Why?

A new reloader who admires others’ attention spans, loading while doing other things. Makes me nervous.

Not everyone is enamored of process in the way he is. I’m not a process person. I admire that. I have a couple review calls a week that I need to be on, but have no active role and provides me no new information.

Thank you for your concern, though.

when i reload i pretty much do nothing else, and even then, mistakes are made. fortunately so far nothing too bad. if i can simplify the process enough so that it's almost purely mechanical, my mind begins to wander and it's time to take a break. this new powder dispenser is a wonderful convenience, but i have to remind myself not to try to keep up with it.

i've been at a standstill, waiting for my supplies to come in from midwayUSA: two pounds of powder and 2 primer pocket reamer tool heads. so i've been waiting in anticipation as they've crept across the country at what looks like a snail's pace. the powder arrived last friday, and the tools were supposed to be delivered on saturday the 6th by end of day. but no joy, seems by saturday UPS had delivered them, down the interstate about a mile from my house, to the post office in charlotte another 30 miles further down the road. where it sat, until today. tuesday. today at 11:something the USPS "processed" it, whatever that means.so maybe they can still honor their original delivery date, on saturday, just a week later. i don't even know who to complain about, midway, UPS or USPS.

reminds me of a certain "hoax" it's just like a flu, like a miracle, in a week, two weeks, by easter. didn't say what year. can you tell i'm ?

Each to his own but I won't even have a phone with me or a radio or TV on when I reload. Prepping brass is one thing but priming, charging, and seating bullets requires total attention for me. My FIL taught me and he reloaded his whole life and never had a misfire, a kaboom, or any problem ever with tens of thousands of hand loaded rounds. I have been hand loading since the early 1980's and never had an issue. Not one...I have had squibs and misfires/duds with factory but never one of mine.

Knock wood. But playing with ammunition and not having a knack or desire for precision and being distracted is just....scary to me.

Then again I measure every case multiple times to make sure they are all the same....inside diameter, outside, weights, case length, OAL. I an't even use a progressive machine and just pump the handle....too anal I guess.

VooDoo

Fair enough, but your post is clearly about the enjoyment you are deriving from the meticulous execution of a detailed process. And good for you for getting that enjoyment. But that’s a separate thing from being safe.

Are you suggesting that any reloader needs to follow that level of process in order to manufacture safe ammunition?

Nope. I'm an idiot..please disregard my opinions as unqualified.

VooDoo

Just make sure we all know who you are at irl meetups so we don’t have to take the lane next to you without knowing.

Shouldn’t be a problem.

I admit when I reload I have a tv or music or something going in the background. I am not one that likes complete silence.

bajajoaquin wrote:Not everyone is enamored of process in the way he is. I’m not a process person. I admire that. I have a couple review calls a week that I need to be on, but have no active role and provides me no new information.

Thank you for your concern, though.

Any distraction while reloading can have catastrophic consequences- no joke there. Splitting your attention is a really bad idea. Double charge titegroup in a pistol and it very well could blow up the gun. Squib then shoot again at the range could do the same thing.

We are literally playing with controlled explosions to send stuff downrange- meticulous and process are absolutely crucial.

Sent from my Pixel 3 using Tapatalk

Thanks for the thoughtful concern. To be clear, I’m not splitting my attention. It’s just an hour that I have on my schedule that I know nobody will be interrupting me.

Here's what a squib will do to a barrel when shot with 9mm major. Happened to a guy at my club. I've seen another guy destroy a Sphinx SDP barrel and slide with a squib round.

it came!
tracking report currently says to expect delivery on the 12th.
the primer pocket cleaner was sort of a mistake, i didn't intend to order it, thought i was ordering something else, but by the time i realized my error i decided to just shut up and get it. the two primer pocket reamers seem to do their job very well. i bought two because i expect to lose one or mess one up. i've chucked one up in my cordless drill. the plan was originally to put it on my drill press, but this seems to work well enough.

never mind, i "fixed" it by slightly loosening the nut on the lower knuckle. cleaned and relubed it all, still don't know what the cause was.

was out in the shed cranking out 7.62 nato and between one cartridge and the next, the lever on my dillon 550b suddenly became stiff to operate. thinking i might have spilled some powder on it or something trivial, i sprayed some wd40 on the big center shaft and wiped it down. had little or no effect. i suspect that the linkage is binding a bit, it's still usable, but something is plainly wrong, i guess i'll just loosen up the crank linkage and see if anything obvious presents itself. any ideas?

finished reloading 7.62. all of my 7.62 and krag cases are loaded. guess it's .45acp time again. or 30-06. need to go to a range and shoot some of this stuff.

