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Reloads Heavy Bolt Lift

HuntND

Sergeant of the Hide
Full Member
Minuteman
Jan 27, 2018
152
16
39
North Dakota
So I’m fairly new to reloading, I have been doing it about 3years and never had any problems, but I had a new rifle built for the first time and bought new brass, 22creedmoor, Peterson Brass, 75gr eldms, 41grs H4350, 3288fps, 20” barrel, suppressed, 180rounds on new brass, no pressure signs. I am seated way off the lands. I started reloading my 1xshot brass and today I shot 23rds, and had 3 at the end that had pretty heavy bolt lift and ejector marks and heavy bolt closure, so I called it quits, but velocity was normal, they measure 1.521 to the shoulder. The 20 others measure 1.520 and no pressure or heavy bolt lift or close.
In my notes the virgin cases were 1.516 and grew to 1.519 so I resized them to 1.517. What did I do wrong on those 3 cases? It is possible that I was adjusting die on those 3 cases and had to much shoulder bump or not enough? Why the pressure? What should I bump shoulder back too now? Can I use those 3 cases again? The barrel still seems to be speeding up a bit so I may have to back off a touch, but I really think it was something I did wrong with those 3 cases.
Thanks
 

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Couple of questions:

What dies are you using? What calipers? How are you throwing powder? Have you measured the "case head separation line"? I've had issues with brass growing fatter in that area because my Redding Type S dies and that chamber just weren't compatible. The sizing die just wasn't going down far enough on the brass. Did you measure each case after sizing or just spot check here and there?
 
I use a standard FL Redding die, with rcbs rockchucker, mitutoyo calipers, rcbs chargemaster lite, I always measure the first 5 or 6 because I am usually still adjusting die, I have a coax on the way! Then Maybe every 10th. I just checked all 50 more I resized at the same time, just about all measure 1.517 there is 1 that measures 1.518. BUT there is 3 that measure 1.514…
 
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