300 Mag at the range

[TackDriver284]

The old Norma brass I used for the 300 Win Mag has no chance for reloading again, the primer pockets have loosened up after 5 to 6 firings and I loaded up 180 Ballistic Tips in new Lapua 300 Win Mag brass. RL22 in 3 round charges,,,74.1, 74.4, 74.7 and 75 grains lit with a CCI 250 magnum primer and .010" off the lands. I did not have any 180 Accubonds at that time, but 3 boxes just arrived at my door from Nosler. I recall shooting the 180 Ballistic Tips and Accubonds a few years ago, since they both have the same BC and both are same POI at 300 yards. I'm doing the same tests for a nilgai or a different big game hunt soon. Today my tests weren't bad either.

74.1 gr - 3150 fps ave
74.4 gr - 3161 fps ave
74.7 gr - 3175 fps ave
75.0 gr - 3190 fps ave
Old Norma fired brass with 75.0 grains was 3150 fps.

Headspace grew .014" on the new fired Lapua brass.
Strange thing happened this morning, I never had a misfire with the 300 Win Magnum, I pulled the trigger on the first round, and click,,,,I left the bolt closed as is, waited 2 minutes and puckered when I opened the bolt and saw that the primer was indented by the hammer, hoping it won't go off, quickly pulled out that round and placed it in the bed of my truck and went to proceed to shoot round # 2 and no hiccups. Continued with round # 3 and still no hiccups, so I decided to get round # 1 from the bed of the truck and closed the bolt on it and pulled the trigger and it did fire the 2nd time. Proceeded the rest of the rounds and 74.7 grains produced the best accuracy at 3175 fps with no pressure, and 75.0 grains - 3190 fps showed faint ejector marks on one brass. Grouped at .35 MOA with new brass which is reasonable for hunting, and I'm happy with that, but I'm not using Ballistic Tips for the upcoming hunt, so I'll load up some Accubonds using 74.7 grains and head over to the range again to verify. Hopefully both bullets shoots the same POI again. I'll continue using that load without any tweaking until all brass are fireformed. I am excited to see how the AccuBond will perform on nilgai, of course it will work beautifully since I used one on a red stag earlier in the year.

 

[desertcj]

Interesting on the misfire with the cci 250M. A few weeks ago I had 2 or 3 with cci 450M. Never had that happen to me before. QC slipping at CCI because of the huge demand?

 

[JD338]

Nice shooting. The misfire is interesting. First thought was maybe the primer wasn't fully seated in the pocket.
A few weeks ago my buddy came over to check the zero on his 30-06. First shell in went click. This was also a CCI primer. Had him try it again and it still didn't fire. The rest of the shells went off fine and his zero was spot on.
He's new to shooting longer ranges and he's set up for success. Here's his last three shots at 250 yards which is MOA

JD338

 

[NYDAN]

Great group and speed. Good luck with the Accubonds.

Primer misfires are disconcerting, to say the least. I have only ever had two that I can remember. Those were Winchester 209 primers in skeet loads. 2 out of about 120,000 reloads isn't too bad. I don't remember ever having a problem with rifle primers.

I have a RCBS primer pocket uniformer. I reset the depth of it so that it didn't cut so deep. The original setting seemed too deep. However, I have to use a different primer pocket uniformer set a little deeper for the Hornady 450 Marlin brass or else it won't clean up the bottom of the pockets. Dan

 

[DrMike]

I have had the experience of primers not igniting. It is relatively rare that this happens, but it has happened on several occasions. As you experienced, a second firing almost always ignites the primer. I assume that the anvil is not quite seated tightly. FWIW, I've had this experience with both CCI, Winchester and as I recall, perhaps once with Federal.

You have produced a great load that should serve you well, nevertheless.

 

[TackDriver284]

Nice shooting. The misfire is interesting. First thought was maybe the primer wasn't fully seated in the pocket.
A few weeks ago my buddy came over to check the zero on his 30-06. First shell in went click. This was also a CCI primer. Had him try it again and it still didn't fire. The rest of the shells went off fine and his zero was spot on.
He's new to shooting longer ranges and he's set up for success. Here's his last three shots at 250 yards which is MOA

JD338

Thanks JD, I made sure all was seated the same depth using the hand primer.