Friday I did about 20 rds of 9mm with 115gr hornaday xtp bullets with a charge of 5.0 grains.

deprimed all of my 45acp brass and sorted out the small primer pocket which is blazer and most federal brass.if anyone want the SPP brass for free, lemme know, there's about 100 of them. ready for prime time, need to get some boxes to store it all in.

i find myself longing for the long-gone day when i could go to a gun show and just buy what i needed. only 6 months ago.

Finished 50 rounds of Special Recipe 9mm...Berry's 124 gr. Hybrid Hollow Points. Double struck plated bullets...I run them with Alliant Unique, CCI primers and 4.9 gr. of powder. https://www.berrysmfg.com/product/bp-9mm-356-124gr-hhp
I have not chrono'd them but they seem to function pretty much like Factory Premium 124 gr. Hollow point like Hornady Critical Defense or Critical Duty and consistently get me 12" of penetration in wet media along with explosive/impressive and consistent expansion. Pretty impressed with these and perfect functioning.

Trying to load 50 a week of these, 50 a week of 5.56x45 until I get back to 1000 of each in stock...means I have to roll about 800 rounds of ammunition over the next few weeks. I have the components. Then all I need to do is find enough additional components to continue replacing training ammunition.

We'll see...I'd like to start rolling more 6.5 Creedmoor but I'm down to 10 bullets.....powder and primers I got. No Hornady 147 gr. ELD-M's in .264 to be had anywhere right now but I have a bunch on back order. Pix of my new 5.56x45 probably this week as I have the bullets and power and primers today. First time reloading 5.56....

VooDoo

lurker wrote: Sun Jun 28, 2020 7:01 pm deprimed all of my 45acp brass and sorted out the small primer pocket which is blazer and most federal brass.if anyone want the SPP brass for free, lemme know, there's about 100 of them. ready for prime time, need to get some boxes to store it all in.

i find myself longing for the long-gone day when i could go to a gun show and just buy what i needed. only 6 months ago.

Since you don't have a progressive priming system on your press it's not that big of a problem. But if you don't want to buy small primers I can see getting rid of them. Plastic coffee cans make great ammo boxes. If you know someone who drinks folgers ask for the cans.

i don't want to buy another type of primer, nor do i want to keep track of 2 types of cases. they'll be gone, one way or another. thinking i may be done with .223 too, so may have small rifle primers to re-home soon.

Yum....first hundred rounds of 5.56X45 and they'll get tested at the range today.
Once fired Winchester brass, Hornady V-Max 55 gr. FMJ bullets over 24 gr. of Alliant AR-Comp and Winchester primers. All loaded to 2.258" and taper crimped.

We gots the components and now we gots da ammo.

VooDoo

VodoundaVinci wrote: Thu Jul 02, 2020 12:26 pm
Once fired Winchester brass, Hornady V-Max 55 gr. FMJ bullets over 24 gr. of Alliant AR-Comp and Winchester primers. All loaded to 2.258" and taper crimped.

You shouldn't need to crimp your bottlenecks at all, the friction between the bullet and neck is plenty to hold the bullet.

All ammunition I load for automatic weapons get a light taper crimp and a push test when I set up the seating die. If I'm loading for a bolt gun then I set the neck tension with bushings as they are not going to be forcibly rammed into chamber.

I have a long boring story about why but it stems from a 3 day meeting with the US Army Chief of Staff a few years ago. I tech'd the show (set up all the video/audio conferencing) and was on standby while the US Army reviewed *every* documented case as their manufactured ammunition having issues. They spent days figuring out why and what and who and explaining in horrible detail why a soldiers Life was maybe put in jeopardy due to a misfire or ammo issues.

70% of the failures came from the same lot that had been improperly crimped and the bullets set back under forced loading.

All my rounds destined for automatic weapons get a light taper crimp until I cannot set the bullet back with hand pressure against the bench. Been doing this for years. Might not need it but...there ya go.

VooDoo