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Posted: 2/13/2015 12:55:30 PM EDT
| I have just started reloading this week. Using once fired 308 brass I wiped them down, lubed them, resized and deprimed them, I'm wanting to clean them in my sonic cleaner so the insides and primer pockets get cleaned up. If I do it this way will I have to re lube them with the hornady one shot or maybe graphite powder to seat the bullet or will it work without lube? |
| You shouldn't need to lube the cases when you seat the bullets. In fact, using lube inside the cases once they have a powder charge can actually contaminate the powder and cause problems with the load. The only thing I would suggest is using a chamfer tool to remove the sharp edge from the inside of the case mouth. |
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By chance, have you read the ABCs of Reloading or the Sticky section at the top of this section?
As a beginner, there are some step by step outlines to follow in that material so you can keep things organized while you absorb the reasons why you are doing what you are doing. It takes time if you are on your own. Which brings up the next point, if at all possible, get a mentor. Several reloading reference manuals also have basic steps outlines to follow. Good Luck and ask questions as you need. http://www.ar15.com/content/page.html?id=399 |
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Quoted: I have just started reloading this week. Using once fired 308 brass I wiped them down, lubed them, resized and deprimed them, I'm wanting to clean them in my sonic cleaner so the insides and primer pockets get cleaned up. If I do it this way will I have to re lube them with the hornady one shot or maybe graphite powder to seat the bullet or will it work without lube? Hornady one shot is not a lube I would recommend. Spray lanolin lube is much easier to use. Dillon, Franklin Arsenal, or the home made variety that I use. Bullets are press fit in the case, no lube is ever used for seating bullets. I also suggest you read the front part of a reloading manual and brush up on the reloading process. ALSO, do not fail to do this, take a sized case and ensure it chambers and extracts normally. This proves you have the sizing die set correctly. You don't need to load a batch of ammo and find out later that it will not chamber. |
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Your forgetting one very important step for bottleneck cases...
Trim to length after every sizing. A case that is too long after sizing can cause some severe pressure issues and cause your gun to go boom... As others said, no need to lube the case mouths or bullets when loading. The rest sounds pretty normal. Sonic cleaner should be good to go. You will want to chamfer your case mouths after trimming For rifle cases I deprime - size - trim to length - tumble - prime - seat bullet - crimp. Pistol cases are the same minus the trim step. I prefer to SSTL media wet tumble. |
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Quoted:
Your forgetting one very important step for bottleneck cases... Trim to length after every sizing. A case that is too long after sizing can cause some severe pressure issues and cause your gun to go boom... As others said, no need to lube the case mouths or bullets when loading. The rest sounds pretty normal. Sonic cleaner should be good to go. You will want to chamfer your case mouths after trimming For rifle cases I deprime - size - trim to length - tumble - prime - seat bullet - crimp. Pistol cases are the same minus the trim step. I prefer to SSTL media wet tumble. Sir, FWIW I normally only trim if a case is longer than max after sizing. Since I trim every case to just under max. approx. .002" the end result is that all my resized cases are of a uniform length just under max. Consistency is the goal. For the OP: it's best to measure the length of the resized case and then trim to the desired length. I believe .308 case length is 2.015" max. so I normally trim them all to 2.013". I've noticed that it's not uncommon for once fired .308 brass to be 2.020"+ after resizing so I would expect that most if not all of your brass needs to be trimmed. Champfering is a step done to eliminate brass burrs on the case mouth than can occur after trimming. The idea, in my humble opinion, is to facilitate seating of the bullet and eliminate scarring of the bullet during seating. Not everyone agrees that this is a necessary step but I'm not one of them. A caliper would be helpful for determination of case length, at minimum a case gage. Case neck tension is what holds the bullet in place. There should be sufficient tension to hold the bullet in place if you try to press it into the case with your fingers but enough to resist movement of the bullet in the case mouth during chambering. especially if you're using a semi auto rifle. As already mentioned you should not use any case lube on the inside of the case neck during bullet seating. My rule of thumb for .308 case neck tension is the inside diameter of the case neck should be .003" less than the diameter of the bullet. Assuming the bullet diameter is .308" the target case neck ID is .305". One thing you should probably check if you have not already is how much you are resizing your cases. I know the set up instructions for your die are usually to just adjust the die down sufficiently to touch the press ram when in the full up position. This may be a good one size fits all rule of thumb but you should be aware of just how much shoulder set back you are resizing your brass. My rule of thumb is to resize a case fired in my rifle .003" shoulder set back as measured by any number of tools intended for the purpose. If you don't already have a caliper you need to buy one and check out the various manufacturers web sites to learn what tools and adapters are available to facilitate these purposes. I second the suggestion that you need to read a bit more about the reloading process to understand more about why you do certain things not just how to do them. HTH, 7zero1. |