 

[TackDriver284]

I have had the experience of primers not igniting. It is relatively rare that this happens, but it has happened on several occasions. As you experienced, a second firing almost always ignites the primer. I assume that the anvil is not quite seated tightly. FWIW, I've had this experience with both CCI, Winchester and as I recall, perhaps once with Federal.

You have produced a great load that should serve you well, nevertheless.

Thank you Mike.

 

[FOTIS]

Nice report

 

[Alderman]

“Grouped at .35 MOA with new brass which is reasonable for hunting” shows you are leaps and bounds ahead of me at the bench. I’d be thrilled to get this result with any gun, let alone a magnum.
I guess if you do this reloading long enough and often enough strange things are bound to happen. Never feels comfortable when it happens though.
Good shooting in any case.
I like reading range reports like this. Let’s me feel like I got to the bench without having to do any of the work.

 

[RL338]

That loads looks good.
The only FTF primers for me were Winchester 209. I never used CCI either , just Federals with no issues.

 

[wvbuckbuster]

Good report on your load work up. As for primers fail to fire it happens. As for CCI had a bad patch back in early 80s that swore me off CCI. Started using them again last few years without any problems. Had a Win LP fail the other day in 45 ACP. Only one. Dan.

 

[xphunter]

Excellent shooting!
With new brass or factory ammo, I have also wondered, if the case got pushed forward just enough with a onery primer to boot, to cause this

 

[TackDriver284]

Excellent shooting!
With new brass or factory ammo, I have also wondered, if the case got pushed forward just enough with a onery primer to boot, to cause this

Thanks. That was my thought that it could be possible.

 

[Heavy Barrel]

Great group!!

Only time I've ever experienced primer misfire was with the Federal valupak 12ga shells. They would misfire in my Beretta 390 I had bought used, but fire just fine in either my 687 or 682 O/U.

After a bit of investigating, a few emails back and forth with Beretta and a brief search of the serial number. They determined the Beretta 390 I had was a Walmart version and in order to meet their obligations and pricing, they allowed Beretta to loosen the tolerances a bit. Which led to a chamber that was cut a fraction too deep in the barrel and causing insufficient firing pin strikes.

 

[JD338]

Great group!!

Only time I've ever experienced primer misfire was with the Federal valupak 12ga shells. They would misfire in my Beretta 390 I had bought used, but fire just fine in either my 687 or 682 O/U.

After a bit of investigating, a few emails back and forth with Beretta and a brief search of the serial number. They determined the Beretta 390 I had was a Walmart version and in order to meet their obligations and pricing, they allowed Beretta to loosen the tolerances a bit. Which led to a chamber that was cut a fraction too deep in the barrel and causing insufficient firing pin strikes.

Hard to believe that Beretta would lower their standards to sell to Walmart. Reminds me of the John Deere riding mowers sold at Lowes.
Glad you were able to get it figured out.

JD338

 

[Heavy Barrel]

Hard to believe that Beretta would lower their standards to sell to Walmart. Reminds me of the John Deere riding mowers sold at Lowes.
Glad you were able to get it figured out.

JD338

I know exactly what you're describing...only my experience is with a JD snowblower from Lowes.

 

[JD338]

I know exactly what you're describing...only my experience is with a JD snowblower from Lowes.

LOL

JD338

 

[TackDriver284]

Great group and speed. Good luck with the Accubonds.

Dan, loaded some 180 Accubonds for the 300 Mag this morning, same charge and same depth. Measured at .4 MOA , cold bore shot was away and above from shot #2 and #3 which was overlapping horizontally. I called it good and fixing to load the remaining old Accubonds left in the box for this coming hunt.
I never tried the 200 ELD-X, just saw them online at Powder Valley just now, and decided to grab two boxes. I'm in need of a few bricks of magnum primers though, still have a few hundred CCI 250 primers left. Going to have to save them for big game hunts and I am not intending to waste them. 7 Mag is on the burner for that reason.