Bassnbow
Well-Known Member
I have about 140 pieces of Nosler brass (280 AI). These were from factory loaded ammo I purchased from a friend that sold his 280. 100 had been loaded with 140gn ballistic tips and 40 were 140gn accubonds. They are all 1X fired from my 280 and now I am planning on reloading them. I know this is not the best procedure with mixed brass, but components what they are, I am making due with what I have. I was fortunately able to purchase 100 pieces of new Nosler brass, but it seems silly not to use these until I can get my hands on some of the Peterson brass.
I'm using Redding full length resizing die, adjusted to bump the shoulder back just a couple of thousandths. After resizing and getting ready to check trim length, I found the overall lengths are very different. Almost all were at or well above the recommended length of 2.525, so I figured no problem, I'll trim all to recommended length. Then I checked the length to the shoulder using the Hornady headspace comparing tool and found there was also a difference between them. Most were somewhere between 2.130 and 2.137. Is this .007 difference significant, seams like it is? I thought they should be the same since they were all shot in the same chamber, did they stretch differently, or maybe some stretched and some didn't? should I still trim to overall length and not worry about it until they have been fired a few more times?
I know ideally I probably shouldn't be loading brass from different lots, but with shortages I'm kind of stuck at this point. The rifle is primarily a hunting rifle and shoots very well, right around 1/2-5/8 with factory ammo and a little better with reloads (still actually fine tuning a load). At this point I have separated the brass based on this headspace measurement into 3 groups with each group being all within about .002 in size. Does this sound like best plan, or am a way over thinking this?
Any advice will be appreciated
I'm using Redding full length resizing die, adjusted to bump the shoulder back just a couple of thousandths. After resizing and getting ready to check trim length, I found the overall lengths are very different. Almost all were at or well above the recommended length of 2.525, so I figured no problem, I'll trim all to recommended length. Then I checked the length to the shoulder using the Hornady headspace comparing tool and found there was also a difference between them. Most were somewhere between 2.130 and 2.137. Is this .007 difference significant, seams like it is? I thought they should be the same since they were all shot in the same chamber, did they stretch differently, or maybe some stretched and some didn't? should I still trim to overall length and not worry about it until they have been fired a few more times?
I know ideally I probably shouldn't be loading brass from different lots, but with shortages I'm kind of stuck at this point. The rifle is primarily a hunting rifle and shoots very well, right around 1/2-5/8 with factory ammo and a little better with reloads (still actually fine tuning a load). At this point I have separated the brass based on this headspace measurement into 3 groups with each group being all within about .002 in size. Does this sound like best plan, or am a way over thinking this?
Any advice will be appreciated