Die question.

[flashhole]

A lot of good discussion on this thread. The OP claimed he is using Berger 115 grain bullets. These are the VLD design and are longer than standard hunting bullets in the same weight.

Make sure your seat die has enough clearance in the seat cup to grap the bullet on the ogive and does not bottom out on the tip of the bullet. If it bottoms out on the tip of the bullet it will not start straight into the case neck. I switched to the Forster seat die for this reason and runout went away. In my case I was loading the Ballistic Tip bullets not the Bergers but the same issue may be true with your die if you are having accuracy issues. It's already been stated a concentricity gage is a great tool to use to ferret out these kinds of issues and improve you loading techniques.

The Lee Collet Neck Die rules ...

 

[Trickymissfit]

How does a sloppy fit of the case neck to the chamber neck effect accuracy as long as the case neck's well centered?

Note that when a bottleneck case that headspaces on the shoulder is fired, the case neck doesn't touch any part of the chamber neck until after the bullet's left and a few inches down the barrel.

I shave necks on a few chamberings I shoot that have undersized necks (.246" & .263"). I size the necks loaded for about .001" to .0015" clearence all the way around (IOW, .002" / .003"). Brass dosn't expand as much in the neck as standard chambers do, and I don't seem to work the necks as hard. I have the idea in the back of my head that these cases are lasting longer, but have never did an accurate survey to prove this. I know I have one 10 case set of Hornaday .223 cases that have well over 35 firings on them and look just fine. Like I said; I can't prove it, but it seems that way.
gary

 

[Bart B]

Brass dosn't expand as much in the (tight) neck as standard chambers do, and I don't seem to work the necks as hard. I have the idea in the back of my head that these cases are lasting longer, but have never did an accurate survey to prove this. I know I have one 10 case set of Hornaday .223 cases that have well over 35 firings on them and look just fine. Like I said; I can't prove it, but it seems that way.

Some years ago, a friend and I took our .308 Win. match rifles whose chambers were both finished with the same reamer and had necks a tad above .344 inch; barely bigger than SAAMI minimum specs. We each used 44 grains of IMR4895 and Federal 210 primers. He used one Winchester case with a loaded round neck diameter of .337 inch and I used one Federal case with a loaded round neck diameter of .338 inch. We both reloaded our single case with Sierra 165 SBT bullets atop the powder charge. Both cases were full length sized with a standard RCBS die whose necks had been lapped out to .335 inch.

Each case was fired sized then reloaded until we ran out of test powder.

He got 57 loads on his case.

I got 46 on mine.

 

[apexmtnman]

Bart, you're preaching blasphemy here. Everyone knows that you work the brass less and get better accuracy with neck sized only cases!
I showed a few months ago that David Tubb full length sizes his match ammo and was roundly chastized by a well respected member here stating that Mr Tubb surely didn't care how long his brass lasted because he was sponsored and got his brass for free, so it didn't matter if he wore his cases out quickly by full length sizing them everytime.

 

[Bart B]

Bart, you're preaching blasphemy here. Everyone knows that you. . . . .get better accuracy with neck sized only cases!

Everyone?

Don't make any bets on that unless your billfold's thicker than all the others on this planet.

Having been on long range international rifle teams with David Tubb and other Nat'l champs, record setters, etc. and talking with them about reloading tools and techniques, I know what type of dies they, and I, use.

Check with Sierra Bullets and find out what type of resizing dies they use on fired cases that shoot their best match bullets no worse than 1/4 MOA at 200 yards.

But you're 100% right on neck sizing. Of course one works the brass less by neck sizing. That is unless a bottleneck case neck has more surface area than its shoulder and body does.

Would you believe that some folks get better accuracy with new cases than full length or neck sized fired ones? And they've used them in competition winning matches and setting records with them out scoring folks who've used both full length and neck only resized cases?

 

[Lefty7mmstw]

Would you believe that some folks get better accuracy with new cases than full length or neck sized fired ones? And they've used them in competition winning matches and setting records with them out scoring folks who've used both full length and neck only resized cases?

