Ramblings and Such From Hunting Coyote

[Bucklowery]

I brought it up because I am setting up a couple of rifles with scopes and as my wife and kids will tell anyone I am OCD about truing the scopes as well as several other things, they have a little different terminology for it. I think it stems from some of my past training and being told often what do you mean half a thousandth of an inch is close enough. you may not be building a piano, but that turbine is going to run at 3600 RPM and weighs 15 tons you better get your machining better than that. That kind of stuff followed me around in all aspects of my life especially hunting coyotes. In the end I love it being that way it just makes me feel good about myself to know I did the best that I could. It probably kept me alive more than once or at least out of trouble. And again, it depends on your distances as to how finicky you have to be or not be.

Mr. Sheetz, I build generators for a few years and you are right. Once you see a 25 ton rotor coming up to speed 3600 rpm in a core she needs to be right on. She wobbles a bit til she get there and get concentric LOL

Thanks

Buck

 

[DSheetz]

Buck; I went to school for steam power and propulsion and yes after a rebuild the first time they come up to speed it is always nerve wracking. bringing them up to temp on turning gear getting the sag out takes time and somebody always wants to rush it, what do you mean I will wipe the seals out. I got to see a generator that the windings grew and went to ground once, one that the electrician dropped the brushes on the armature while it was running, he was lucky and didn't die just spent a couple of days in a burn unit I got to spend a couple of days grinding the heat affected zone out and removing metal 180 degrees out to balance it again. I saw the after math of trying to put two on line 180 degrees out of synch it blew them both off of the pedestals and totally destroyed them killing one person. I have a lot of respect for you guys that build the generators, they are big, but they are precision machines. Long, hot, hard days and nights they say you have this many days to get it done but are always pushing you to get it sooner, every hour is costing the company 25000.00 to 60000.00 and those guys act like it's coming out of their pocket, I guess it is in their yearly bonuses. BTW it's just Dave but thank You for the showing of respect. I always disliked all of the critical stages and waiting to see if they would settle out and the turbine deck would stop vibrating or if we were going to lose a blade tip, I got to see that one time when the operator slugged it with water at full RPM the shell opened up from the temperature change the three blade tips took out the condenser, it was down for a month. We cut the three blades short went 180 degrees and cut three blades to the same length rebuilt the diaphragms low speed balanced the rotor slugged the shell back together and ran it till we could find a new set of blades. I learned on Westinghouse they called them blades fixed and rotating GE calls them buckets fixed and rotating. As with hunting coyotes it's a complex art, and craft, the more precise and more that you learn the better off you will be.

 

[DSheetz]

We have been seeing a lot of severe weather all across the United States I am hoping that all are safe and sound as well as all of their family and friends. Last night we had winds of 30-40 mph steady with gusts of 98 mph. but a lot of people had tornadoes. A winter storm is supposed to move in tomorrow with 2-3 feet of snow in areas nearby. It reminds me of the weather control we tried to do in the 60's and early 70's in Asia.

 

[DSheetz]

How much preparation do you put into your brass before loading it? Do you uniform the primer pockets? Do you full length size it, then trim it to length, debur the flash holes, weigh it to get within a certain weight range for all of it, do check to see that the necks are uniform thickness and concentric. When you prime your brass do you try for even seating depth of them? Do you weigh each powder charge? When you have your bullets seated to depth do you check that they are true with minimal run out?

 

[windypants]

New brass:

uniform primer pocket
deburr flash hole
find longest shoulder that will chamber easily, then full length size to that length with bushing die (-.005 bushing)
check weights and neck thickness for uniformity (ADG and Lapua have been very uniform)
chamfer neck
deburr neck by putting steel wool in socket and spinning drill (Alex's trick)

Fired brass:

lube with thumb and finger while holding neck
deprime, FL size, .002 shoulder bump, -.005 bushing
tumble in walnut media to degrease
clean primer pocket
check length; trim, chamfer, deburr as needed
seat primer to uniform feel with Lee hand primer
dry lube neck (Imperial dry lube with media)
uniform neck with expanding mandrel
dry lube again and spin tight nylon brush until warm ( Alex again)
dump powder- weighed to nearest kernel
Seat bullet with LE Wilson in-line seating die and arbor press

Seating this way is very accurate (+/-.0005) and gives excellent feel of the neck tension. Also, runout is much improved since I started using this method and Micron sizing dies, although I haven't actually tested that on target to know if it even matters. Alex doesn't think so. He doesn't use dry lube or mandrels, only the nylon brush before seating. Some of these steps are subject to change pending further testing on long range targets, but I'm very happy with the accuracy of this method right now.

Its always interesting to see other people's methods.

