SmallCaliberCentral

In order what steps do you do first from the case prep to the loading of the bullet?

Example: (1)Deburr the inside and outside of case mouth (2) clean the inside of the case neck with brush (3) put in tumbler ............

I need some guidance on the order of operations in reloading any help would be appreciated.

There are different steps in loading new brass versus loading once fired brass versus loading brass that needs to have the shoulder bumped back. Are you refering to one in particular or all of them? I'm sure you will get a variety of answers regardless which information you wanted.

New brass:
FL size
Trim all to the shortest
Chamfer
Deburr
Neck Turn
Uniform primer pockets
Deburr flash holes inside and outside
Tumble
Weight sort brass
Weight sort bullets
Prime
Charge
Seat
Check run out

How much do the steps change when reloading once fired brass? When you mentioned that the brass needs to have their shoulder's bumped back is that what the neck sizing die is for?

kirbymagnum

Once virgin brass has been fired in your rifle it takes the shape of your rifle's chamber. It is now custom fitted for your particular rifle. You should not try to shoot that brass again in another rifle unless you full length size it first. It might not chamber in another rifle. In order not to prematurely work harden the brass you should not use a full length sizer again until it becomes hard to chamber. Repeatedly firing brass will make it work harden and eventually become hard to close the bolt. That is when you want to bump the shoulders back a little so it's not so hard to chamber. This is probably a good time to anneal again to return the elasticity lost to work hardening.

Once fired brass:
De-prime without sizing
Clean primer pockets with uniformer
Trim all to the same length
Chamfer
De-burr
Tumble
Clean inside necks with brush
Weight sort brass
Weight sort bullets
Neck size
Prime
Charge
Seat

The only difference to the process when you need to bump the shoulders back is to use a full length sizing die or I think there are specific dies designed to bump the shoulder back. I have never used them though, I just use my full length sizing die. Set the die up so that it contacts the shell holder and then back it out about one turn. Run a case through the die and try to chamber it in your rifle. If it is still hard to close the bolt progressively turn the die back down towards the shell holder in 1/8 turn increments while continuing to try to chamber. When the case chambers easily, lock the die in place and run the rest of them through. You might want to anneal again at this point.

Note:
Not everyone would go through all the trouble that I do. There are steps you could omit like weight sorting and cleaning inside case necks. It depends on what you are doing with the ammo. If I was loading 500 rounds to go varmint hunting I might not do everything I would do if I was loading 50 to go to the range. Then again, it never hurts to be precise. Soon enough, you will undoubtedly decide which steps you will and will not repeat. That's up to you.

The steps may also change with the type of case cleaning you do. I use an ultrasonic unit to clean mine.


my steps are...

De-prime without sizing
Clean brass (Ultrasonic)
INSPECT brass
Brass prep, flashole maintenance, neck turning... (for once fired factory loads).
Neck size
Trim all to the same length
Chamfer
De-burr
Weight sort brass (for range/competitive shooting)
Weight sort bullets (for range/competitive shooting)
Prime
Charge
Seat
Check runout

With ultrasonic cleaning there is no need to clean the primer pockets or brush the necks.


A note on setting seating depth.

I use a modified case cut with a dremel (split neck). This way if I seat a little to deep I just push the bullet back out and try again.

Thanks for the help.

After you are done tumbling what should the inside of the case look like? I have had mine in the vibrator for about 6-8 hours and there is black on the inside from the burnt powder. Can you vibrate them to much? I started vibrating without doing some case prep such as de-prime, chamfer, deburr, and trim.



To check how far you are into the lands you can color the bullet the a marker ( use a dummy round) and chamber it and what ever is scraped off is how far you are into the lands. How far should you seat the bullet into the lands? If you do seat the bullet into the lands does it improve the accuracy? ( or will it vary from rifle to rifle?) Since you have to reduce the load when seating into the lands do you lose velocity or do you get it back from the pressure of the bullet because it is jammed into the lands?

Geez people actually weigh the brass? I love to fiddle with stuff but I just don't see the logic in weighing the brass. The way I see it 2 cases could weigh differently for any number of reasons.

I read an article on 6mmbr.com about a guy shooting a 7mm WSM 1000 yards, off a bipod no-less, and he was getting groups in the 2 1/2 range. He admitted he used to weigh cases but found it just didn't help.

As for seating depth, I can't seat a 40 grain bullet far enough out to touch my lands. I found 2.275 or so works best for me.

My routine:

Assuming I don't need to trim

Decap
Clean
Prime
Charge
Seat Bullets



SHOOT!

Kirby: The black is normal, don't sweat it. I vibe tumble for about 4 hours with no worries.

I don't bother with weighing my brass, not even for my long range rigs. When I'm getting very small or even .250" to .375" groups, that gives me consistent hits on PD's and ground squirrels out past 600 yards, I don't need any better accuracy. With that kind of accuracy potential, chucks are dead meat about every time unless the chowderhead with the rifle blows it.

For measuring the bullet to land relationship, do yourself a favor and just get the Stoney Point Comparator with the caliber insert and modified case in your caliber of choice. No dinking around, repeatable, dependable, and cost efficient. One of the best, most practicle reloading tools you'll ever buy. Available from all the mail order houses including Sinclair Intl.

One thing about the 204 Ruger caliber, is that unlike most other accuracy/varmint oriented calibers, it just is not fussy about touching the lands. My Sako M75V shoots dinky groups, kills gophers farther than I'd have ever believed with a factory barrel, and I've got a whopping .100" jump to the lands; farther than any of my other target/varmint rifles. I only have about anywhere from .070" to .100" of bullet in the case depending on bullet used (only shoot it single shot off my field bench, box to rifle, back in the box).

