Precision rifle loading, process question (not processing)

[Citadelgrad87]

I have a 700 5r in .308 that i am taking baby steps with.

I use lapua brass, 175smks, 4064 powder. Im at 42.2 as a nice grouping load.

I dont yet have an annealer, but after the first of the year that will change. I will anneal every firing when that happens.

So i neck size/ deprime with redding competition dies on a rockchucker

trim with a wilson sinclair,

Chamfer and deburr and run a hand primer pocket cleaner

Tumble

Prime with a lee hand held, the square tray model

Charge

Seat with a redding micrometer seater

I want to streamline my powder operation, if possible.

I have a lyman 1200 electronic scale-dispenser. I set it to dispense 41.5, then set it on auto repeat, which throws the next charge when the pan is replaced.

Previously, i just ran the lyman and charged with the result, but i dont think its as accurate as it pretends it is.

So now I run a charge, dump the pan into a lyman/ohaus M5 that is dead accurate, set at 42.2. I trickle to the exact charge weight, then dump that pan into the next case.

The lyman is slow, but it generally beeps that its done throwing when i am still trickling, or dumping the charge into the case.

I did about 140 rounds last night, and never had to wait for the trickler.

Seems like the only way to speed up would be to change to a precision poweder measure and not weigh each round. Not sure if that will yield good results.

Thoughts on my process and streamlining it?

Im not impatient, just trying to streamline where possible.

Thanks.

[J-cat]

https://www.autotrickler.com/auto-trickler.html

[Switchbarrel]

Speed & accuracy

https://youtu.be/ZgUa8DjLMSk

J-Cat beat me by a minute

[JagerDog]

I do the same except throw light with a standard powder measure.

[17+1]

[divingin]

Seems like the only way to speed up would be to change to a precision poweder measure and not weigh each round. Not sure if that will yield good results.

I have yet to find a measure that will consistently throw charges within about +/- 0.3 grains. Even my Chargemaster will occasionally be off that much (though it's less often than a straight powder measure.) Granted, 0.3 grains isn't exactly way off, but I try to eliminate powder as a factor by getting charges as close as I can. In order, from most to least consistent 1) RCBS CM, 2) Lee Classic (at least when new - they wear pretty quickly, but are cheap to replace), 3) whatever model of Harrell I ended up with, and 4) Hornady. I weigh and adjust all bolt rifle charges on a scientific scale.

I will add that here are a lot of very good shooters who charge straight from a measure. I guess you'll have to figure out what works for you.

[Citadelgrad87]

I have read that neck tension is much more uniform if you anneal after each firing, and i have read that guys are getting 40 firings out of doing so.

I figure if i have the machine, this seems like a worthwhile step.

[Whiterabbit]

So, I read a few things:

#1 you don;t have a functional problem with your loads (or else you would have complained)

#2 your quesiton is about streamlining the process (I interpret that as you want to go faster)

#3 you anticipated the obvious answer which is "get a second powder dispenser", by saying it's not your bottleneck.

My answer: yes it is. Because now you are verifying each charge, which is why you are not waiting for the auto-dispenser. This is also killing your productivity.

--------------------------

Here are my bulletized suggestions for productivity.

#1 trust your power dispenser. By this, I don;t mean trust what you already have, I mean do what you need to do to trust your dispenser. If that means replacing with a chargemaster, or sartorius, or modifying the trickler tube, or whatever. This is your #1 productivity killer. Figure out how to eliminate the verification step. That will speed you up the most right now.

#2 Once you figure out #1, double up. You already expected this answer. Once you fix the powder dispensing, you'll be held up by it. Double up.

#3 trimming. Lathe type trimmers are great for their versatility, but suck for productivity. I can;t do without a lathe type trimmer. But for cartridges I am serious about loading for, I use a WFT chucked up in my 10-22 lathe. Then burr and chamfer with an RCBS tool also chucked in the lathe. It is fast. Really fast. You can figure out how it's best for you. I think the WFT may not be the great productivity solution if using a handheld drill, but you'll just have to figure it out. WFT no matter what is better than your wilson sinclair. Maybe you'll prefer a giraud, I don;t know.

4. Progressive. This will help speed you up lots. use either an thru powder expander or lee charge die with a funnel, and dump the auto-dispense powder through the die.

5. Cleaning. This one is less productivity because you can run it overnight. But it can still bottleneck you.

6. case feeding. This slows you down more than you think, especially when you are already feeding bullets and powder. This one is cheaper and easier to implement than a bullet feeder, which I don't think you can do so easy for a 308.

This should get you darn fast, darn quick.

------------------------------------

Here's a process that can get you going super fast (not the fastest, but high quality)

1. used cases go on the progressive via case feeder, toolhead has a universal decapper and nothing else.

2. bin gets dumped into the tumbler. clean. Lube.

3. Cases go back into the progressive for sizing. Dump back into tumbler if desired for lube cleaning. Or not.

4. trim, deburr, anneal. Lots of room for productivity here.

5. Back on the progressive with a toolhead for priming, chargin, seating.

6. profit.

You can do it much faster, but this gets you tumbled brass, clean primer pockets, trimmed and annealed when needed or wanted, and is a totally batch process until you trim and anneal. And if you use an anneleze, the only non-batch process is the trimming.

Just add whatever listed capability you want for productivity as you see fit based on what step of the reloading process you find a chore. For me, it's trimming and charging. Everything else for me is a joy.

[Whiterabbit]

FYI I can load 243 winchester on a progressive press for an RPR with excellent results.

[Citadelgrad87]

So, I read a few things:

#1 you don;t have a functional problem with your loads (or else you would have complained)

#2 your quesiton is about streamlining the process (I interpret that as you want to go faster)

#3 you anticipated the obvious answer which is "get a second powder dispenser", by saying it's not your bottleneck.

