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No More Neck Sizing for Me

why is it when someone is having good results doing something one way and not your way you tend to tell them they're wrong?

read my words, i have yet to run into an issue neck sizing, and with over 1500 rounds down the pipe i have not had a sticky bolt lift due to neck sizing only. when i run out of brass and i get to 5 firings on each piece i will be annealing them and i will full length size ONCE after annealing, then proceed to neck size until i need to anneal again which will probably be in many years time. now go suck on your thumb and dribble.

all this cause i was trying to make people have a laugh by posting up a fox that i smashed in the neck and said i neck size. mcdonalds keeping full length sizing in business. now go return the womens undies back to the store cause you bought the wrong colour. it doesn't suit you.
Maybe you can expand on “good results.”
Good for what? Good enough? Good for you?
 
4k568o.jpg
 
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Haha. I picked up 4000 BR-4 on the weekend.
 
I would love to here some pros for neck sizing. I know some pros for having a collet die. I never found any benefit. What is the benefit if it doesn't save time?

Oh, your opportunity to ask a serious question at this point left port a long time ago, lol.
 
I would love to here some pros for neck sizing. I know some pros for having a collet die. I never found any benefit. What is the benefit if it doesn't save time?

A few of the best F Class shooters I've shot with fire each case only twice. Once is with a light load to fire form the brass, usually fired during practice, then neck only resized, then fired again once more in competition.

After that, the cases are never used again for competition.

Personally I find that practice to be wasteful and expensive, and I'm far too cheap to follow such a plan, but these are some excellent national team shooters with an amazing success record. So there is definitely more than one way to skin the cat.
 
A few of the best F Class shooters I've shot with fire each case only twice. Once is with a light load to fire form the brass, usually fired during practice, then neck only resized, then fired again once more in competition.

After that, the cases are never used again for competition.

Personally I find that practice to be wasteful and expensive, and I'm far too cheap to follow such a plan, but these are some excellent national team shooters with an amazing success record. So there is definitely more than one way to skin the cat.
Are they world champion hall of famers?
 
A few of the best F Class shooters I've shot with fire each case only twice. Once is with a light load to fire form the brass, usually fired during practice, then neck only resized, then fired again once more in competition.

After that, the cases are never used again for competition.

Personally I find that practice to be wasteful and expensive, and I'm far too cheap to follow such a plan, but these are some excellent national team shooters with an amazing success record. So there is definitely more than one way to skin the cat.

Do they trash it after that second because it wont hold a primer anymore? Any idea on their reasoning, or what benefit they get from doing it this way?
 
Do they trash it after that second because it wont hold a primer anymore? Any idea on their reasoning, or what benefit they get from doing it this way?

No doubt they run the second firing on the hot side, but the reasoning for only two firings is more along the line of variability induced as a result of brass rework and work hardening. They feel whatever happens after that increases case to case variability.... Not sure I agree, but that seems to be the takeaway.

Cortina has legitimate concerns about tight fitting brass, but that is circumvented when they simply don't repeatedly recycle the cases.
 
No doubt they run the second firing on the hot side, but the reasoning for only two firings is more along the line of variability induced as a result of brass rework and work hardening. They feel whatever happens after that increases case to case variability.... Not sure I agree, but that seems to be the takeaway.

Cortina has legitimate concerns about tight fitting brass, but that is circumvented when they simply don't repeatedly recycle the cases.

Interesting, case to case variability from work hardening over the life of brass is some real Vudu. By that I mean its a variable we can't really measure or quantify. Not that all F class shooters are witch doctors. :LOL: :LOL::LOL:So we attempt to mitigate it hypothetically, because the best we can usually get is anecdotal evidence. We do thing like anneal. I do it, i don't believe a piece brass I have fired twenty times and anneeled 5 or 10 times is the same as when it was new, but I did seem to see less split necks, which of course is anecdotal because i have seen different brass produce more and less split necks over its life.
 
No doubt they run the second firing on the hot side, but the reasoning for only two firings is more along the line of variability induced as a result of brass rework and work hardening. They feel whatever happens after that increases case to case variability.... Not sure I agree, but that seems to be the takeaway.

Cortina has legitimate concerns about tight fitting brass, but that is circumvented when they simply don't repeatedly recycle the cases.

Make a YouTube video about that. Go up and down the line asking the pros why they retire brass after a few shots. Name the video "STOP USING BRASS OVER AND OVER AGAIN!!!!"
 
