Most significant step in reloading

L

londonhunter

Guest
Please help to settle a discussion / argument at our club over the pond about reloading techniques in general
If I list the following procedures, drawing from all your experience

Which step contributes most with visible improved match results in order of preference.

In my mind ALL steps are important but for argument sake I am trying to establish the most useful step for members who have limited financial resources when starting out reloading

Thanks

NECK TURNING

ANNEALING

CASE TRIMMING

WEIGHT SORT CASES

TRYING TO ACCURATELY THROW POWDER ACCURATE TO WITHIN 0.01 GRAIN

MEOPLAT TRIMMING

CONCENTRICITY MANIPULATION AFTER SEATING
 
You forgot Seating depth, this is a biggie with me. Come to our shooting school next year, we'll tell you all the secrets. So add that to the list, and you have also have to know how to shoot.

Joe Salt
 
Updated list

NECK TURNING

ANNEALING

CASE TRIMMING

WEIGHT SORT CASES

TRYING TO ACCURATELY THROW POWDER ACCURATE TO WITHIN 0.01 GRAIN

MEOPLAT TRIMMING

CONCENTRICITY MANIPULATION AFTER SEATING

SEATING DEPTH

ABILITY TO SHOOT !
 
Hi LH, I don't think you can put any one part in front .. It is and always will be a practice of fixing all the areas that can hold the combination back .. If you were to ignore all the other sections of qualifing and preparation and just trim the Meplats ,this will not net you to the best results ..But imo if you don't Meplat uniform for Long Range Benchrest then your groups will suffer..JR.. Jeff Rogers
londonhunter said:
Please help to settle a discussion / argument at our club over the pond about reloading techniques in general
If I list the following procedures, drawing from all your experience

Which step contributes most with visible improved match results in order of preference.

In my mind ALL steps are important but for argument sake I am trying to establish the most useful step for members who have limited financial resources when starting out reloading

Thanks

NECK TURNING

ANNEALING

CASE TRIMMING

WEIGHT SORT CASES

TRYING TO ACCURATELY THROW POWDER ACCURATE TO WITHIN 0.01 GRAIN

MEOPLAT TRIMMING

CONCENTRICITY MANIPULATION AFTER SEATING
Click to expand...
 
That's exactly my argument

I cannot put one ahead of another

That's my conclusion however other members beg to differ

hence I though I put throw the argument into the lions den (i.e. HERE)
 
Longhunter, Jeff Is right but when you change something or try anything new make sure its one thing at a time or you won't know what did what. So if they tell you your wrong tell them they need to go to school!

Joe Salt
 
I agree with the others, consistant seating depth , and consistant neck tension from one loaded round to the next is probably two of the most important aspect of extreme accuracy reloading.

That is one thing I do not like about starightenning rounds after the bullt is seated. If you have to hit it more tham once, I would suppose neck tension will be compromised.......jackie
 
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Jackie

Case annealing would be the best way to maintain consistent neck tension correct ?
 
and in what type of shooting are we talking ??
hunting, dangerous game.varmints....factory guns...custom guns ???
what..
mike in co
 
Hey guys....is this a trick question???? Think this one through, there is only one answer to the question he asked.....

CASE LENGTH...

If the cases are to long or being pinched by the carbon ring....nothing else matters...not neck tension...not seating depth....not powder charge...because they will NEVER EVER shoot if they are to long.

There are so many things that make ammo accurate and each one of them can destroy accuarcy.....it's like asking what the most important part of a car is....

Now after them cases are the correct length...

1. Bullet
2. Concentricity
3. Seating depth
4. Powder charge
5. Primer
6. Cases

Hovis
 
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HovisKM said:
CASE LENGTH...

Hovis
Click to expand...

+1

Out of the original list
Neck trimming will not matter unless they are shooting tight neck chambers. Neck trimming on a factory chamber is a waste.
Annealing is only needed when the brass is work hardened.
Weight sorting cases, I would say that I am kind of on the fense with this one. Cheap Winchester, and Remington cases do benifit from this but it is something that only needs to be done once. Lapua, Nosler, and Norma cases I find this to be a waste of time, the box usualy falls into a 1% cull rate.
Throwning charges I dont think that it is as important as some people claim, I (As well as many.) charge cases right off the powder measurer, and call it good. I dont weight each charge.
Meplate trimming you will never notice anything untill you get out past 500 yards.
Consintrisity is a good thing but for me, I am not going to waste my time straightining bullets. If they dont spin right they get culled out for sighters.
 
