loading to ejecting.  





None of them have turned a gray/white that I've done so far.  I don't let them get that toasty.  I will twirl them in the torch until they start to get a bit of purple on the case and then dunk them in the water.  I doubt it takes more than a few seconds each to come up to temp, and I'm using straight propane, and not MAP gas, FWIW.



ETA:  I also haven't run them through any polishing media since I annealed them...  Might do that and see if it changes them to look more like Coug's.





 

MAPP gas... or at least what is now sold as MAPP gas (yellow bottles) is pretty much a waste of money as unless you add oxygen, you only gain about 100F over propane.  Makes no sense to spend $10/bottle on MAPP when propane is $2/bottle. I use a 10lb refillable propane cylinder, with a hose that has T to feed both torches.  Consistency is the key.

 

Well, for the next 100 or so I'll go a little lighter on the annealing then.  I thought I needed to get them similar looking to mil brass, but if that's not the case then all the better... less propane I need to burn.  Thanks for the insight.



At this point I haven't had any issues with the ones I've loaded and shot, but I'll keep an eye open for issues.  I do a full-length sizing on the brass, fwiw, so will that working of the brass harden them up again some?  



Thanks for the help.



 

Core15 9.5" SS upper on SBR lower.




150 grain Nosler BT




16.1 grains Lil'Gun powder




one load at 2.07" OAL... seemed to be a compressed load and accuracy was lousy.




one load at 2.22" OAL... not much better accuracy (shot the jugs below with one of these at 50 yards).




Aimpoint PRO with 5X magnifier behind it used for the sight.  It's a bit
hard to use the combo, unfortunately, since I've started getting
far-sighted (and haven't gotten glasses yet)... either the dot can be
fairly clear and the target is BLURRY, or I can have a double-dot to
sight with and a clear target...  Anybody have a suggestion for fixing
it, or do I just need to get reading glasses?  Sucks to have 20/13
vision at distance and can't read small print anymore...
Anyway...
Did some more shooting today and found that 16.1 grains of Lil'Gun at
2.07 might be a compressed load, apparently, with the 150 grain Nosler
BT's.  I tried pulling one of them after shooting the other 4 (and
getting lousy accuracy) and the powder was stuffed so tightly into the
case that I had to poke into the case with a small dowel to get it to
uncompress and fall out.  The 4 I shot at 50 yards grouped around 2.5"
using the Aimpoint Pro and 5X magnifier.  So... that load's not going to
work for me nearly as well as the 15.6 grain load did at 2.07 OAL.
I also loaded up some at 16.1 grains of Lil'Gun at the recommended 2.22"
OAL and it wasn't much better accuracy-wise... maybe a *little*
tighter, but not anything to brag about.  I did shoot one at some milk
jugs I'd filled with water and the results are below.  The jacket and
lead core separated and the lead took another trajectory going left of
the jacket's path.  Unfortunately, the lead passed out the fourth jug,
but the jacket stayed in the 4th jug and I was able to get it out.  I
also found a couple pieces of bullet jacket laying to the side of the
busted jugs.
Only bullet parts I could find:

Jug 1.  You can see where I hit in the middle of the circular section of the jug:

Jug 2.  There was a small hole in the plastic just above the large split-open section.  My guess is that a piece of jacket pealed off in jug 1 and hit it there:  

Jug 3.  You're looking at the exit.  The entry points in the jug are on
the far side and you can clearly see two pieces that hit it:

Jug 4.  Obviously it has shed a LOT of energy at this point.  No cracks in
the jug, and while there are two entry points, there is only one exit
(the lead core):

Jug 4 exit:

Overall, I don't think either one of these loads are for me.  I'm going to go back to the 15.6's at 2.07" OAL and see what happens.  I got good accuracy out of them.  I might need to do something about the aimpoint/5X magnifier combo, too...  might have to get a 1-4X scope or something to put on it.





ETA:  I'll save up a few milk jugs and shoot one of the 15.6's into some jugs hopefully this weekend and post the results.






 

 

I think maybe the Nosler Accubond might hold together a little better. Their site says they offer more expansion at lesser velocities. I have a bunch of 125's to load up, and will test them.

The BT's aren't very impressive to say the least!

They do make a mess of milk jugs, and from the BOT http://theboxotruth.com/docs/bot19_2.htm,
it looks like they'll penetrate about as far as .223 JSP through water.
 But yeah...  I don't think I'd hunt deer with them... maybe groundhogs
or coyotes since they do tend to fragment fairly well (and not really
mushroom).  I still need to shoot some of the Barnes TTSX bullets I have
loaded up, but that's for another day.
 
 

Nearly the same as my 150gn Nosler BT load.

15.5gn Lil'Gun, FEDGM205M, COAL of 2.170". This produces a 1 MOA group at 100yds. out of a 10.5" barrel, and 1800fps.

ETA: No I don't have any proof!

This may have already been posted...and this is my first post in the Reloading forum but here goes

Just fired my custom built 300 AAC Blackout this weekend for the first time. Here is the load I used. It worked beautifully. VERY low noise and ZERO felt recoil. The only noise I got was an almost non-existent crack and the sound of the round whizzing downrange.
1.) 300 AAC Blackout
2.) Lake City brass
3.) 1.368" trim length
4.) Barnes Tac-Tx blacktip (all copper rounds, lead-free)
5.) 110 grain ballistic tip
6.) Hodgdon H110 powder
7.) 19.0 grains
8.) OAL 2.250" with light crimp on cannelure
9.) Rem 7-1/2 primers
10.) Custom rifle - 16" stainless AR-Stoner barrel 1:8 5R twist with YHM Phantom flash suppressor, WMD Nickel-Boron BCG, 556 Tactical upper/lower matched set
11.) No chrono data yet...don't have one. These rounds did group very nicely for a brand new barrel. I will try to chrono these next time we are at the range.

Next will be a set of subsonics based on a 210-grain Berger HPBT. I have some H4198 powder on-hand and a friend is supposed to bring me enough A1698 to do about 30 rounds. Any advice with the subsonics would be appreciated. This rifle is not suppressed yet so I hope I can get the action to cycle and have the rounds stay subsonic.