No doubt they run the second firing on the hot side, but the reasoning for only two firings is more along the line of variability induced as a result of brass rework and work hardening. They feel whatever happens after that increases case to case variability.... Not sure I agree, but that seems to be the takeaway.

Cortina has legitimate concerns about tight fitting brass, but that is circumvented when they simply don't repeatedly recycle the cases.

Sounds like BS. All of the F Class shooters I know load lower nodes and use 30"+ barrels to make up the velocity. New brass is considered the devil and 10+ reloadings is common.
 
It's not BS at all and they are not using new brass. They are using once fired brass. Hey, it seems to work well enough for them. If you are on the national team and flying to a major match almost always outside the country, do you want to worry about any little thing? No, of course not. They go into it using what they feel most confident with.

Guys on this side of the border spend their own money to go to these matches and its very expensive... One guy told me it cost him $30K a year to be on the team with gas, accommodations barrels, ammo etc. They aren't going to spend all that money to go to a match with anything they don't think is as perfect as it can be.

I personally use my brass as long as it will hold a primer, and I agree that most guys do as well, but these guys do what they do because it seems to work for them. I'm not going to argue about it... It's just what they do and they have reputations to protect.

Any of you guys buy a rifle rest off Viper Bench Rest? His pretty brass knobs are all made from twice fired brass he fired over the last 20 years for either 1,000 yard bench rest or F Class and then melted down into ingots. He's a great shooter who follows this practice, but he is not who I'm speaking of on the team.
 
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Previously my process was to full length resize all fired brass and all was well but it was a bit time consuming having to tumble twice to try to clean off the lube and even then the unique left my cases looking like hell.

Well, I decided to cut some time and just neck size with my Lee die, check the case in a gage and let it fly. Loaded up a couple hundred rounds easy peasy. Such an easy process and no mess to deal with.

Went to the range this morning and the first round I had to nudge a bit to chamber, still not a big deal. The second round was a bit tighter and I should have just stopped there but I chambered it anyway. Sure enough, it stuck and I didn't bring a rod to remedy the situation so my day was over.

When I got home I tapped the spent case out with a cleaning rod and dead blow. Then I went through about every tenth round that I had loaded trying to gently chamber them, about 90% were too tight.

So now I have to figure out how to resize these without screwing up my precious primers.

Any suggestions?
Why are you tumbling twice? That's not necessary. Even if the brass went in the mud, you can just rinse it off.
Just neck-sizing for a bolt-action should always be fine. After firing, the brass will be fire-formed to the chamber. You are re-sizing the neck because after firing the neck has expanded too much to grasp the new bullet when you reload; it was fire-formed to that rifle's chamber neck too. Even many semi-autos will fire their own fire-formed brass just fine after neck-sizing, without any sticking problems. You DO have to make sure that fire-formed case hasn't grown longer than the SAAMI specs though. After you fired that last round, you say the case was stuck in the chamber. If you fired it, it would have just fire-formed itself again to that rifle's chamber and should not have presented any difficulty in extraction. The only difficulty should (possibly) have been in chambering the cartridge prior to firing, not after firing. I only own one .308 semi (SCAR 17) and often just neck-size my brass (it lasts a VERY long time that way). No issues chambering or firing or reloading cases repeatedly. Same with an old (Armalite-made) AR-180. I've only bothered to neck-size for that rifle since I bought it in 1970 or 71 (used to use a Lee loader and a mallet for that). Never given any problems, just needed to trim the length and anneal those necks every 5-8 times fired or toss them when the neck cracks. You can not just neck-size brass that was fire-formed in ANOTHER rifle though. Certainly not for any semi that I have ever encountered. But you DO have to trim those cases to correct length, and although it happens slowly, the cases will gradually get longer and longer until they are too long, so you need to always check case length and trim them back to spec. If you have stuck cases after firing, the problem isn't the neck-sizing. Especially after the case has cooled and shrunk. It is something else. If it is a semi, then I would expect an extractor failure. On a bolt-action, I would expect some chamber issue, or a serious pressure problem with the reload, but not even that after the chamber and cartridge cooled down (10 minutes max). Don't know what kind of action you are using or what caliber so difficult to say more with any accuracy. Unless you want your brass shiny-new, why are you bothering to tumble it even once. If it's a semi, get a brass catcher for the range and just tumble occasionally when it doesn't just wipe clean I do that after annealing (sometimes). You gotta trim it to length though no matter what yo are doing, but that should only cause a failure to chamber, not a failure to extract. You should consider a lube that doesn't need to be removed before reloading. many wax based lubes won't mess with your powder, and I only wipe the outside of the case so they don't attract grit. But I don't usually process and reload more than 50 or 100 at a time.
 
