Another thread that I read with a phone, but needed a keyboard to respond properly.... I hate typing on those infernal phones.
There is a lot to digest here... so I'll throw out a few musing on some of the things I've read in the thread... and based on precision (and pliniking) reloading for about 45 years now... Including wildcatting, making cases, casting boolits, etc.
First, I saw the mention of 'lawyer loads' or how loading manuals show lower charges than they did decades ago. I'm fortunate enough to still have my loading manuals that, in some cases, date to the 1960's. With my pen-written notes in them and in some cases manuals I 'inherited' with others pen-written notes in them. And I will say that 1975 vs. 2025 manuals DO trend downwards in max loads. At a time when materials science, engineering, barrel technology, etc. are trending to more strength and the ability to handle more pressure. This may be for 'liability' reasons. It may be that powder formulations (chemistry and manufacturing processes have improved in 50 years, too!) may make powders more efficient. Measuring technology may be better and give better insights into pressure. Or components like cases and primer cups may have evolved for various reasons causing reloading manual 'authors' to recommend lower loads. So I can't say 'why' they are lower.
But when I am starting loading for a new cartridge or bullet weight, I don't just look at my 2023 reloading handbook (my most up-to-date) but I look at about 4 handbooks. And will often look online as well to see what their load numbers are for a given powder, bullet, primer combo. The more data points the better. I almost never look at what the cartridge case is. Because much of the data is for pretty generic cases and I'm often reloading strange stuff... ranging from custom-made cases to BMG to wildcats. Or military cases.
My loads always start well below max. For one, max is rarely the most accurate. Not 'never' but rarely. Second is that starting low lets me build up and watch for pressure signs and back off or say 'enough.' Signs I look for are pretty standard... hard bolt lift, flattened or cratered primers. Sometimes just load 'feels' not right. And usually too fast = not the most repeatable/accurate. So why would I even bother going near max loads. To quote, I think, Townsend Whelen "Only accurate rifles interest me." Big booms and maximum velocities are often an anathema to ultimate accuracy, so I just don't go there.
That said, especially these days there are folks who have 'reason' to go there. The ELR game is defiinitely changing people's perceptions of how cartridges need to be loaded and is as much a 'new' form of wildcatting as everyone playing with shoulder angles and case capacities in the 30's through the '50's. As I have said here, we are in a new "Golden Age" of wildcatting.
Competitions that require flat-shooting UKD targets. Extreme-range hunting (like prairie dog shooting back in the day spawned a revolution in flat-shooting high-pressure small calibers) for big game is also influencinig folks to push pressures and max limits. And new gun designs and barrel designs, metallurgy, case shapes, powder formulations, etc. are pushing pressures up... because they allow pressures to move up.
I've been saying for several years (and I know several folks who are echoing this, such as John Baker whose Structured Barrels are a neat new addition to shooting) that pressures are the next frontier of the precision rifle world. IMHO, we are going to see much higher pressures. In fact, we already are. Not long ago, the 6.5 Creedmoor was running about 60,000 or maybe a bit more PSI (I think in CUP -- Copper Units of Pressure still... but will talk PSI here.). That was considered HOT. But new military small arms cartridges like the .277 Fury (Sig developed a few years ago) are putting out 80,000 PSI in Hybrid cases (see other thread on hybrid cases here... it's interesting) And I don't think it will be long before we see some cartridges graduating from laboratory and into shooters hands... probably here on Snipers Hide... that are over 100,000 PSI pressure. Certainly the barrel, receiver, bolt lockup, case, etc. technologies exist to support such pressure. All that is needed is the demand for them.
First demand probably won't be the .mil or .le communities, but the competition community where a flatter-shooting, longer-range round will make it easier for competitors to gain an edge on UKD or ELR targets while minimizing scope adjustments or even eliminating the needs for prisms, extremely long vertical adjustment on scopes, etc. And the wildcatting community (if not the sporting arms SAAMI community) will be there pushing it.
All that said, for the average and ESPECIALLY the beginning handloader... hot loads are not your friends. They beat up you and your gear. They are rarely as accurate/repeatable as slightly slower loads. And there is a lot more room for error as you learn the craft of making really, really good precision ammunition to feed your rifle. So follow the LATEST reloading handbook numbers. Use others as reference if you are lucky enough to have older/other manuals. Use "Internet" data, but run it against the published factory data. Even the little pamphlets that some powder producers offer in lieu of 'full manuals/handbooks" are useful. Put all that data into your notebook (You DO have a notebook, right? To record everything in? Right? A Paper Notebook? That goes to the range with your databook??) and work your load from below max to find the sweet spot for your gun and your style of shooting.
That's basic beginning advice for anything! Before graduating to Formula 1, hopefully you master a go-Kart or an open wheel!... The same in reloading. Crawl, walk run.
BTW, I started reloading .38 SPL's by the hundreds as I was an early IPSC competitor in the 1980's before it got 'serious.' I used a Lee Load-All and hammered every cartridge into the die (with a hammer) and building my rounds that way. When I moved to a $23 Single Stage Bonanza Press as a high school senior in 1983-ish... it was like I'd suddenly joined NASA! Used that press exclusively until I expanded my reloading setup dramatically beginnnig in 2005... with a second press and a BMG press. And taking it to its ultimate level (see the reloading room thread) in 2014. In 2005 was when I got very, very bit by the precision rifle bug. And began to alter my loading from volume plinking, pistol and low-volume hunting rounds... to one-holers. (Plus a few years working in weapons development at GD was a PhD Education in small arms tech.)
Anyway, this is another interesting thread and has certainly brought out the 'point/counterpoint' nature of some of the discussions. But the OP had the right idea when he asked about Max loads. And hopefully there is some good info here to help guide his (and others) forays into handloading.
I like to say, too, that the reason I like shooting, especially precision shooting, is that it is one of the most pure, 'no-excuses' sports there is. It is you, the shooter, against physics. Period. It's not against other people. Or the weather. Or the game. Or anything else. It is you against physics. Because it is understanding the physics of internal, external and terminal ballistics that lets you put your round on your target a 'whatever' range. And do it again. And again. All those outside factors (wind, weather, mirage, heat, spin drift, etc. etc. etc.) are variables that YOU the shooter must master. And are all things affecting the relatively simple physics of bodies in motion. You must be master of them all. And when you are handloading, you are mastering a core part of the equation. Internal ballistics. And removing excuses (bad factor ammo, didn't fit my chamber, too much jump to the rifling, blah, blah blah) As a handloader, you are eliminating those variables/excuses one at a time. Using what amounts to the shooters version of the 'Scientifiic Method" which is hypothesize, experiment/test, analyze data and try the next thing.
Nothing is more satisfying than a single hole made with a rifle you built (or designed/spec'd for those without lathes) and a round you loaded. In conditions that you mastered. It's why shooting is such an utterly demanding cerebral sport... if not the most physical.
Hope this helps... I am sure I am forgetting something I wanted to mention. But this is getting into TLDR territory. So I'll just stop for now.
Cheers,
Sirhr
