Best Reloading Manual.

[wanderinstar 1]

Probably been asked before,and no doubt will be asked again.

But which is th best manual? Have been reloading for about two years now. The bloke that showed me said to measure OAL from base of cartridge to the tip. I was talking to someone yesterday and he said you had to measure with a bullet compariter. Which is correct?

[oxo 385]

Try the lee reloading book, some of the loads are a bit low but rifles are individual things, never jump straight to a load someone recommends, work up. Its easier measuring to the ogive with a comparator fitted to your vernier but i just measured to the tip at first. Comparator is only about a tenner anyway.

[coldweld 65]

Reloading Data is changeing all the time download some ,buy some you can never have too much info.

 

COL is measured as you have been told !!!

 

Your rifle might have a different one though ! Factory made rifles tend to have a longer COL tham SAMMI as bigger is less of a problem than a short chambering. You Tube will show you all about COL gauges

[wanderinstar 1]

Once you have got OAL using ogive as datapoint. How does that translate into using bullet seating die. If I am to believe everything I have read. The polymer tip on a V Max bullet is not an accurate datapoint. So how do I set the bullet seating depth?"

[markha 99]

Each particular bullet head manufacturer has load book for their product.

 

A comparitor is only any use if you have a gauge for measuring the seating depth in your rifle chamber, ie the point at which a particular bullet head touches the lands of your chamber. This will then be classed as the maximum OAL that your rifle will accept from the distance from the bolt face to the bullet head touching the lands.

You then decide whether to load your rounds at the maximum OAL or as most people do, load them 20 thousands of an inch shorter as a starting point for building more accurate rounds.

Some rifles may like a big jump in to the lands for accuracy, other rifles like to be as close as 0.005" off (away) from the lands, and others more in to competition shooting may even jam their rounds in to the lands by 5 to 10 thousandths of inch.

 

If you have been loading for 2 years and following your loading book and your happy with accuracy then great. But the idea with hand loading is to find out what powder weights and bullet heads and OAL and seating depth gives the best accuracy in your rifle.

 

IN answer to your last question " how do I set seating depth for Vmax" you need to get a comparitor gauge that measures the overall length at the bullets 'ogive' (look in your loading book for info on this), so as above:

 

1 Get OAL gauge to measure accurately the maximum distance from bolt face to lands with a particular bullet head ( you have to do this for each bullet head type you use as they all different).

 

2 Using a comparitor gauge you measure the above cartridge overal length to the bullet ogive.

 

3 Make rounds as normal but using the comparitor gauge keep measuring the OAL to ogive untill your OAL is around 0.020" shorter than the maximum OAL measured in step 2.

 

4 Make up batches of 5 rounds with different OAL, Starting at 0.020" then 0.015" then 0.010" then 0.005"

 

5 Go out and shoot 5 rounds at 5 different targets with your 5 different seating depths.

 

You may see that one set of 5 has a smaller group size than the others, thats the OAL that your rifle prefers with the particular bullet heads you are using and the particular powder type and weight you are using.

 

Obviously you have to watch very closely for signs of pressure along with your chrono readings to compare to the factory load data in your reloading book.

 

Surely you must have notice that when measuring your COAL with calipers from base of cartridge to tip of bullet that there is always a varying amount of difference than can be a couple to 5 thousands inch? Its about the same with any polymer tipped bullet head, thats why using a comparitor is the only accurate way to do this - Your seating die does not push the bullet head in from the tip, it pushes it in from the bullet ogive area, which is the same place that a comparitor measures it from.

Have a look on youtube there is a wealth of info on this.

All the best and don't go past the powder weights in your reloading manual!

[SNAP SHOT 194]

markha has it spot on,

 

Theres a load of people out there that Think they know how to reload, i saw some dangerous characters that reloaded for years,

and thought they knew everything,

 

Don't take any info you hear for granted, a few books i recommend you read are the abc's of reloading, and reloading for competition, when

you masters the bascis of the other book...

 

Snap.

[wanderinstar 1]

Cheers Markha andSnapshot for your info will get these books and start reading. Thanks again.

[shootlodge 143]

here one for free

 

http://www.lapua.com/upload/downloads/brochures/2011/vihtavuorireloadingguideed9eng.pdf

 

scroll down & enjoy.