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Quoted:
Sir, FWIW I normally only trim if a case is longer than max after sizing. Since I trim every case to just under max. approx. .002" the end result is that all my resized cases are of a uniform length just under max. Consistency is the goal. For the OP: it's best to measure the length of the resized case and then trim to the desired length. I believe .308 case length is 2.015" max. so I normally trim them all to 2.013". I've noticed that it's not uncommon for once fired .308 brass to be 2.020"+ after resizing so I would expect that most if not all of your brass needs to be trimmed. Champfering is a step done to eliminate brass burrs on the case mouth than can occur after trimming. The idea, in my humble opinion, is to facilitate seating of the bullet and eliminate scarring of the bullet during seating. Not everyone agrees that this is a necessary step but I'm not one of them. A caliper would be helpful for determination of case length, at minimum a case gage. Case neck tension is what holds the bullet in place. There should be sufficient tension to hold the bullet in place if you try to press it into the case with your fingers but enough to resist movement of the bullet in the case mouth during chambering. especially if you're using a semi auto rifle. As already mentioned you should not use any case lube on the inside of the case neck during bullet seating. My rule of thumb for .308 case neck tension is the inside diameter of the case neck should be .003" less than the diameter of the bullet. Assuming the bullet diameter is .308" the target case neck ID is .305". One thing you should probably check if you have not already is how much you are resizing your cases. I know the set up instructions for your die are usually to just adjust the die down sufficiently to touch the press ram when in the full up position. This may be a good one size fits all rule of thumb but you should be aware of just how much shoulder set back you are resizing your brass. My rule of thumb is to resize a case fired in my rifle .003" shoulder set back as measured by any number of tools intended for the purpose. If you don't already have a caliper you need to buy one and check out the various manufacturers web sites to learn what tools and adapters are available to facilitate these purposes. I second the suggestion that you need to read a bit more about the reloading process to understand more about why you do certain things not just how to do them. HTH, 7zero1. Quoted:
Quoted:
Your forgetting one very important step for bottleneck cases... Trim to length after every sizing. A case that is too long after sizing can cause some severe pressure issues and cause your gun to go boom... As others said, no need to lube the case mouths or bullets when loading. The rest sounds pretty normal. Sonic cleaner should be good to go. You will want to chamfer your case mouths after trimming For rifle cases I deprime - size - trim to length - tumble - prime - seat bullet - crimp. Pistol cases are the same minus the trim step. I prefer to SSTL media wet tumble. Sir, FWIW I normally only trim if a case is longer than max after sizing. Since I trim every case to just under max. approx. .002" the end result is that all my resized cases are of a uniform length just under max. Consistency is the goal. For the OP: it's best to measure the length of the resized case and then trim to the desired length. I believe .308 case length is 2.015" max. so I normally trim them all to 2.013". I've noticed that it's not uncommon for once fired .308 brass to be 2.020"+ after resizing so I would expect that most if not all of your brass needs to be trimmed. Champfering is a step done to eliminate brass burrs on the case mouth than can occur after trimming. The idea, in my humble opinion, is to facilitate seating of the bullet and eliminate scarring of the bullet during seating. Not everyone agrees that this is a necessary step but I'm not one of them. A caliper would be helpful for determination of case length, at minimum a case gage. Case neck tension is what holds the bullet in place. There should be sufficient tension to hold the bullet in place if you try to press it into the case with your fingers but enough to resist movement of the bullet in the case mouth during chambering. especially if you're using a semi auto rifle. As already mentioned you should not use any case lube on the inside of the case neck during bullet seating. My rule of thumb for .308 case neck tension is the inside diameter of the case neck should be .003" less than the diameter of the bullet. Assuming the bullet diameter is .308" the target case neck ID is .305". One thing you should probably check if you have not already is how much you are resizing your cases. I know the set up instructions for your die are usually to just adjust the die down sufficiently to touch the press ram when in the full up position. This may be a good one size fits all rule of thumb but you should be aware of just how much shoulder set back you are resizing your brass. My rule of thumb is to resize a case fired in my rifle .003" shoulder set back as measured by any number of tools intended for the purpose. If you don't already have a caliper you need to buy one and check out the various manufacturers web sites to learn what tools and adapters are available to facilitate these purposes. I second the suggestion that you need to read a bit more about the reloading process to understand more about why you do certain things not just how to do them. HTH, 7zero1. Good points all around and I agree with you. You should not have to trim after every firing. However, in the interest of time, and using a simple tool like a WFT, why not? It takes less time to run them thru a WFT than it does to gauge or measure every case does it not? 