A friend, who loads for various varmint rifles, and who is as meticulous with his reloading as any competition shooter, , annealed all of his brass last year. In preparing fro this year's annual, out of state prairie dog hunt. Instead of reporting his usual frustration from his rifle check trip to the range, he was beaming as he told me of his results. He said that the difference in uniformity in bullet seating force was quite noticeable, and that he credits this years better results to that, and that to the annealing. He started out with the Hornady kits, eventually developing the experience to be able to discontinue the use of the Templaq in favor of simply watching the progress of the color change down the case till it was a quarter of an inch below the shoulder. This was made easier by his cleaning his cases with a vibratory cleaner.

The reason that I have not tried this with my 6PPC loading is that I use 133, and it seems to like a lot of neck tension, which annealing would undoubtedly reduce. For that reason, I am reduced to sorting as to bullet seating force, by feel.

Of course I would always agree that once a likely powder charge is arrived at, that seating depth has the greatest potential for accuracy improvement, when doing an initial tune. On the other hand, when making adjustments for temperature, I leave the depth alone, and work with powder charge.

Accuracy is a weakest link thing. I often meet shooters, who do not compete, that choose to ignore one or more of the links, and by doing so, IMO, they are are self limiting.
 
Hi guys it is not a trick question
Just to help me to settle an argument / discussion at my club in Bisley
We are a mixed bunch some FTR some F class and some bench shooter and some tactical shooters
All of us have a different view as to the most important step in reloading.
Hence I started this thread
 
I've got to go along with Jackie on "straightening" seated bullets. I experimented with straightening loaded rounds, and aside from the process being a pain in the caboose, the rounds that had been "straightened" shot worse than the old crooked unstraightened ones. This was at 200 to 300 yards too so that at longer ranges the results would likely be worse.

Other than that everything is important, but as long as the rifle's chamber is straight with the bore and relatively tight worrying about concentricity of loaded rounds would be pretty far down the list for me. Set the loading dies up square with the world and do everything else with as great uniformity as possible.
 
I would like to modifiy my answer a bit. I still believe out of the list case length is the most important. Watch Jack Nearys n133 tuning videos, he agrees that out of everything the gun responded the best when the cases was trimed. BUt with that said I dont trim cases after every firing, maybe after 3 or 4 firings.

Now something that is not on the list but I believe it is just as important, if not more, is uniformed primer pockets. I do recut my primer pokets after every firing. I also turn my cases as I seat the primers. I feel having the primers uniformed in depth, and squarly seated is very important. Ingintion is one of the most over looked, and crutial things.
 
Hovis, For one thing there is no carbon ring in any of my rifles including my hunting rifle. Maybe you should start by cleaning your rifle with help of a good bore scope! I think case length is a no brainer.

Joe Salt
 
i would say there are atleast three answers as you have three different disciplines.
sorta impossible to profide a single answer


unless

its
common sense.

mike in co

londonhunter said:
Hi guys it is not a trick question
Just to help me to settle an argument / discussion at my club in Bisley
We are a mixed bunch some FTR some F class and some bench shooter and some tactical shooters
All of us have a different view as to the most important step in reloading.
Hence I started this thread
Click to expand...
 
Most important reloading procedure ?
How about wind flags from in front of your bench out to the target that you are shooting at.
That has always been my beef with the 600 and 1000 yard guys. What are you looking at, the grass ? the trees ? The wind sock on the hill ? I've spent decades shooting woodchucks at various long ranges and the old NRA High power manuals are worthless--- Without windflags of at least 100 yd intervals, It's a crap shoot, unless of course your loyal woodchuckin' buddy is directly behind you with a good spotting scope, calling your first missed shot. Then, Mr. Marmota Monax is in real danger of goin' down !
Joel
 
and now for something completely different......

I think the single biggest factor affecting accuracy is how you fireform your cases. You get ONE chance to make straight cases.

Bugger it up and all else falls by the wayside.

al
 
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