Seating bullets

[Pete Wass]

When I started in serious benchrest way back in the 1970's, I was told to load 28 grains of a number of available powders and seat the bullet to be about 15 thou into the lands. That actually worked OK for me for many years. In 1995 we had the WBC in Brisbane (Australia) and I met Glenn Newick. He convinced me that about 8 thou OFF the lands was the way to go. That worked well for me too. I believe that the barrel will tell you what it wants, and not to be fixed in ideas as to where to seat the bullet. Nowadays I start with about 12 thou in and work back to about the same OFF. Somewhere along the line (3 shot groups at that stage) the stars will align. Works for me!

I have used for years .006" in and found the load that gives the most accuracy at 6 in. I know jumping works and have seen it but, for some reason, have avoided it, don't know why. Guess it's just a mind block thing. At 6 in, one can open the bolt without pulling bullets and I have found 6 in to give great accuracy.

 

[zippy06]

I have used for years .006" in and found the load that gives the most accuracy at 6 in. I know jumping works and have seen it but, for some reason, have avoided it, don't know why. Guess it's just a mind block thing. At 6 in, one can open the bolt without pulling bullets and I have found 6 in to give great accuracy.

Hi Pete, is that for 6PPC ?

 

[Pete Wass]

Hi Pete, is that for 6PPC ?

I have used that on a 6BR I shot for a couple of years with the same result but I shoot 30BR almost exclusively. I found that .006" in was an accurate seating depth most often and a real safety in case of a dud primer, which happens occasionally. Much more than .006" in will stick bullets in the throat, from my experience.

Pete

 

[Pete Wass]

Im no expert, but I remove firing pin from the bolt. Then I use the Hornady gauge to get a rough measurement where to begin. I seat a dummy round so it sticks in the lands. I keep reseating the bullet deeper in this dummy round until the bolt drops freely on its own. This will be my touch point. (cbto)

But, we know the brass case rims can be different thickness so some sorting is required before beginning to keep this measurement consistent.

Full length dies make all Cases equal length, butt to shoulder, regardless of the rim thickness. You were for sure on the right road though . What Alex showed was getting the measurements down to .0005' I guess at some point we must decide how far we want to go and if we are going to allow some slop in the system but we should know as exactly as our measuring tools will allow us, where the slop begins.

You didn't mention rather or not your bolt has a a spring activated ejector but if it does, that needs to come out as well.

Pete

 

[Joe Duke]

Pete is on the mark with his advice! You might also test all around that .006" number as well. Somewhere around there is a magic seating where the guns sort of come alive. We may all measure a bit different or have tools that are a bit different. So don't be afraid to test your own setup with numbers that vary a bit.