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Quoted:
I have just started reloading this week. Using once fired 308 brass I wiped them down, lubed them, resized and deprimed them, I'm wanting to clean them in my sonic cleaner so the insides and primer pockets get cleaned up. If I do it this way will I have to re lube them with the hornady one shot or maybe graphite powder to seat the bullet or will it work without lube? - Wipe down the brass to remove any dirt or grit - Lube the outside of the case with a good sizing lube, I use ordinary castor oil from the drug store, applied with my fingers - Lube the inside of every 3rd case neck with graphite powder just before you size each case. This is to ease passage of the expander button inside the sizer die. Don't use the outside lube for this purpose because it won't come out with cleaning after sizing, it could contaminate the powder charges and degrade the neck's grip on the bullet - Size with your sizing die, bumping the shoulder back about .004" from the fired dimension, use the Hornady headspace gauge to measure the amount of set back. - Collect all the sized cases and either carefully wipe off the lube on the outside of the case, or better yet, clean in a vibrating "tumbler" with plain corn cob media for a couple hours - After cleaning, measure the length of each sized case using your caliper. If over the recommended "maximum" length, then trim using your trimming tool. For high volume cases I use the Little Crow trimmers, for everything else, I use the LE Wilson set up. - After trimming, chamfer the inside and outside edges of the case mouths, using hand tools or similar mounted in a drill motor - Set these sized, cleaned and trimmed cases aside in a coffee can until your are ready to load some rounds - When the time comes, prime the desired number of cases, charge with the appropriate powder and charge weight and seat the selected bullet using your seater die. For AR rifles, overall length is determined by the available room in the magazine. For .223 its about 2.255", for the 6.8 SPC, its more like 2.290" A few other tips: For the last step above, I suggest you load only a few rounds at a time until you find a pet load for your rifle, via trial and error. This process is one long experiment. Bullets are the primary variable affecting accuracy, followed by powder type, charge weight and primer type. The bullet needs to be matched to the twist rate of your rifle (longer bullets need faster twist). For the .223 I suggest you start with the lighter bullets in the 50 to 55 grain range. My .223 AR has a 1in8 twist and its pet load is 53 grain flat base Matchkings over 25 grains of Benchmark and CCI 450 primers for about 3050 fps. Accuracy is excellent, with this load my .223 AR is far and away my most accurate rifle. All of this may seem like a lot of work just to get some low cost ammo. In fact, the case preparation steps are the only laborious part, but once you have 100 or 200 cases sized, cleaned and trimmed, you can load small amounts of ammo for your experiments in only a few minutes (the fun part). I like to think I go to my local rifle range to free up more brass for my reloading hobby. When you finally get your pet load for your rifle dialed in and you have a trophy target hanging on the wall with 10 rounds into less than an inch at 100 yards, it will be all worth it. Achieving that degree of accuracy with factory or military ammo is almost impossible. Good luck and keep your questions coming - CW |
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Quoted:
I have just started reloading this week. Using once fired 308 brass I wiped them down, lubed them, resized and deprimed them, I'm wanting to clean them in my sonic cleaner so the insides and primer pockets get cleaned up. If I do it this way will I have to re lube them with the hornady one shot or maybe graphite powder to seat the bullet or will it work without lube? What manuals do you have and have you read them? One Shot works best if you take it to the range and give it One-Shot with your newly loaded ammo. Then purchase an acceptable lube, Dillon if you like a pump spray, or the old tried and true, Lube-n-Pad. Clean your brass before you run them through the Sizing die. You can clean them again after if you wish, but clean brass with not damage your FL die like dirty brass can. Before you load any bullets into that brass, make sure your newly sized cases "Chamber" in your rifle. If not, your sizing die needs adjusting. |
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