Top 20 Most Frequently Asked Reloading Questions

Top 20 Most Frequently Asked Reloading Questions


I get a lot of questions about a lot of things, but the vast majority have something to do with reloading. Some are repetitive, so I decided to list the top 20 most frequently asked reloading questions along with my answers to them.

Before you read these, please realize that I don’t claim to know everything about reloading. In fact, I’m constantly learning new things, and changing my mind about old things, especially when I take on a new cartridge or shooting discipline. My answers to these questions are based on my own personal experience and nothing else.

As is the case with everything I publish, I don’t care if you do it my way or don’t agree with me. I’m not trying to sell you anything. I’m skeptical by nature, and only interested in results. The answers to questions pertaining to process are born out of experience gained from reloading thousands of rounds, not a few boxes of specialty ammo. With an open mind and some discipline, they are easily tested for accuracy and compatibility.

If you’re looking for in-depth reloading information, be sure to check out the Panhandle Precision YouTube channel, as well as our articles at panhandleprecision.com.

I measured the maximum CBTO in my rifle, but I can’t seat the bullet that long because of my magazine length. What should I do?

Seat the bullet at the max COAL that will still function in your magazine, then see how it shoots.

My most accurate barrel spent the last half of its life shooting 140-grain Berger Hybrids and VLDs that were jumping .200” to the lands.

I measured the maximum CBTO in my rifle, but the bullets are almost falling out of the neck when I seat to the lands. What should I do?

Don’t do that. The most commonly stated rule of thumb is to have at least one caliber’s length of bullet bearing surface seated in the neck. I’ve broken that rule slightly with one cartridge, but not by much.

It could happen with any combination, especially when dealing with a factory rifle, but it seems to happen most frequently with light-for-caliber bullets. That’s not my thing. I go for the heavy bullets. If I want to sling lighter projectiles, I’ll drop down a caliber or two.

How much would you charge to make a custom modified case for me?

I don’t do that, but Hornady does!

I have runout in my loaded round. How do I fix that?

I don’t know. I don’t check concentricity anymore. I think it’s a waste of time.

Jake Millard 260 Remington

I just bought a Redding Type S Sizing Die. It won’t size the whole neck like my regular sizing die will. What’s wrong with it and how do I fix it?

Nothing is wrong with your bushing die. It’s normal for a portion of the neck near the shoulder not to be sized. If you look down into the die from the top, you’ll see a shelf that supports the bushing. The thickness of the shelf, plus the slight bevel in the bushing, roughly equals the amount of neck that isn’t getting sized.

I use bushing dies for seven different cartridges now. In my experience, not sizing that small portion of neck doesn’t cause any performance issues.

Do you use a mandrel to set neck tension on sized cases?

Yes and no. I use a Sinclair expander die with a mandrel that’s .001” smaller than bullet diameter to set initial neck diameter on new brass. I used to run fired cases with dented necks over that same mandrel before sizing with a bushing die, too.

I don’t use a mandrel in a separate sizing operation for fired cases. I now use the expander button that comes with the Redding Type S sizing dies. The only reason I started using the expander was due to the volume of dented necks from practice sessions over a concrete surface.

I’ve also used bushing dies with no expander at all. It works!

Why don’t I get shoulder setback, or “bump” when sizing my brass?

It’s usually because the sizing die hasn’t been screwed down far enough to contact the shoulder of the case. It often occurs after the shellholder has barely contacted the bottom of the die. Give it another small clockwise twist. It doesn’t take much to go from none to too much, so proceed slowly.

Be sure to lubricate the case again before running it into the die. Consistent lubrication is important for consistent sizing, as is clean brass and a smooth die.

If you’re using a comparator to measure shoulder setback, you’ll notice that the case grows a little before setback. That’s because the die is forcing the main body diameter to shrink, which causes the shoulder to move forward slightly.

I want to start reloading for my new rifle. Do you have a starting load for 308, 6.5 Creedmoor, 6.5 PRC, 300 WSM, etc.?

No. I don’t shoot or load for any of those cartridges. I’ve published most of my loading data for what I do load for in one form or another.

