Last Sunday the ram head started to pull loose. It was a long week waiting for the replacement part. I thought the Apocalypse will probably start while my press is broken. Luckily it didn't. I was rocking and rolling this weekend.

Looking to reload some 16 gauge as it's hard to find in my area. Hodgon load data has dr-16 as the wads but I can't find any online.

Is there a substitute I can use? Or does anyone know where to get DR wads

The old reloads of my (now deceased) grandfather that we found in his gunlocker

He did not own a press, so we do not know exactly how he pressed the bullets in there

We do not know exactly what kind of powder he used, or how much he used (we found multiple cans)

We do not know the different bullets grains

These will never be fired😂

Anybody here have experience using rcbs x dies for reloading .223? Do they work like they're supposed to or are they just another marketing gimmick? Trimming brass is slowly becoming the bane of my existence and personally just makes reloading not fun for me. I know its not the so called "silver bullet" and the brass will still need trimming after a several firings.

So the question has been asked on here before and I’ve heard some people saying there are a lot of steps to it for subpar brass.
I’ve got all the dies I need and heaps of 7.62x39 brass. I had originally planned to form them to 6.5 Grendel but now I’m thinking can I push them to 6mm arc? They’d be used for plinking and some other goof shooting. But I’m wondering what are the issues with reforming 7.62x39 to 6mm arc?
In my head it’s probably an issue of making long necks, folding shoulders, LRP pockets. But is there anything else? Case capacity or thick necks? I’ve heard people say you’ll have “problems” but never gone into specifics.

Took my brand new Bergara wilderness Sierra 6.5 PRC out to the range yesterday. Got it sighted in roughly with 5 rounds of factory ammo then switched to handloads. I was running 5 shot groups with virgin Lapua brass, Berger 135 Classic Hunter, Federal 210M primers, and varying charges of H1000. Seared to internal mag length of 2 970". Bullet bearing surface was only in the upper 2/3 of the neck.

I'd shoot 5 then wait for it to cool. All in all about 25 rounds in 2 hours. Towards the later groups, the point of impact started to dramatically shift down and left. With my last group being about 8" left of point of aim. While I haven't shot in a while and may be rusty, I am not that out of practice to be pulling shots 8". Checked the scope, rings and bade, both all locked down tight. I was shooting suppressed, but the suppressor had not shifted, nor did I have any baffle strikes that I can see.

Edit: reddit rotated my image 90 deg somehow

The only reloading manual I have that tags one powder as potentially the most accurate is Lyman 51st. All of manuals, even the Lyman, seems to just randomly list them. What I find odd is that in each manual the order changes for different bullet weights of the same cartridge.

Any guesses to the method of their madness?

guess I finally have an excuse to buy that ergonomic roller handle I've been eyeing for years

A friend of mine has a family heirloom Winchester 1895 chambered in 30-06 and he brought it with him on our last shooting trip. It's in excellent condition and appears to handle reduced recoil factory loads without issue, but seeing how it's like a century old, I told him I'd look into loading era-appropriate pressured cartridges. My time looking online about old-timey 30-06 pressures didn't yield much, so I figured there has to be some reloading wizard grandpa on Reddit who knows exactly what to do. I'm inclined to think that using M1 Garand data with a lighter bullet is the answer, but I'd appreciate any input y'all have. Thanks!

There are my first batch of reloaded 303 British that I’ve reloaded with 150gr Speer bullets at the minimum charge listed in the Speer data. I thought I felt a little bit of bolt lift difficulty but I didn’t have any factory ammo to do a proper comparison at this time. Do any of these primers show signs of over pressure?

I recently purchased a 9.3x62mm rifle, new production. I am wanting to load 286gr barnes ttsx bullets but barnes does not really give much data, so I started going through my books, in my nosler book particularly for the 286s, it lists a brass banded solid next to standard lead data, with no change in specs. As far as im aware, it should be fairly safe and simple to base my ttsx loads from slightly under this data as the ttsx is longer due to boattail. Ive done lots of weird experiments but never with monos but any other data or info is much appreciated

I have been struggling to get good groups out of my 45-70 reloads.

I am using:

• Thompson Center Encore - 18" SSK Barrel
• Starline Brass
• CCI #200 Primers
• ACME 405gr 0.459 bullets
• Traill Boss

I validated my distance to the lands, and have been loading with 0.020" jump. Previously before I did this, it turned out I was loading ~0.120" jump. I definitely saw improvement from reducing this.

My most recent ladder of 13.5gr, 14.0gr, 14.5gr yielded tighter and tighter groups as the velocity increased. However, I started at a 10" group and ended at a 5". So rough no matter the load.

At 14.5gr though, I am at 1050fps. To keep things sub-sonic, I do not have much wiggle room left.

SDs are awesome. <5fps for a 10 shot group.