The difference between my rounds sticking and functioning is around three hundredths of an inch, yeah I'm not skilled enough to see that.
More like 3 thousandths of an inch. On a .223REM the difference between a GO and a bolt can't rotate the locking lugs during chambering is 4 thousandths of an inch. It is the same for .308WIN, on most rifles. Some guns chambers are a little tighter than others and those are less tolerant of a case that is more than 1 or 2 thousandths longer than the SAAMI minimum.
 
@cav21082108

So, @kingaling and I was wondering what the -0070 means for Cartridge base to datum (.420): 2.2700 - .0070? Also, unless otherwise noted body dia. -.008 (.020)?

300WinMagSAAMI.jpg
 
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Those are unilateral tolerances in the negative direction. The nominal is max size and they can only be smaller by that unilateral tolerance or less.
That means you’re measuring the body diameter at 2.2630”-2.2700” from the datum.
 
why is it when someone is having good results doing something one way and not your way you tend to tell them they're wrong?

read my words, i have yet to run into an issue neck sizing, and with over 1500 rounds down the pipe i have not had a sticky bolt lift due to neck sizing only. when i run out of brass and i get to 5 firings on each piece i will be annealing them and i will full length size ONCE after annealing, then proceed to neck size until i need to anneal again which will probably be in many years time. now go suck on your thumb and dribble.

all this cause i was trying to make people have a laugh by posting up a fox that i smashed in the neck and said i neck size. mcdonalds keeping full length sizing in business. now go return the womens undies back to the store cause you bought the wrong colour. it doesn't suit you.

Found another Aussie I'd trade all of the leftists in America for.
 
Those are unilateral tolerances in the negative direction. The nominal is max size and they can only be smaller by that unilateral tolerance or less.
That means you’re measuring the body diameter at 2.2630”-2.2700” from the datum.

The unilateral tolerances in the negative direction makes sense. But regarding the body diameter statement, did you mean the length? In the pic posted that measurement looks like the length from base to datum.
AND... for the body diameter noted at the top " body dia. -.008 (.020) " is that -.008 unilateral tolerances for all measurements that don't give one (lengths and diameters) or strictly for the cartridge diameters only?
 
The unilateral tolerances in the negative direction makes sense. But regarding the body diameter statement, did you mean the length? In the pic posted that measurement looks like the length from base to datum.
AND... for the body diameter noted at the top " body dia. -.008 (.020) " is that -.008 unilateral tolerances for all measurements that don't give one (lengths and diameters) or strictly for the cartridge diameters only?
You measure the body’s diameter, at that length.
Any tolerance not denoted on the dimension itself will fall under GD&T. General Dimensioning and Tolerancing
 
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Yeah, don't think that is the whole SAAMI page for the 300 WM.
 
Yeah, don't think that is the whole SAAMI page for the 300 WM.
According to the pdf i downloaded from the saami.org site, that pic leaves nothing out for that cartridge except for maybe at the very top where it says "MAXIMUM CARTRIDGE / MINIMUM CHAMBER", which explains why some of the measurements are noted with a "-" and some are noted with a "+" between the numbers.

Edit: DOH! Just saw your updated pic.
 
I use a 308 Win die as a bump die for my 260. Would probably work OK for 243, also.

FWIW, my 260 brass starts out as 7-08 brass, and gets necked down (partially) with a pass through the Hornady New Dimension F/L die, adjusted to leave the lower 1/2-1/3 of the neck still at 7mm original diameter. This ensures a better seal, stopping sooting directly at that point, and centering the case neck more positively in the chamber. 7-08 tends to be more available in crunch times. For example, 7-08 is available from Lapua right now, at somewhat over $1 a case.

I wonder if the 3-8 die would do the bump trick on a loaded 243/260 cartridge, too. (Don't forget to remove the decapper stem...)