How often do you trim brass, and what length do you trim to?

I usually trim brass after every trip through the sizing die. I rarely trim new brass. Be sure to base your decision on the need to trim using sized cases.

Reloading manuals list the maximum SAAMI case overall length, and often publish a trim-to length. The sized cases should never be left longer than the max published length, because the chamber will be cut close to the same dimension. A loaded round with a case neck that’s jammed into the end of the chamber can quickly cause big pressure problems.

Once I get my sizing die set up, I measure the overall length of several sized cases. I set up my trimmer to cut them slightly shorter than the shortest measured case, just enough to clean up the neck. If I run into a few that don’t get cut, I don’t worry about it. They’ll grow on the next firing.

Just like all other measurements, this one gets logged in my load book.

Whether or not I trim the case, I always chamfer the inside of the neck.

Why do you do all that work on fired brass? Why not just clean the brass with a wet tumbler?

I have no interest in wet tumbling. I don’t want to dry brass, and I don’t care what the inside of the case looks like. I’ve used vibratory tumblers with corn cob media for over twenty years. They work just fine.

Yes, I think the outside surface of the case needs to be as clean as possible before sizing. Very small batches of brass can be cleaned by hand, but it just makes sense to use a machine for large ones.

I’ve tried this, that, and the other thing. What should I do next to improve my load?

I don’t know. All I can do is outline in general terms what I do with my rifles. Every barrel is different. Be sure to keep good notes on what you’ve done, and the results on target.

Why don’t you do 10-shot groups during load development? I read on the internet that it’s the only way to ensure an accurate load.

Yeah, I’ve read that, too. I do 10-shot strings when it’s warranted, but it usually isn’t. I recommend tailoring the testing to the intended use of the rifle.

For instance, a long-range hunting rifle chambered in 338 Edge would warrant a three-shot group. An even better test for that rifle would be several cold-bore, one-shot “groups” fired onto the same target. A PRS competition rifle chambered in 260 Remington should eventually be proven with 10 shots.

I usually start with three-shot groups, with the thought that if it doesn’t shoot with three, why waste time and components? If it looks good with three, I’ll try five. Five-shot groups are what I use the most to prove and check accuracy now, even with the big boomers.

Do I really need a bunch of measuring tools?

Yes. At the bare minimum, I recommend an electronic caliper, comparator bodies, and inserts to measure CBTO and shoulder setback.

Annealing Alpha Munitions Brass

How often do you anneal brass? Do you anneal before or after sizing?

I anneal every cartridge I load for by the fourth firing, and generally anneal every cycle after that. I anneal prior to sizing, right after the fired cases come out of the tumbler. I use a Bench-Source annealer machine, and no, I’ve never tried another machine.

For a look at the Bench-Source, check out this VIDEO.

I have a hunting rifle that shoots lights-out, but the bullet I want to use for a special hunt doesn’t group well in it. What should I try next?

My first requirement for using any bullet is that it shoots well in the barrel. That’s because the first rule for good performance on animals is to hit them in the right spot. I don’t think you need special bullets to kill special animals. If I were going on a once-in-a-lifetime hunt, I would carry a rifle that I have complete confidence in. That confidence would come from firing an appropriate caliber bullet that consistently hits where I expect it to.

I don’t get emotionally attached to components. I use bullets from Berger, Hornady, Sierra, and Nosler. I’ve shot tiny groups and killed plenty of critters with bullets from each of those manufacturers. If one of them doesn’t shoot in a new barrel, I don’t waste a lot of time or treasure on it. I move on to the next one.

I’ve been reloading my whole life, but now I want to get into long range shooting. Do I need special dies to make special ammo?

I don’t think so. My favorite die combo for every cartridge I reload for is the Redding Type S FL bushing sizing die and Redding Competition seating die. Having said that, I’ve loaded ammo that shoots as well as I can with standard sizing and seating dies from a variety of manufacturers.

In what increments do you adjust bullet seating depth when tuning a load?

I start at .010” off the lands, and generally adjust that depth in .010” increments if needed. The smallest increment I would work with is .005”, but I rarely move less than .010”.