My answer: yes it is. Because now you are verifying each charge, which is why you are not waiting for the auto-dispenser. This is also killing your productivity.

--------------------------

Here are my bulletized suggestions for productivity.

#1 trust your power dispenser. By this, I don;t mean trust what you already have, I mean do what you need to do to trust your dispenser. If that means replacing with a chargemaster, or sartorius, or modifying the trickler tube, or whatever. This is your #1 productivity killer. Figure out how to eliminate the verification step. That will speed you up the most right now.

#2 Once you figure out #1, double up. You already expected this answer. Once you fix the powder dispensing, you'll be held up by it. Double up.

#3 trimming. Lathe type trimmers are great for their versatility, but suck for productivity. I can;t do without a lathe type trimmer. But for cartridges I am serious about loading for, I use a WFT chucked up in my 10-22 lathe. Then burr and chamfer with an RCBS tool also chucked in the lathe. It is fast. Really fast. You can figure out how it's best for you. I think the WFT may not be the great productivity solution if using a handheld drill, but you'll just have to figure it out. WFT no matter what is better than your wilson sinclair. Maybe you'll prefer a giraud, I don;t know.

4. Progressive. This will help speed you up lots. use either an thru powder expander or lee charge die with a funnel, and dump the auto-dispense powder through the die.

5. Cleaning. This one is less productivity because you can run it overnight. But it can still bottleneck you.

6. case feeding. This slows you down more than you think, especially when you are already feeding bullets and powder. This one is cheaper and easier to implement than a bullet feeder, which I don't think you can do so easy for a 308.

This should get you darn fast, darn quick.

------------------------------------

Here's a process that can get you going super fast (not the fastest, but high quality)

1. used cases go on the progressive via case feeder, toolhead has a universal decapper and nothing else.

2. bin gets dumped into the tumbler. clean. Lube.

3. Cases go back into the progressive for sizing. Dump back into tumbler if desired for lube cleaning. Or not.

4. trim, deburr, anneal. Lots of room for productivity here.

5. Back on the progressive with a toolhead for priming, chargin, seating.

6. profit.

You can do it much faster, but this gets you tumbled brass, clean primer pockets, trimmed and annealed when needed or wanted, and is a totally batch process until you trim and anneal. And if you use an anneleze, the only non-batch process is the trimming.

Just add whatever listed capability you want for productivity as you see fit based on what step of the reloading process you find a chore. For me, it's trimming and charging. Everything else for me is a joy.

Thanks very much for taking the time to type all that, i appreciate it.

I need to chew on it.

I have a dillon 550, so i dont think a case feeder is in my future.

Off to research.

[ar15barrels]

I want to streamline my powder operation, if possible.

I have a lyman 1200 electronic scale-dispenser. I set it to dispense 41.5, then set it on auto repeat, which throws the next charge when the pan is replaced.

I run a charge, dump the pan into a lyman/ohaus M5 that is dead accurate, set at 42.2. I trickle to the exact charge weight, then dump that pan into the next case.

No sense in running the lyman dispenser if you are going to trickle to final weight.
Just use a regular powder measure.

Play with the measure and see what the SD is over say 20 charges.
Then set the measure to throw a weight that is 0.1gr less than the SD from your target weight so that you never throw a charge from the powder measure OVER your target weight and only need to trickle the smallest amount of powder to hit your exact final charge weight.

[Whiterabbit]

I have read that neck tension is much more uniform if you anneal after each firing, and i have read that guys are getting 40 firings out of doing so.

I figure if i have the machine, this seems like a worthwhile step.

From another thread:

Be data driven. Don't sheeple along. If you can, find someone who has an annealer and do your own testing. doesn't have to be big either. Take some 1x brass, 2x brass, and annealed brass. Even 3x brass if you can. Let's say 10 rounds each, 40 rounds for a fun day at the range. Shoot four targets, using random selection for each round. (don't round-robin shoot, and definitely done shoot all 1 of one, all 10 of the next, etc)

If there is not a clear trend or difference, don't anneal every time. Waste of your resources.

You could make reloading 10 times more complicated than you already are, BR shooters already do. But do you need to? Chances are, you'll never see it on your target. But data would tell you for sure. For them, it probably did.

[Whiterabbit]

I have yet to find a measure that will consistently throw charges within about +/- 0.3 grains. Even my Chargemaster will occasionally be off that much (though it's less often than a straight powder measure.)

https://www.ebay.com/itm/RCBS-Chargemaster-Reducing-Insert-w-extra-Reducing-Sleeve-Aluminum-/192463548196

It works.

You will still throw over 0.3. Just less often. ANother great thing about dual chargemasters is when one throws 0.1 over, just dump and use the other throw. That keeps you +/- 0.1 gr (aka limit of the scale).

[triggs75]

+2 on the fx120i. You cannot get much quicker than it and be able to measure down to the kernel of powder. A single kernel of powder can range from .02 to .04 gr depending on the powder. H4350 is pretty consistent at .02 gr but does have some longer sticks in there.

Without going down the rabbit hole too much, the fx120i is well worth it

Here is a 42.00 gr H4350 throw is recorded when I first got mine, much quicker than the CM to me.

[ar15barrels]

I dont yet have an annealer, but after the first of the year that will change. I will anneal every firing when that happens.

I do have an annealer.
I would not run my brass through it more than every 3 firings.
Even 5 firings would be fine.
If you are using bushing dies, you are just not working the brass enough for it to work harden enough to justify annealing.
I went 12 firings on Winchester brass without ever annealing and the necks never split.
The primer pockets got loose first.
The neck tension stayed consistent and I know that as I seat with an arbor press.
You can REALLY feel the differences in neck tension when you seat with an arbor press.