Greg
 
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I realize this may be blasphemy but if you don't load cartridges balls hot they don't blow out the case web so easily. My mild 6.5CM fired brass all chambers easily after several firings. I realize this is SH and it is 80K PSI loads or bust but neck-sizing-only does works when your loads are conservative. Boring, I know...
 
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I realize this may be blasphemy but if you don't load cartridges balls hot they don't blow out the case web so easily. My mild 6.5CM fired brass all chambers easily after several firings. I realize this is SH and it is 80K PSI loads or bust but neck-sizing-only does works when your loads are conservative. Boring, I know...

My reloads are 168's over 41 grains of Shooters World Precision running 2300fps, I don't consider that very hot.
 
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Why are you tumbling twice? That's not necessary. Even if the brass went in the mud, you can just rinse it off.
Just neck-sizing for a bolt-action should always be fine. After firing, the brass will be fire-formed to the chamber. You are re-sizing the neck because after firing the neck has expanded too much to grasp the new bullet when you reload; it was fire-formed to that rifle's chamber neck too. Even many semi-autos will fire their own fire-formed brass just fine after neck-sizing, without any sticking problems. You DO have to make sure that fire-formed case hasn't grown longer than the SAAMI specs though. After you fired that last round, you say the case was stuck in the chamber. If you fired it, it would have just fire-formed itself again to that rifle's chamber and should not have presented any difficulty in extraction. The only difficulty should (possibly) have been in chambering the cartridge prior to firing, not after firing. I only own one .308 semi (SCAR 17) and often just neck-size my brass (it lasts a VERY long time that way). No issues chambering or firing or reloading cases repeatedly. Same with an old (Armalite-made) AR-180. I've only bothered to neck-size for that rifle since I bought it in 1970 or 71 (used to use a Lee loader and a mallet for that). Never given any problems, just needed to trim the length and anneal those necks every 5-8 times fired or toss them when the neck cracks. You can not just neck-size brass that was fire-formed in ANOTHER rifle though. Certainly not for any semi that I have ever encountered. But you DO have to trim those cases to correct length, and although it happens slowly, the cases will gradually get longer and longer until they are too long, so you need to always check case length and trim them back to spec. If you have stuck cases after firing, the problem isn't the neck-sizing. Especially after the case has cooled and shrunk. It is something else. If it is a semi, then I would expect an extractor failure. On a bolt-action, I would expect some chamber issue, or a serious pressure problem with the reload, but not even that after the chamber and cartridge cooled down (10 minutes max). Don't know what kind of action you are using or what caliber so difficult to say more with any accuracy. Unless you want your brass shiny-new, why are you bothering to tumble it even once. If it's a semi, get a brass catcher for the range and just tumble occasionally when it doesn't just wipe clean I do that after annealing (sometimes). You gotta trim it to length though no matter what yo are doing, but that should only cause a failure to chamber, not a failure to extract. You should consider a lube that doesn't need to be removed before reloading. many wax based lubes won't mess with your powder, and I only wipe the outside of the case so they don't attract grit. But I don't usually process and reload more than 50 or 100 at a time.

If you like working dirty brass, all the best to you. I have a tumbler and I use it.

Now, your idea that fire formed brass will function in the same chamber that it was fired in former sounds solid except that it's not, at least in my case. This has been addressed. My rifle is a Christensen MPR, it's the only one I reload for and yes, I trim my brass.

As for my misspeaking about hundredths or thousandths, that has been addressed as well.
 
I realize this may be blasphemy but if you don't load cartridges balls hot they don't blow out the case web so easily. My mild 6.5CM fired brass all chambers easily after several firings. I realize this is SH and it is 80K PSI loads or bust but neck-sizing-only does works when your loads are conservative. Boring, I know...
Per earlier posts, his issue was a very tight chamber and not hot loads. In reality, his loads look downright tame compared to book.
 
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Live and learn...Just part of reloading . There’s a reason most people have somekind bullet puller..Been reloading quite a few years and still learning—-
There’s lots of reasons to have a bullet puller. Needing to bump shoulders doesn’t need to be one of them.
 
Definitely lots of reasons for that.
 