By what increments do you adjust powder charge?

That depends on the powder volume of the case, the powder burn rate, and the velocity of the load. I usually increase the charge in .5-grain increments when I’m climbing to the top of the pressure curve and decrease by at least the same amount when I see the first pressure signs.

I’ve tried .1-grain increments plenty of times, and always found it to be a complete waste of time. I like to move in .2 or .5 increments with the cases I load for.

At what distance do you shoot during load development?

I do all my target work at 100 yards. I have year-round access to it, environmental factors don’t generally affect the data, and I zero everything at 100 yards.

Once I’ve identified a load that looks good, I prove it at distance on natural targets or steel plates. I think punching paper is necessary, but boring. I try to get away from it as soon as possible.

When do you stop testing and start shooting?

As soon as possible! My standard requirement for a custom barrel is five shots into .5 MOA or less at 100 yards, with muzzle velocity extreme spreads of < 20 fps. If I’ll be using the rifle for long range work, I’ll test the load at the transonic range. If it holds its accuracy with low vertical dispersion, I’m done.

With our increased focus on PRS/NRL-type shooting, we now include more 10-shot group testing before signing off on a load.

I hope this list of reloading questions and answers helped someone. It would have been easy enough to expand the list quite a bit, but this one took five months to finish. If you email me one of these questions, you’ll be reading this after clicking on the link. Thanks for reading!

 

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Sam

As an Idaho native, avid hunter, and long range shooter, Sam has written numerous articles and gear reviews for various online publications. Specializing in long range hunting in the mountains of northern Idaho, Sam founded Panhandle Precision as a way to continue sharing his passions.

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36 Comments

  • Blane Cuny
    December 31, 2019 at 17:57

    Thanks for the great info. I always learn something new when I watch your videos. Happy New Year!

    • David Robinson
      January 1, 2020 at 08:15

      Great article and helpful! Hope to see some new videos soon.

  • Ward Anderson
    December 31, 2019 at 18:59

    Your tips are always good to read. I appreciate your sensible result driven outcome.

    Thanks for sharing

  • Neil Yates
    December 31, 2019 at 21:20

    Great info as always. Thanks Sam. If only all web information was as accurate and easy to understand as yours.

  • Gary Snyder
    January 1, 2020 at 06:07

    Thanks for all you

  • don marbach
    January 1, 2020 at 10:28

    thank you hope to see more in 2020

  • Scott Turner
    January 1, 2020 at 17:22

    Thanks for the cut and dry info

  • Tj
    January 1, 2020 at 18:20

    Thanks so much for the information worth the wait miss you on Utube

  • Marshall
    January 3, 2020 at 05:39

    Sam your reloading info is very helpful and easy to understand! When I found your you tube channel, I was just getting started in reloading. The information you put out was very useful! Thank you very much! Have a great New Year and look forward to more of your information and reviews!!

  • Greg
    January 3, 2020 at 10:07

    I have a Redding bushing die .337 why is it that when I size my shell and I measure the neck it reads .335

    • Sam
      Sam Millard
      January 3, 2020 at 15:54

      Maybe the bushing is marked incorrectly?

  • Steven C Johnson
    January 4, 2020 at 07:05

    Awesome list Sam! I hope you and Jake have an awesome 2020!

  • george fisher
    February 25, 2020 at 12:59

    Sam,
    Thanks for the great info and videos. I do have a question, I don’t see it answered anywhere, why do you use magnum CCI primers? Hornady reloading manual says “no.” You must get some advantage with them in FPS, ES etc. BTW, I have a Sako and Tikka in .260 Rem. Love them.
    Thank you,

    • Sam
      Sam Millard
      February 26, 2020 at 03:59

      I’ve had great results using CCI 250s in a few 260s. Sometimes BR2s work better. Either will work in general.