I am not even going to pretend I have 1/10th of the knowledge of the guys that already responded, but I would like to add a question about the procedures mentioned.

1) On once fired brass, why don't you start by neck sizing and depriming simultaneously. I don't see the logic in turing this into two steps.

2) Can't you tumble before you do this so that you don't have to deal with picking all the cleaning media out of the primer pockets (that is one of the biggest hassles of this process in my mind).

My procedure for once fired brass would have been:

1) Tumble
2) Neck size and deprime
3) Trim to length
4) Chamfer/debur neck
5) Clean primer pocket (should already been uniformed and deburred on before first load)
6) Prime
7) Dump powder
Seat bullet
9) Shoot p-dog at long distance amazing friends and other on lookers

Obviously there is a reason the other guys are tumbling later on - please enlighten me as to what it is. Thanks-

goody523 wrote:
1) On once fired brass, why don't you start by neck sizing and depriming simultaneously. I don't see the logic in turing this into two steps.

2) Can't you tumble before you do this so that you don't have to deal with picking all the cleaning media out of the primer pockets (that is one of the biggest hassles of this process in my mind).

I use ultrasonic (wet bath) so I remove the primer then clean. This keeps my sizing dies nice and clean. Since there is no primer in the brass the primer pocket is also cleaned (no need to spin a tool in the pockets).

goody523, Probably to get the lube off. I tumble before anything on fired cases. I use just a little wax on the neck to neck size, none on the inside; I don’t run an expander anymore. I am very careful with my fired cases, out of the box, in the gun and back in the box. Just a quick wipe after neck sizing with a paper towel and done. I can get quite a few firings before they need to be trimmed again, so primer pocket cleaning is the only other thing. I don’t want to spend any time on reloading chores in the shooting season. That is what they invented winter for.

goody523

If you run a case into a die to size the neck the expander ball will open it again. The two steps involved in squeezing the neck and then expanding it again will work harden the necks. Besides, expander balls can introduce run out into your cases. Lots of reloaders throw them away and just use free floating, self aligning neck sizing bushings.

I use a one of a kind neck sizing die. It started life as an RCBS full length bushing neck sizing die. I used a friction wheel cutter on my Dremel drill to cut it off just below the shoulder to body junction. After cleaning it up and squaring it with a series of files and hone, it works great. I removed the expander ball and stem so it just neck sizes. This was one of those times when I just had to have something to do and had this die I never used. This could be a great project for a non hunting day.

You could just use a punch to deprime. I simply run the decapping pin assembly all the way down as far as it will go in one of my full length dies and use that to knock out the primers. I don't have to line anything up and the die never touches the neck. Since the cases are fired the expander ball doesn't touch the neck either. Then I use the homemade neck sizing die to size the neck. I can almost size down to the neck to shoulder junction with this die.

I spin a tooth pick in each flash hole whether or not there is any tumbling media in them. It helps to get the soot out that can reduce the hole size. Try it some time and see what it leaves on the toothpick.

The solution to get rid of the expander ball on a Redding neck die is to buy a ball one caliber smaller. You can still use the decapping pin and not touch the inside of the neck. My 204 die uses a .17 ball. I use a Forster Co-Ax, so ram contamination is not an issue. When I still used a ram press, I used a Redding decapping die and a dedicated press for decapping. No sense of throwing all that primer debris on the ram of your good press. You are lapping the ram with every stroke.

Once again I am going to show my ignorance of what is going on by asking the following question (hopefully other green horns are learning from my questions here as well - I'd like to think I am not the only one clueless about such matters). With my current off the shelf RCBS neck sizing die is what is actually going on:

A) The downstroke of the ram is sizing the outside of the neck to the proper diameter and the upstroke is using the expander ball to basically set the inner diameter to the correct dimension?

or

B) The reverse of A?

I believe (A) is the correct answer and if so it sounds like you guys are saying that you disable the expander ball so that nothing happens on the upstroke. If this is indeed what you are talking about it seems that there must be some downside to not using the expander ball or the manufacturer of the die wouldn't have made it part of the process. If that is indeed the case, what is the downside to not using the expander ball? The only thing I can think of is when you have cases that have necks that get dented inward - no expander ball = bad news in that scenario.

Assuming all of this is correct and I decide that I am willing to risk not using the expander ball to increase case life (and improve accuracy?), are there off the shelf neck sizers that don't have the expander ball?

The deeper I get in to this the more I wonder how I ever hit anything in the dark ages when I used to just go buy a box of ammo at the store....

Thanks in advance for the insight.

Dies with expander balls usually overly compress the neck and then it's the expander ball that opens the neck to the correct size. With a bushing neck sizing die you can just use the bushing the size you want the outside of the neck to be without the expander ball. On bushing dies the top screws off so you can insert different sized bushings. When I screw the cap back on the die I make sure I tighten it so I can just hear the bushing rattle arouond inside. This will let the bushing align itself on the case neck. Non bushing dies can't do that. If the die is not concentric or the case is not square with the die the case can become out of round. Sometimes the expander ball isn't perfectly centered in the die and will push the neck off center. The biggest advantage to using a bushing neck sizing die is that you can vary your neck tension by using different sized bushings. Just the same as seating depth and powders, your rifle might like a little more or a little less neck tension. You just have to experiment. Without interchangable bushings you are pretty much stuck with one size.