This is not for or against neck sizing but only to show how those stupid stats are misleading. Here I used a Lee Collet die loaded at 50.4 grains +/- .1 gr. I have an AVG= 2907, SD= 5 and ES of 18. Population was 50 and I just picked 10 out of the case for a sample. I know small population but it is a large sample regardless of the fact this is sort of random rather than statistical selection. Got similar results using a Lee FL die bumping shoulders. So, not bad using entry level shit. Groups look good except for one odd fucking thing. More often than not at least 20% of 5 shot groups have holes outside the one ragged hole and these are not outliers or pulled shots and groups average about .4-.5 moa. AVG, SD and ES are statistical calculations. Well, so is regression (least squares). Below are my 20%ers. Probably why the pros use the best competition equipment, including dies, to compete. Will I ever spend that kind of money to get these groups down to .25 moa. I doubt it. This is also why eyeballing OCW and related load devleopment is such fucking bullshit. You can do the same type of analysis during load development to see some "node" a member picked out for you based on pictures is total garbage.

ES1.gif
 
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Previously my process was to full length resize all fired brass and all was well but it was a bit time consuming having to tumble twice to try to clean off the lube and even then the unique left my cases looking like hell.

Well, I decided to cut some time and just neck size with my Lee die, check the case in a gage and let it fly. Loaded up a couple hundred rounds easy peasy. Such an easy process and no mess to deal with.

Went to the range this morning and the first round I had to nudge a bit to chamber, still not a big deal. The second round was a bit tighter and I should have just stopped there but I chambered it anyway. Sure enough, it stuck and I didn't bring a rod to remedy the situation so my day was over.

When I got home I tapped the spent case out with a cleaning rod and dead blow. Then I went through about every tenth round that I had loaded trying to gently chamber them, about 90% were too tight.

So now I have to figure out how to resize these without screwing up my precious primers.

Any suggestions?
Always, ALWAYS FULL LENGTH SIZE. If you have a plastic hammer bullet puller put in your she'll holder vs that ss piece and it works like a dream. I use the RCBS bullet puller and it works well. No substitute for experience. Been there done that too.
 
This is not for or against neck sizing but only to show how those stupid stats are misleading. Here I used a Lee Collet die loaded at 50.4 grains +/- .1 gr. I have an AVG= 2907, SD= 5 and ES of 18. Population was 50 and I just picked 10 out of the case for a sample. I know small population but it is a large sample regardless of the fact this is sort of random rather than statistical selection. Got similar results using a Lee FL die bumping shoulders. So, not bad using entry level shit. Groups look good except for one odd fucking thing. More often than not at least 20% of 5 shot groups have holes outside the one ragged hole and these are not outliers or pulled shots and groups average about .4-.5 moa. AVG, SD and ES are statistical calculations. Well, so is regression (least squares). Below are my 20%ers. Probably why the pros use the best competition equipment, including dies, to compete. Will I ever spend that kind of money to get these groups down to .25 moa. I doubt it. This is also why eyeballing OCW and related load devleopment is such fucking bullshit. You can do the same type of analysis during load development to see some "node" a member picked out for you based on pictures is total garbage.

View attachment 7459110

The problem with low velocity spreads is that at a certain point, we are no longer testing our loads. We are actually testing the chronograph. These results more than likely reflect that.

Few chronographs are actually capable of accurately measuring within 20 FPS.

We did a test a few weeks ago where we shot through several chronographs at the same time. There was a Magnetospeed, a Labradar and a light curtain model... cant remember the brand. The consistency we are lead to expect was just not there. At one point there were discrepancies of 100 FPS between units, then we would try a different load and then they would get closer.

At first it looked like one was consistently faster than the other, but then that reversed and the other one was faster for a while.

It's frustrating when we spend good money on such equipment only to find that it just does not work as advertized.
 
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You’re talking out your fucking ass. AGAIN!
 
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Anyone else bump shoulders with a body die and use a collet die to set neck tension?
I bump shoulders with a body die, size necks with a neck bushing, and set tension with a mandrel.
 
The problem with low velocity spreads is that at a certain point, we are no longer testing our loads. We are actually testing the chronograph. These results more than likely reflect that.

Few chronographs are actually capable of accurately measuring within 20 FPS.

We did a test a few weeks ago where we shot through several chronographs at the same time. There was a Magnetospeed, a Labradar and a light curtain model... cant remember the brand. The consistency we are lead to expect was just not there. At one point there were discrepancies of 100 FPS between units, then we would try a different load and then they would get closer.

At first it looked like one was consistently faster than the other, but then that reversed and the other one was faster for a while.

It's frustrating when we spend good money on such equipment only to find that it just does not work as advertized.

I'm an auditor. Show your supporting documentation.