  • Tony Bonds
    March 11, 2020 at 14:44

    Sam,
    Thanks you very much for the great information on how to increase the precision of my HandLoads. Just for my clarification, using my FL resizing die to bump the shoulder back on a piece of brass that was fired in my rifle just back it out until i get the desired amount of bump on the shoulder ?
    Thank you,

    Reply

  • Paul Ware
    April 14, 2020 at 14:32

    Sam: Really like your YouTube videos. Have seen a lot of them and watch them almost every day. Hope I can ask questions when I need to. Am fairly new to reloading but probably twice your age. Maybe more. Still shooting, though. I’m from Idaho, too! Paul Ware

  • KEVAN DANIEL
    April 14, 2020 at 15:44

    As someone who is fairly new to reloading, the rabbit-hole of measurements, gauges, and procedures, is often overwhelming to try and understand. More than anybody I’ve found online so far, you explain things with just the right amount of detail so as to give a thorough understanding, but also not leaving me with more questions than answers when I read your posts and watch your videos. Thanks!

  • Paul Beck
    August 26, 2020 at 14:46

    I want to resize 30-06 brass to 270 Win.. My question is the different length between the 2 cartridges. Do you fire form the shorter 30-06 brass? Please let me know what the answer is. Thank you.

  • Jeff Cote
    September 22, 2020 at 15:03

    Hello Sam I enjoy watching Jake shoot his PRS match’s. I do have a couple questions maybe you can help me with. I’m looking to get a 6mm Greedmoor or a 6.5 Greedmoor. Do you have any suggestions on rifle builders to use. Also where could I find the targets you use for sighting in process?
    Thank You.

  • Randal Kidd
    October 24, 2020 at 10:30

    Hey Sam I got a question for you ! Starline brass neck thickness is 15. thou. / Burger Hunter Elite 264. bullet . Which = 294 ! I then chose 292 S- bushing , for 2 thou. hold on bullet . Well I was checking seating depth with ogave guage , and bullet slid in shell , just by getting mic tight for reading ! I grabbed another ,I could move bullet in with little force ??? Changed bushing to 291 , bullet still moved when guageing , put 290 , Still can move rather easy ??? What have I got into ? I have to order more bushings an keep trying ? Never had problems reloading 223 with S bushing with 2.thou. neck tension .

    • Sam
      Sam Millard
      October 26, 2020 at 03:53

      Are you using an expander with the die?

  • Clark Crowell
    January 24, 2021 at 11:11

    Thank you for all the great inforamtion on this sight. I apologize if this questions been answered before. What chronograph and powder scale are you using?

    • Sam
      Sam Millard
      January 25, 2021 at 05:43

      Magnetospeed V3 and Chargemaster Lites.

  • Brian
    January 27, 2021 at 13:16

    Thank you for the wealth of information Sam.
    I have one very serious question. When are you and Jake going to do a video series about loading and shooting AR platform rifles?
    Unlikely you’d ever get a minute of rest ever again if you do that, but there’s a lot of shooters who would love to see it. As I’m sure you know, there are some incredibly accurate AR platform rifles and equipment available, and shining a positive light on the modern sporting rifle would probably do some good in our current political climate. Think of it this way, you’d be helping your country. I’m just kidding. Sort of.
    Thanks again.

  • Keith
    March 14, 2021 at 09:02

    Reloading a 6.5 prc shooting 56 grns of rl 26 measurement to the lands is 2.145 when seating that bullet it compresses the load should I back off the powder

    • Sam
      Sam Millard
      March 14, 2021 at 17:40

      Even if it’s not over pressure, it will be difficult to get consistent seating depths with a compressed load. A 12″ drop tube will help with ~ .5 grain of RL26, but I wouldn’t try a compressed load with a large batch of rounds.

  • Al Miles
    April 13, 2021 at 13:01

    G’dy, I really learn from your videos and articles. I have a question about shoulder bump. I measured six once fired brass cases using a headspace body and bushing, and had a variation of five thou from the longest to the shortest. I assume the longest expanded to the size of the chamber and the others didn’t or the others sprung back various amounts. I’m ready to size these cases but don’t know whether to bump back two thou from the longest, bump back to the length of the shortest or take an average and bump to that. I’ve even thought of measuring the 120 case lot and sorting the long and short ones in different batches. What would you do if you had that much variation in one shot cases.
    Thank you,
    Al

    • Sam
      Sam Millard
      May 11, 2021 at 04:53

      That’s a big spread. Are you removing the primers before measuring? I’ve seen variations of .001-.002″, and will set the die to the longer cases.