 

[DSheetz]

Yes, it is interesting to see how others do theirs. You do yours pretty much the same as I do mine. The first time sizing them I cut all of them to the same length after neck sizing. I use a redding primer pocket uniformer on my primer pockets. And a Lyman flash hole deburring tool after I have cut them to length, so that the flash holes are all the same depth. I still use a neck deburring tool but it doesn't take much after they are trimmed to length. I clean my necks on fired brass before anything else is done with a nylon bristle brush of the caliber that the brass is inside and 0000 steel wool on the outside. After three firings I will bump the shoulders back .002 and recheck the case length. I still weigh all of my powder light and trickle to weight. I don't neck turn my brass as I don't have any tight chambers, I do check my rounds for concentricity of the bullets after they are seated. I like the Lee dry lube paste but still use RCBS lube and a lube pad just not over lubing them so that the cases don't get dented and clean my dies often. All primers are seated using a Lee or RCBS hand priming tool. Here again it's an art and the amount we each decide to do with it is our decision to make like the rest of perusing coyotes and again I'm a little peculiar with my loading. There are some out there that have way more knowledge than I could ever know but I still will read and watch how they do things to try and learn more from them! Alex Wheeler and Brian Litz are just a couple of them. As stated before, and will be again, I love to learn.

 

[Straight Shooter]

I am very basic. KISS. Anneal (if it is needed). Deprime and full length size. Don't clean primer pockets or flash holes. Trim and chamfer if needed. Prime. Powder fill. Seat bullet.
I am not a competition or benchrest shooter. But I can shoot your eye out. Especially after my afternoon nap.

For some reason I struggle to get a consistent .002 inch shoulder bump. I am assuming that has something to do with my reloading technique. But it seems to be good enough for inch of coyote and 1/2 inch off the bench.

 

[windypants]

I have trouble with consistent shoulder bump too and not sure what to do about it, except my groups say maybe I don't need to worry about it. I tightened my die a hair (more over-center pressure) and haven't felt any stiff bolt closings lately.

Dave, have you shot groups to compare 'good' and 'bad' concentricity? I want to but haven't yet.

I think I have some steps I can probably eliminate to simplify things, but I want to verify it on paper and not sure if I want to spend any barrel life on it now when it's shooting so good.

 

[milestown]

We have been seeing a lot of severe weather all across the United States I am hoping that all are safe and sound as well as all of their family and friends. Last night we had winds of 30-40 mph steady with gusts of 98 mph. but a lot of people had tornadoes. A winter storm is supposed to move in tomorrow with 2-3 feet of snow in areas nearby. It reminds me of the weather control we tried to do in the 60's and early 70's in Asia.

DS
I just saw a face book posting of someone's aluminum goose neck horse trailer being blown/rolling across the prairie sideways. Near Clark Wy.
You can keep the wind.
I'm sure you heard the one about the WY. cowboy who had been riding his horse in the wind the day before. He said when the horse lifted his tail to fart and the wind blew the bit out of its mouth.

Hal

 

[DSheetz]

I haven't really noticed a lot of difference unless they are hitting way off sided, and it causes them to start wabbling then it's a matter of keeping that the same like a tire being out of balance. Sizing two or three times on the same piece of brass then going to the next piece makes it more consistent because brass has an elasticity to it, so you need to overcome that to get it to retain the shape you are trying to achieve and stop springing back out of size, as long as you aren't having stiff bolt closing, I think it's good. For me the groups say a lot about what I can get away from doing. I tend to overdo things just because that's the way I am. I know it's me not my equipment 98 percent of the time because I'm that way and do extra things that might make a difference and I haven't proved one way or the other to my satisfaction yet. To me it is a competition between me, and the coyote and I want to end its life quickly and cleanly out of respect for the animal. With today's firearms and ammo having the quality that they do it's not really a problem but then taking pride in my craft takes over and the annel retentive side kicks in.

 

[DSheetz]

milestown: I'm ready for the wind to go away I haven't really had enough calm days to get my rifles sighted and loads checked.

 

[74honker]

While I know I'm OCD about alot of stuff, my brass prep is KISS. I full length size but only as much as needed to chamber easy. Trim when needed, usually after 2nd firing on new to square all back up. Tumble clean every firing before anything else is done. I use one shot lube and spray inside necks too and that's all I do to the necks. I do have a couple micrometer seating dies otherwise just a normal seating die. I'm debating whether to try annealing and have a setup made to do it open flame just haven't done it yet. Not near the work windypants or Dave are doing but my main go to will do bugholes all day if I do my part and so far on my latest project showing it will to. I'm sure I'll have to pay the piper someday when I run into an issue of somekind but so far been pretty lucky.

 

[74honker]

Forgot to ad that I do clean primer pockets with brush but that's it there. Haven't deburred flash holes or squared pockets. And I do chamfer and debur mouths after sizing everytime. Also ALL my work is done manually on prep, no powertools lol. I do wieght sort cases and bullets and prime with handprimer by feel. I use powder throw short then trickle to finish useing beam scale then double checking with small digital to .01g accuracy. I'm sure I'm forgeting something else but that pretty much sums up my proccess.

 

[Straight Shooter]

Forgot to ad that I do clean primer pockets with brush but that's it there. Haven't deburred flash holes or squared pockets. And I do chamfer and debur mouths after sizing everytime. Also ALL my work is done manually on prep, no powertools lol. I do wieght sort cases and bullets and prime with handprimer by feel. I use powder throw short then trickle to finish useing beam scale then double checking with small digital to .01g accuracy. I'm sure I'm forgeting something else but that pretty much sums up my proccess.

That is just about exactly what I do, but I don't square the primer pockets.