What’s happening here

[sh1kar]

A rather unsatisfactory afternoon reloading for the 7mm Rem Mag. A while ago I bought some once fired, annealed RWS brass. I usually use Norma but the 100 brass I have is fired 3 times so thought I would give these a go.

I started off F/L resizing and despite plenty of lube on pad and in mouth round 27 got jammed. Ah well off to mates tomorrow to borrow his tool !

I carried on prepping the resized brass and got to stage of weighing and loading powder. Whoa! Had to check a few times as the powder was much higher up the case than in Norma. By about 5 mm. Clearly RWS is lower internal capacity. Any way carried on. Get to seating bullet. Oh dear. Norma right. RWS left.





I am assuming as it’s a compressed load the bullet is going in part way. Compressing powder. Then die is shoving case mouth and bullet back as struggling to ram it into the powder

This got me thinking as very occasionally, say one round in 30 in the Norma brass the cartridge won’t chamber. Earlier in the afternoon I pulled the bullet from such a one. Oddly the brass without bullet then chambered, I think without the bullet the chamber was able to nudge the mouth to the extent it would fit. I wonder if even with Norma the odd one is compressed and seating bullet distorts minutely, which cant be seen with naked eye, the case mouth preventing chambering.

Rifle is a Callum so very fine tolerances and load is 75g Retumbo with 140 Nosler so not a v long bullet as it is

Thoughts?

I am going to have to use the RWS for a different load too (not sure what) and stick to Norma for my current recipe

s

 

[Foxyboy43]

Stop! Pull them and start over with a much lower (i.e. safer) load sourced from reputable data then work up - slowly!!! The fact that you are getting such resistance/compression is a clear indication of a considerable difference in volumes - basic learning point is to stick with same brass, trimmed to same length. You are lucky you have not encountered a methinks! It may also be that those brass are not once-fired at all and the brass has hardened to the point that the mandrel struggles to stretch it so consider dumping or at least annealing them.
Stay safe.

 

[NigelM]

Agree with Foxy. Don't pull the trigger on them. They are not happy cartridges. Pressure is going to be much higher than your Norma brass load. Don't know how feisty that is but not sure I would want to get my face too close to it.

I would start by weighing the RWS brass vs Norma. My guess is the RWS is much heavier which would explain the reduced case capacity. If you have chronographed your Norma load and are happy with the accuracy at that velocity you just need to work up a load in RWS that matches the same velocity. Same powder will be fine, it will just take less of it because of the reduced vessel size. You will just have a recipe for Norma and a different one for RWS but the result should be the same.

 

[borbal]

Do you lube the inside neck of your brass...?

 

[Steff]

Totally work hardened, age old brass with over annealed necks. Scrap the shxxt.
Your current RWS brass will take at least four more loading cycles without problems, and without annealing.

 

[sh1kar]

I am not going to fire them!! I bought this as assured once fired annealed brass off an SD member. There were definitely annealed as can see the flame colouring on neck. I can only assume they were as advertised and once fired. The norma load works fine, I have fired maybe 300 shots from this particular load without mishap

Yes I lubed inside.

I have some different Swiss powder I bought for when the Retumbo runs out so I think I will use the RWS brass to work up a load for that. Just a bugger I have a Zeiss V8 with ballistic current and with ring 9 and the load data I fed in to the app it works brilliantly out to 500 yards with the Norma brass. I will have to redo that for a new RWS load.

I think I will just put the prepped RWS stuff away and revert to Norma until Retumbo runs out.

S

 

[Mr. Gain]

Perhaps gauge the neck thickness of the RWS as well as measuring it's water capacity? If you have a custom chamber there may be some neck turning required.
In any event, this thread is a handy reminder of the importance of remembering that all brass is not the same and therefore as important a variable as the powder charge.

 

[Foxyboy43]

Hmmmm. Interesting thread - so why if there are clear agreed specs for calibre pressures - SAAMI et al, can there not be similar common specs for brass per calibre thereby obviating the potential for ?
Just a thought.

 

[User00036]

Is it my imagination, or are the 2 bullets on the left starting to crack round the shoulders?

 

[sh1kar]

Stop! Pull them and start over with a much lower (i.e. safer) load sourced from reputable data then work up - slowly!!! The fact that you are getting such resistance/compression is a clear indication of a considerable difference in volumes - basic learning point is to stick with same brass, trimmed to same length. You are lucky you have not encountered a methinks! It may also be that those brass are not once-fired at all and the brass has hardened to the point that the mandrel struggles to stretch it so consider dumping or at least annealing them.
Stay safe.

They were all trimmed to same length (of the shortest case)

The compression occurred during bullet seating not F/L resizing - that went great

S

 

[sh1kar]

Is it my imagination, or are the 2 bullets on the left starting to crack round the shoulders?

longitudinally or vertically?

S

 

[Steff]

You can fabulate all sorts of things on this. As a matter of fact your brass is dead annealed.

 

[sh1kar]

You can fabulate all sorts of things on this. As a matter of fact your brass is dead annealed.

Which means? No longer accepting heat treatment to become elastic?

S

 

[Steff]

Which means? No longer accepting heat treatment to become elastic?

S

It means that annealing should be done by someone who knows what he is doing, if at all. It further means that the brass you have bought is scrap.

 

[sh1kar]

It means that annealing should be done by someone who knows what he is doing, if at all. It further means that the brass you have bought is scrap.

Why would the mouth collapse on bullet seating and not F/L resizing when presumably under pressure from the mandrel to create neck tension?

S

 

[Steff]

Why would the mouth collapse on bullet seating and not F/L resizing when presumably under pressure from the mandrel to create neck tension?

S

The mandrel obviously didn‘t really work on the necks but rather on the ‚dreaded dougnut‘ your cases seem to have. You mentioned in your initial post that you had problems on extracting the expander ball, which is not an issue with the necks but with a work hardened neck-shoulder junction.
Also, a smooth mandrel will not produce this sort of buckling as the drive bands of a bullet will.

 

[HandB]

They were all trimmed to same length (of the shortest case)

The compression occurred during bullet seating not F/L resizing - that went great

S

Gosh - bullet seating in my experience is a fairly gentle process, even with compressed loads (my 7x57 has some compression of powder). I use a couple of thou of neck tension. Your photo suggests some quite violent forces were involved with the seating. What kind of neck tension did these cases show?

 

[sh1kar]

Bit lost

The F/L resizing of cases kept the neck intact and in dimensions, as I measured. All then trimmed to shortest case length. The mandrel clearly resized the mouth/neck as I felt friction on the rockchucker (despite mouth internal lube as it normally does)
Visual on resized case all good

fill case with powder , seat bullet , and wham, compression rings. So I am not understanding

s

 

[sh1kar]

Bit lost

The F/L resizing of cases kept the neck intact and in dimensions, as I measured. All then trimmed to shortest case length. The mandrel clearly resized the mouth/neck as I felt friction on the rockchucker (despite mouth internal lube as it normally does)
Visual on resized case all good

fill case with powder , seat bullet , and wham, compression rings. So I am not understanding

s

@Rider

 

[HandB]

Bit lost

The F/L resizing of cases kept the neck intact and in dimensions, as I measured. All then trimmed to shortest case length. The mandrel clearly resized the mouth/neck as I felt friction on the rockchucker (despite mouth internal lube as it normally does)
Visual on resized case all good

fill case with powder , seat bullet , and wham, compression rings. So I am not understanding

s

It's a tough one - your eyes and hands and general health are more important than any brass so I wouldn't take any risks with these dodgy cases - I suggest empty them and dispose of them.