      • Al Miles
        May 11, 2021 at 05:59

        Sam, thanks for the reply.
        I’ve since done some more inspections. This is factory loaded 6.5 Creedmoor 140 grain FMJBT. I measured 60 pieces of the once fired brass then decapped using a universal decapping die.and remeasured each piece. I got up to three thou difference between some of the cases with primer in and primer out. Measuring the primer pockets revealed some were too shallow by 2-3 thou. I will have to deepen the pockets before I reload.

        I then remeasured all 60 cases of decapped brass and found a greater variation in shoulder bump. Some were as low as 1.5315″ and some as high as 1.5375″. Measuring a box of unfired cartridges got a result of 1.531-1.532″ Seems some of the brass did not expand at all on firing. I decided to test fit the brass in the rifle with the ejector pin removed, I sized the cases with the longest base to shoulder measurements with shoulder bump of 1.5375″ to 1.5345″ in 0.0005″ steps. The longest ones resulted in heavy bolt drag. The drag slowly got lighter until I reached 1.535″ at which point the bolt was free of drag. I think I will use that measurement to size the cases and the ones with shorter bump may expand out on the second firing.
        Make sense to you?

  • Im Anonamous
    October 29, 2021 at 10:08

    Have you considered posting your videos on Rumble.com? Consider responding to this on your website. Thanks.

    • Sam
      Sam Millard
      November 2, 2021 at 05:15

      Some of them have been there for a while.

  • Mike Pilkinton
    May 23, 2022 at 05:35

    Sam
    I’m pushing 72 yrs old. 30 years ago I started reloading for my bolt action rifles to simply save some money. Saving money never happened. Due to my career taking time, kids needing my attention, the improvement of factory loads, and space required for workshop, I got away from reloading.
    I retired about four years ago, the kids are all out on their own and I rediscovered the hobby of reloading just for the fun of it.
    Your You-Tube channel was a wealth of info for me to get started again. It was straight forward, common sense practices that made sense to me. You explained your processes in a manner that unlocked a lot of mysteries that I never quite understood.
    I notice it’s been a while since you posted any new videos and I just wanted to let you know how much I enjoyed what you used to publish, and thank you for engaging me again in a hobby I enjoy.

    Best regards,
    Probably your oldest fan

    PS I’m in Texas and for years I figured you must be in Lubbock or Amarillo, the Panhandle of Texas!

  • Duane Yantorno
    October 20, 2022 at 16:56

    Sam how do you seat a bullet to the CBTO with out just using OACL to set your seating depth?

  • Kevin Dubose
    December 2, 2022 at 07:33

    If I am hand loading and doing fifty rounds I have to re do probably 10-15 because they sow to long another 10 show to short using .223 annealed brass and last step Wilson mandrel die loading for gas gun I can only get two or three in a row to 2.255-2.260 the longer bullets I have to keep dialing down to get to acceptable range problem is I usually have 6-10 that are short of 2.250using a reading micrometer die and being cautious with every step of brass prep thanks

  • Barry Miller
    March 4, 2023 at 17:25

    Just started my reloading adventure and your videos and articles are my go-to source for getting started. Thanks for a lot of great content. I am reloading for my 7mm Rem Mag to use as my mountain hunting rifle for elk and moose. This is a new rifle so have tried a few factory loads to begin with to see what it might like or dislike. As a result I do have some once-fired brass to play with that consists of Federal, Hornady, and a few Sig cases. I also bought some new Norma brass but haven’t opened that brass up yet. Do you have recommendations for brass going forward? Maybe a top-three list. And is factory ammo brass worth keeping? My goal is to get a solid elk load out to 600 yds.

    • Sam
      Sam Millard
      March 7, 2023 at 14:51

      The only brand of those four listed that I’ve used is Hornady. I would at least try all of them, but I’d be careful to segregate them for load development. In the end, I’d probably use whichever I had the most of.

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