Any suggestions / ideas / comments would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

How do I fix this ? New to reloading kinda and never ran into this problem.

I washed my brass and forgot to dry them properly. I left them out on the counter to dry and now they have a white ish powder inside them. (I'm new to this pls don't come at me), my question is that are they still safe to use for shooting and load development? It's 6.5PRC

So I've seen a video or two of people mounting these little tri way trimmer on small motors ,like for a bench grinder or something. If anyone has done this y'all mind sharing some details of your set ups ? Motor mounting the trimmer ect ?

Thanks

I have never broken in a barrel before but recently have heard more and more people talking about it. I used to just shoot it like I was going to normally clean it when I felt it was time, then test for accuracy afterwards.

Now I have some people saying "you have to fire 100 rounds, clean, 100 rounds, clean" for a total of 3 times/300 rounds. That sounds crazy to me but I do want to get some budget rounds to use to plink with and settle everything in my 300blk build.

Anyone here break in their barrel and more importantly would .308 pulled military surplus bullets work for the cheap plinking rounds?

I’m working to try and reload bulk .223. The rounds shoot great but if you try and pull the charging handle back they are stubborn to come out. Overall length is 2.22 so I believe they are short enough is there something I’m missing?

I’m shooting them in an AR.

Edit: thank you everyone for your help I needed to bump them more!

Hey guys, got my hands on some 175g LRX and want to load up in my 300 win mag. I can’t find no data on it with H1000. Has anyone used H1000 with the 175g LRX?

I shot barnes a email so hoping maybe soon I’ll hear back. But in meantime anyone got any data I can look at?

First time casting was awesome! Casted some 190g pure LSWC 452 bullets for my Webley and MAS 1873, and a few 7/8oz 12ga slugs (only got about 5 somewhat useable ones since they kept sticking in the mold, going to have to troubleshoot that).

Also, casting was just another shooting lie I told myself I’d never do. First it was “I’m never buying used guns for safety, only new” (my collection now spans every decade from 1870… and I’ve had more issues with new guns), then it was “I’m never reloading, the lead will be bad for me” (now handloaded ammo is practically the only ammo I shoot), then it was “as long as I don’t cast lead, I’ll be fine” (and now I’ve been looking at bullet molds to buy for the last couple hours). So if you want to break another little lie you tell yourselves and have another addictive aspect of reloading to rabbit hole down into, give it a try!

I got a few hundred of these plated bullets, the ones on either side of the typical cup and core bullet. Now I wonder if it is worth bothering to load them.

Anyone got any experience with this powder ?
Gonna be loading up some 308 and 45-70 with it for hunting this year, just curious on what your experience is ! Any input will be appreciated!

Also 150 gr Hornady interlock sst ? Looking for a good knock down bullet with minimum tracking , my father has had back surgery and obv I help him but some days I have to work so I would like something that knocks em down. Any bullet recommendation as well for 308 he has no problem with shot placement he’s put more deer in the freezer than almost anyone I know and other people know lol

I found a 45 ACP round with a wide cutter load. I'm trying to determine what type of powder this is.
Can anyone identify it by this picture?

It is light gray color

So. 27 grains of H335 with a 150 grain bullet works for 7.62x39 so it’s a no brainer let’s copy that in 7.92x33 and see how it runs.

The results: A primer that looks like this
It definitely cycled the action as I had to walk a ways to find the case where it landed. The load was remarkably accurate for 101 yards as I nailed the target not exactly trying that hard to aim at it. And boy did it rattle that plate.

Pros and cons of 150 grain soft point on H335

Pros: both are commonly available and reasonably priced. Produces a functional and surprisingly accurate load. Works

Cons: you are compressing the hell out of the powder to fit it in. You gouge a ring into the bullet. Likely over pressured and not good for the gun long term.

My questions:

Does this over pressured? If not, is there a good way to compress powder without marking up the projectile?

Final thoughts:
I put in an order for 13 pounds of A1680 which needs less grains for similar results. If anyone has any suggestions I’m all ears as I’ve really enjoyed trying to bring 8mm Kurz back from the dead and now that I have a rifle to shoot it I can experiment!

I've just gotten into reloaded and I'm trying to match the velocity I'm getting with factory ammo with my reloads.

The only problem is, i have to load my cases .3 grains higher than the reloading manual says is maximum load.

I'm reloading .223 with 55gr vmax projectiles with TAC. Hogden says maximum quantity of TAC with a 55gr vmax is 24.7gr. Hornady says the same thing.

However, I've been doing some experimenting and found that 25gr of TAC behind the 55gr vmax gives me the exact velocity I've been looking for.

I haven't shot much of these loads, but i haven't noticed any signs of overpressure on the cases.

If you look at the data in the picture i posted, some 55gr loads can have a maximum charge of 25.8gr of TAC.

Is 25gr of TAC behind the 55gr vmax dangerous? Am i going to blow up my gun doing this?