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should weigh every round unless you are just plinking.

weigh the entire completed round?

I weighed every single powder charge Individually, it's a ladder run.
5 @ 21.0 gn
5 @ 21.3 gn
5 @ 21.6 gn
and so on
for a total of 35rds of ammo.

for the sake of brevity I just wrote my ladder start-end....1.8gn is pretty significant of a spread even for plinking IMO.
 
They might be that shiny cause I accidentally left the tumbler on for 12hrs :eek: whoops.

I did use the Hornady oneshot and I liked it quite a bit! Didn't stick one!!!! Hahaha Sizing even these small cases definitely let you know you working at it! (RCBS JR2).

next up will be loading up a ladder for my new to me .243, that one I'm super excited about! All the components are so much easier to handle, I may have dropped...a few projectiles lol

Get a timer and plug the tumbler into the outlet, problem solved.;)
I generally let mine run for minimum two hours but if desired shinnyness is not achieved, I'll go 4-8 hours or longer.
 
I think I 'wasted' about 30 rounds of .30-30 yesterday.

I put a new sight on my Buffalo Bill commemorative short rifle and mostly wanted to get it sighted in and I did not bring my bench, rest etc. and thought 'elbow' resting it on the hood would be ok.

Well the first couple shots were not on paper at 50 yards and I figured this as the front sight was slightly taller so I raised the rear and got it on paper.

Ok, so a few more shots were not grouping well and inconsistent so after a few more I got off the hood and loaded and shot one kneeling and it was dang near dead center so I shot a couple more and was much more satisfied.

I shot the last couple rounds back on the hood with a return to the inconsistency so I'll never 'hood rest' again - At least with a WInchester !
 
should weigh every round unless you are just plinking.
Not me, man. Do you weigh your pistol charges?
If you did any weighing it should be for those.. a 5 grain pistol charge being off 1/10 grain is equal to a 25 grain (puny) rifle charge being off by 1/2 a grain.
No powder measure in the world can't throw charges that are off 1/2 a grain given a 25 grain charge.
If the rifle charge is 50 grains it'd be 1 grain to hold the proportional difference.
 
weigh the entire completed round?
...

Perhaps he meant weighing the bullets which is something you can do when you get anal about precision. You can also weigh your empty cases and sort them. Then with careful measurement of powder you should get consistent ammo if you are using same weight bullets and same weight cases and same weight powder.

The other reason you might weigh your cartridges, though I've never done it, is to look for squibs (no powder). The reason I don't think it is good for consistency as opposed to looking for squibs, is that if you have a bullet that is 0.5 gr heavy and drop powder 0.5 gr light, the end result is going to look perfect when it isn't. Like @Certaindeaf mentioned, this is more meaningful with pistol carts than rifle as being 0.5 gr. light on 4.0 gr powder load is a significant 12.5% error, but on a 50 gr. rifle load is a 1% error.

For a real world look at variation, I just grabbed ten random 9mm cases (deprimed and thoroughly wet tumble cleaned with stainless pins and headstamp sorted) and weighed them on an RCBS digital scale:
Well Cleaned​
WIN
Blazer
9mm Brass​
57.6
59.8​
58.1​
60.1​
58.3​
60.2​
58.4​
60.2​
58.6​
60.3​
58.7​
60.3​
58.8​
60.4​
58.9​
60.7​
59.1​
60.7​
59.5
60.8​
Average
58.6
60.35
Median
58.65
60.3
Extreme Spread
1.9
1.0
Standard Deviation
0.54
0.31

And here's some bullets. The 9mm are Xtreme copper plated hollow point 124 gr. and the .40s are 150 gr. Nosler jacketed hollow points:
9mm
.40 S&W
123.8
149.9​
124.2​
150.1​
124.2​
150.4​
124.2​
150.6​
124.3
150.6​
Avg
124.14
150.32
Median
124.2
150.4
ES
0.5
0.7
SD
0.19
0.31

The total weight of the heaviest 9mm case plus bullet (blue text) is 183.8. The total weight of the lightest of each (green text) is 181.4 and the difference between these is 2.4 -- for reference I'm using a powder load with these that runs 5.8 grains. It is possible that the light case/bullet combo could hide a 2+ grain overcharge and the heavy combo, a 2+ grain undercharge (a 30% powder error is huge). This is why I don't think weighing the whole cartridge is useful for precision, but might be for looking for no powder or double powder conditions (providing the case will fit a double). But just being a grain or two different is probably not useful information.

Anyway -- yes -- I had fun playing with tables. Sorry for the wall of text.
 
Last Edited:
Perhaps he meant weighing the bullets which is something you can do when you get anal about precision. You can also weigh your empty cases and sort them. Then with careful measurement of powder you should get consistent ammo if you are using same weight bullets and same weight cases and same weight powder.