I've seen some stellar accuracy fireforming brass from 375h&h to 7mm stw also. Those cases shouldn't shoot worth a hoot if you have to go through all the case prep some go through, but I have been known to get 1/4 moa with them. I belive I was using h4831 and 120 grain Sierra's, which is even worse because it isn't a full case and you can't jamb the bullet into the rifling.
I've gotten lazy of late and haven't been re-forming to 7stw, but it was a bunch cheaper when I had the 375 brass and little stw brass. Selling the first 375 and needing to use the brass for it for something nudged the issue too.

 

[apexmtnman]

Bart
My post above was my feeble attempt at sarcasm. I don't own a neck size only die, I full length size all my cases just enough to get them to chamber easily as they are all hunting guns. I have seen many posters say that neck sizing fire formed cases is the best way to get accurate handloads and its nice to have someone as experienced as you verifiy that that is not really the case.

 

[Bart B]

Bart
My post above was my feeble attempt at sarcasm.

Well then, maybe I should tell your Mommy on you. Then she'll take you out behind the woodshed and put a "scar" on your back side's "chasm!". . . .

 

[backwoods83]

To the OP, just buy a vld seating stem for your seater die so that you seat off the ogive and not halfway between the meplat and ogive, that can distort the jacket depending on how much effort it takes to seat the bullet.

 

[boomtube]

Ahhh...the ogive is the entire surface from full body diameter to the meplat. No one makes a rifle seating plug designed to push on the meplat. Most seater plugs are counter bored sufficently to prevent meplat contact no matter what bullet is used, it's mechanically easier and more accurate to bore the plugs after counter boring. I know of no seating plug that is designed to contact bullets at bore diameter.

 

[RTK]

Bart
My post above was my feeble attempt at sarcasm. I don't own a neck size only die, I full length size all my cases just enough to get them to chamber easily as they are all hunting guns. I have seen many posters say that neck sizing fire formed cases is the best way to get accurate handloads and its nice to have someone as experienced as you verifiy that that is not really the case.

I frequently neck size only and have found them to be just as accurate if not more over full sizing.

When I started shooting my first 22-250 AI I couldn't find full length size dies anyway. It shot 1/4 MOA all day and fire formed brass at 1/2 MOA.

I neck size out of laziness too, on my large calibers I only use the FL die when I start to get a hard close and need to bump the shoulder.

 

[backwoods83]

Redding and rcbs both make vld seater plugs to push just ahead of the bearing surface on the largest part of the ogive where the lead core actually is instead of the hollow nose just after the meplat, I use standard and vld seaters and there is a difference. Yes you can bore out a standard seater, but why half *** something.

 

[Bart B]

I frequently neck size only and have found them to be just as accurate if not more over full sizing.

A very common thing with reloaders; it happens a lot. With all due respect to folks who've tried full length sizing and never got the accuracy neck sizing produced for them, it's been my experience that after learning their set up and process details using a full length sizing die, they typically set the fired case shoulder back too far. And that's an accuracy killer for sure.

 

[Trickymissfit]

Redding and rcbs both make vld seater plugs to push just ahead of the bearing surface on the largest part of the ogive where the lead core actually is instead of the hollow nose just after the meplat, I use standard and vld seaters and there is a difference. Yes you can bore out a standard seater, but why half *** something.

years back I took a good look at 6mm bullet shapes with a Shadowgraph using a collet setup to hold the bullets in a vee block. I did rotate the bullets to check for error (out of roundness), but probably should have. I was more or less just interested in how much their shapes varied. They were all over the place! So were nearly had a strait ogive and others had a radius with varying numbers (I never bothered to plot them, and I should have). What I saw was that no seater plug was ever going to be perfect for every bullet. I even went so far as to make a couple of them for a couple bullets (Berger 88's and one Sierra). I saw an improvement with the 88's in runout, but didn't help the Sierra at all.

Anyway it would appear to me that if you were Lee or Forster (or whoever) your seater plug would pretty much have to be generic. Even the VLD plugs would vary a little bit. In otherwords no plug will ever be perfect.
gary