| HELP FORMING MACH IV BRASS FOR BULLBERRY BARREL |  | ||
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Posted by: usmcpanzer 01/09/2002, 07:56:42 |
I am using the Bullberry neck sizing die on Rem .221 brass and then full length sizing with a Redding die set. The first run through the die looked good until I tried to chamber the brass in the barrel. Not even close. I had to run all of the brass through the Redding dies again and really lean into the press. The interesting thing is that the brass came out with a small buckle just below the bottom of the shoulder.
I then tried to close the TC with the brass in the barrel. I could get it to lock up but only after I snapped the barrel shut several times for each piece of brass. Doing this can not be good for the long term life of the pistol (I am really having to put A LOT of pressure). When that was done I loaded up some light loads of 15 g of H4198 and 20 g V-maxs and figured all would be well. Well sort of. The next stop was the family cow pasture in Alabama. I got things all set up and chambered a round, snapping the barrel shut firmly to be sure it would seat. The hammer was cocked and then..."click". It seems that even after resizing with all I had, and then snapping the brass into the chamber it still was not enough to get the barrel locked well enough so that the hammer would fall all the way to the firing pin. SO I proceeded to REALLY snap the barrel shut with all my strength and..."click". After about 5-10 full strength snap closings I was able to finally get the pistol to fire. The great news is that I got .5" groups @100 yards (1" @ 200) off of a shakey card table bench in the cow pasture. The bad news is that I fear that the pistol and barrel will not last long with the abuse I have to put it through to get the brass to seat properly. What am I doing wrong? FYI I took some of the fire formed brass and chambered it to see if it would let the hammer fall. It would, but still requires one healthy snap shut. Any advise on case forming be great or is there something that could be done to the barrel so that it would lock up easily AND let the hammer fall? Thanks for any help! |
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| Re: HELP FORMING MACH IV BRASS FOR BULLBERRY BARREL -- usmcpanzer | Top of thread | Archive | |
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Posted by: jim saubier 01/09/2002, 09:05:26 |
Here is what I did and would do again. I think that the go-no go guage that he is working with is a little short because the experience that you are having is not isolated. I had a Mach IV barrel with the same situation. I sized my brass the way that I wanted and sent them with the barrel to Fred. He took a couple of thou deeper with the reamer to make it better. I was sizing with the button out of my press and the shell holder up against the die. Another answer to the problem would be to have the FL die shortened by .005" which would allow you to bump the shoulder a bit more. I agree with your concern and I didn't want to have to snap the thing shut either. Keep us posted on how you make out. |
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| no problems here | | ||
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Posted by: Drifter 01/09/2002, 16:37:20 |
I have a bullberry barrel for my encore in 17 m4. I have a set Redding form dies and then Redding fl resizer and seater. I have had no problems at all with my brass. I am not sure what the difference in dies is. I just set the form dies so that the shell holder firmly seats against the die at the top of the stroke on the press. I would check the measurement on that chamber, it could possibly be a quality controll issue with bullberry, wich I know all about. If your dies are set up right that's where I would be looking. good luck |
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Posted by: JD ® 01/10/2002, 06:49:33 Author Profile |
right tools for the right job, will always give you the best results |
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Posted by: JD ® 01/10/2002, 06:43:52 Author Profile |
there is nothing wrong with your barrel, when you get a BB barrel you need to snap it shut for awhile to get the locking lug broke in to your barrel, you will not have to snap it as hard as you shot it more as for your brass you are not forming them right, you realy should get forming dies or something, the MK4 is real picky with the forming of the first brass, now with your now firformed loads, was presure high and when you FL them do they fit good now JD |
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Posted by: Varmint Al ® 01/12/2002, 21:29:41 Author Profile |
This is controversial, so I am not recommending it, but it is what did with the same tight closing 17 Mach IV barrel. I got some Flitz and polished the chamber. Took a cotton swab and made sure the brass at the end of the swab would not go any farther than the neck and polished the chamber till it shined like a diamond up a goat's, a$$. Then I also polished the FL die the very same way. With very little friction, the die will actually resize the brass more. Then for setting up the FL die in my Rockchucker press, I screwed it down till it took just about as much force to close the press as it does without and brass in it. (There is actually a mil or so of spring in the press). You can't hurt the press if you don’t over do it. With the same force, it merely puts all the force on the brass instead of the shell holder when you do your resizing. I find that my brass lasts much longer when my chambers are polished. I go through the reasons I do this on my Reloading Page. A polished chamber is really good engineering. A rough chamber stems from an old wives tail and black powder times when actions were not considered "strong enough". Good Hunting from... Varmint Al
http://www.varmintal.com/ahunt.htm |
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Posted by: Drifter 01/12/2002, 21:37:36 |
I followed your lead here AL, after reading the section about polishing dies on your page I tried it with my 17m4 dies and it worked great, makes life easier. That was almost a year ago. Now all of them are polished,17 rem ,17 m4, and 7mm rem mag.
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