What did you do in the reloading room recently?

Broccoli Iglesias said:
I should have looked at the pics a little better LOL.

Very nice looking mold.
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Dude makes art not bullet moulds.
I should see if he has any heavier match designs for the 45-70. I would love a nice bullet for the Sharps. Not that I shoot it much or could shoot a good bullet any better than a bad one but it feeds the addiction.
 
I loaded a few rounds for the 03. Gardner's Cache and Quality Cast. Both are coated gc. The charge was 20 grains of IMR4227. The Quality Cast shot a much smaller group @100 yards. They're similar in weight and shape but the Gardner's are .309 and the Quality Cast is .310. The 6.5x55 shot lousy with the Gardner's Cache. At 170 grains, it may be too long and heavy to stabilize. I'll try the Quality Cast, which is much lighter.
 
100 rounds of 45acp. Made with some old federal small primer brass I've had hanging around for a long time. My stock of small primers is much better than my stock of large so evening things out.

Cfe pistol 6.3 grains under 230 grain berrys plated.

Have bolstered the ammo stock this week......wife and I got covid! Both of us vaccinated too.....so I'm off home for 10 days lol. Just regular old cold symptoms for us so far.....so I set a goal of 100 rounds a day.

20210903_135734.jpg
 
gerrycaruso said:
I loaded a few rounds for the 03. Gardner's Cache and Quality Cast. Both are coated gc. The charge was 20 grains of IMR4227. The Quality Cast shot a much smaller group @100 yards. They're similar in weight and shape but the Gardner's are .309 and the Quality Cast is .310. The 6.5x55 shot lousy with the Gardner's Cache. At 170 grains, it may be too long and heavy to stabilize. I'll try the Quality Cast, which is much lighter.
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6.5x55 “should” have a pretty fast twist and stabilize , unless of course you have reach that RPM threshhold for cast ?
 
I didn't measure the twist rate but t should be about 1 in 8. Factory ammo seems to be in the 120 to 140 grain range. I'll try some cast bullets in that range. The rifle shoots very well with 120 grain jacketed bullets and the bore looks great. We'll see.
 
gerrycaruso said:
I didn't measure the twist rate but t should be about 1 in 8. Factory ammo seems to be in the 120 to 140 grain range. I'll try some cast bullets in that range. The rifle shoots very well with 120 grain jacketed bullets and the bore looks great. We'll see.
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Did you slug the bore and size appropriately? I had a buddy with a 6.5 Carcano and jacketed shot patterns at 50 yards. Cast bullets that were something like .003” over nominal jacketed size shot a tight little 1.5” group.
Now I know that carcanos are probably a whole different animal than what you’re playing with but it’s worth a shot.
 
I didn't slug the bore. I've shot cast bullets in a lot of calibers but 6.5x55 isn't one of them. I have no molds or sizing dies in that caliber. The stock disk indicates that the bore is excellent and that's what it looks like. The bullets I tried are sized .267 which should be slightly larger than groove diameter.
 
whacko said:
100 rounds of 45acp. Made with some old federal small primer brass I've had hanging around for a long time. My stock of small primers is much better than my stock of large so evening things out.

Cfe pistol 6.3 grains under 230 grain berrys plated.

Have bolstered the ammo stock this week......wife and I got covid! Both of us vaccinated too.....so I'm off home for 10 days lol. Just regular old cold symptoms for us so far.....so I set a goal of 100 rounds a day.

View attachment 519051
Click to expand...
Seems everyone is getting covid , shots or no shots
Lots of people probably dont even know, especially with allergy season.
gerrycaruso said:
I didn't slug the bore. I've shot cast bullets in a lot of calibers but 6.5x55 isn't one of them. I have no molds or sizing dies in that caliber. The stock disk indicates that the bore is excellent and that's what it looks like. The bullets I tried are sized .267 which should be slightly larger than groove diameter.
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Your probably going to find you need a .270” bullet for 6.5x55… is it a swede mauser? fill that throat up some...
They are a fast twist rifle 1/7.5 or so.
Your most likely going to find the accuracy node in the 1200-1600 fps range.
So far my 6.5 swede cast loads have been just ok. im running a as cast .268" from Norms. I did not have him size them. Eventually I will find a .270" mold and will size down if needed.

some info here
www.gunboards.com

Cast Bullet Shooting in the Swedish Mauser

www.gunboards.com www.gunboards.com
 
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Made 50 45acp plated 230 round nose with 6.3 cfe. That was the last of my plated 230 grain.

Want to save some of my last can of bullseye so figured I'd try cfe with some 200 grain swaged lswc. Problem is the hodgedon website lists 200 grain cast at 7.4 to 8.2 grains and those are well over 1000 fps. I'm running swaged lead to boot and don't want to be up at that velocity. So I did some internet search and a few reloading venues say the website data is way too hot for lead and they load as low as 5.8 grains cfe to keep the velocity around 800fps to avoid leading. I made 20 rounds at 6.3 and I'll test and see what I get.

Then I found a HUGE bucket of 357 brass I forgot about and sorted out a bunch of remington into the tumbler. It's all once fired factory.....time to Ditch a bunch of 357 that I've been reloading for awhile and probably on my 10th time through the press.
 
Finished up 400 rounds of light 44 magnum over WST last night. Used up the last of the WST in the process. The last round I got enough charge for by cutting up the canister and brushing out the bits that were sticking to it. Had 9 rounds to go, so I loaded those over CFE pistol. In all I loaded 1300 rounds in the last week. It all started because I thought about taking my 45 Blackhawk out again and realized I didn't have any ammo assembled to load in the 45 ACP cylinder. Guess it just kind of got out of hand. Good news is that I've simplified my inventory, having used up, in addition to the WST, all the 200 grain Hi-Tek 44 and 45 bullets and all my 9mm bullets.
 
whacko said:
Made 50 45acp plated 230 round nose with 6.3 cfe. That was the last of my plated 230 grain.

Want to save some of my last can of bullseye so figured I'd try cfe with some 200 grain swaged lswc. Problem is the hodgedon website lists 200 grain cast at 7.4 to 8.2 grains and those are well over 1000 fps. I'm running swaged lead to boot and don't want to be up at that velocity. So I did some internet search and a few reloading venues say the website data is way too hot for lead and they load as low as 5.8 grains cfe to keep the velocity around 800fps to avoid leading. I made 20 rounds at 6.3 and I'll test and see what I get.

Then I found a HUGE bucket of 357 brass I forgot about and sorted out a bunch of remington into the tumbler. It's all once fired factory.....time to Ditch a bunch of 357 that I've been reloading for awhile and probably on my 10th time through the press.
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Any splitting?
If not why ditch it if you are loading at low pressure?

If you have your heart set on tossing the brass put it up for karma (I could use some 357 brass for range fodder)
 
Tried seating a .311 Hornady SST bullet in ( 7.62x39 ) and the Lee seating die would not seat the bullet deep enough. It would not reach a depth to allow crimp at the cannelure.

The die was touching the shell holder ( bottomed out ) and the adjusting screw was bottomed out.

I had to remove the adjusting screw from the die and the insert and place an expended primer behind the insert to get it to seat the bullet deeper.

I'm curious to see how this seating die works with other bullets.
 
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whacko said:
time to Ditch a bunch of 357 that I've been reloading for awhile and probably on my 10th time through the press.
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Bro, dont. Wait till they split.

3 days ago I reloaded 200 9mm I have been reloading since 2019. 3 cases split. The rest are still fine. Loaded over 10 times. I stopped counting a while back.

I shot those 197, and will reload them again tomorrow. I expect maybe 1 to split.
 

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