The other reason you might weigh your cartridges, though I've never done it, is to look for squibs (no powder). The reason I don't think it is good for consistency as opposed to looking for squibs, is that if you have a bullet that is 0.5 gr heavy and drop powder 0.5 gr light, the end result is going to look perfect when it isn't. Like @Certaindeaf mentioned, this is more meaningful with pistol carts than rifle as being 0.5 gr. light on 4.0 gr powder load is a significant 12.5% error, but on a 50 gr. rifle load is a 1% error.

For a real world look at variation, I just grabbed ten random 9mm cases (deprimed and thoroughly wet tumble cleaned with stainless pins and headstamp sorted) and weighed them on an RCBS digital scale:
Well Cleaned​
WIN
Blazer
9mm Brass​
57.6
59.8​
58.1​
60.1​
58.3​
60.2​
58.4​
60.2​
58.6​
60.3​
58.7​
60.3​
58.8​
60.4​
58.9​
60.7​
59.1​
60.7​
59.5
60.8​
Average
58.6
60.35
Median
58.65
60.3
Extreme Spread
1.9
1.0
Standard Deviation
0.54
0.31

And here's some bullets. The 9mm are Xtreme copper plated hollow point 124 gr. and the .40s are 150 gr. Nosler jacketed hollow points:
9mm
.40 S&W
123.8
149.9​
124.2​
150.1​
124.2​
150.4​
124.2​
150.6​
124.3
150.6​
Avg
124.14
150.32
Median
124.2
150.4
ES
0.5
0.7
SD
0.19
0.31

The total weight of the heaviest 9mm case plus bullet (blue text) is 183.8. The total weight of the lightest of each (green text) is 181.4 and the difference between these is 2.4 -- for reference I'm using a powder load with these that runs 5.8 grains. It is possible that the light case/bullet combo could hide a 2+ grain overcharge and the heavy combo, a 2+ grain undercharge (a 30% powder error is huge). This is why I don't think weighing the whole cartridge is useful for precision, but might be for looking for no powder or double powder conditions (providing the case will fit a double). But just being a grain or two different is probably not useful information.

Anyway -- yes -- I had fun playing with tables. Sorry for the wall of text.

See that all makes sense, I even know some benchrest guys will actually measure the internal volume of the cases to eliminate as many deviations as possible.

Now these are just rounds for my AR, so I think I may have gone just a bit overboard for what it is. (16" M4 profile with basic standard parts) not a precision rifle by any stretch.
 
See that all makes sense, I even know some benchrest guys will actually measure the internal volume of the cases to eliminate as many deviations as possible.

Now these are just rounds for my AR, so I think I may have gone just a bit overboard for what it is. (16" M4 profile with basic standard parts) not a precision rifle by any stretch.

I don't think you went overboard for doing a ladder test -- you want to control as much as you can so it gives you useful data. Now, if you told me you were hand measuring 1000 rounds to run through a utilitarian semi-auto -- that would be a different conversation (probably requiring a shrink!). ;-)
 
Loaded my first wildcat rounds tonight in anticipation of sighting in the rifle tomorrow (well, today since it's 3:30 in the morning...).

Did some milder .30-06 Ackley Improved loads. My dad's loads were using RL-22 with 67 grains of powder and 180gr bullets. I went with 62 grains, which is what the latest manual says is max. Tried that with the Hornady 178gr ELD-X.

Then tried some Varget at 48 grains and Nosler Ballistic Tip 180gr. Will sight in the scope using factory .30-06 to get it on paper, then start seeing how the reloads do.

IMG_20201005_032136622.jpg
 
1900 rounds of 9mm target loads for Steel Challenge. 3.8 titegroup/125 grain Berry's target hollowpoints. Got this week off to practice for State Championships on the 10th, been hitting competitions every week to improve my skills. Planning to go all in on revolver after this match... still easier to get large primers for the 625 revolver, haven't been having much luck finding any smalls at all.
 
I spent some time & reviewed component inventory over the past few days. I'm set to reload a fair amount.
I did do some brief searching as well and got another 8# keg of powder and 2k 115g 9mm projectiles coming in.
Looking forward to building up a bunch between now & next spring ;)
 
With the crazy ammo prices recently I pulled out of storage a set of 9mm Luger reloading dies I have not used since the 1990s!
Have been working on a pile of cases (300?) depriming, re-sizing, etc. Also did some research on which powder and load for 125 grain RN lead bullets.
 
A week ago on the Pro1000 I knocked out 300) (had 100 from last year) 300BLK supers with W296, Nosler 155g HPBT loaded into my converted cases from proper head stamps. I even found a box of P-mags that I forgot that I had so I put them to work.;)

9A3DC501-2F3D-4412-AAC8-09C89015AAF3.jpeg
 

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