What did you do at your reloading bench today?

Todd S said:

I helped a new reloader load up 50 rounds of 6.5CR for ladder testing. I also helped a friend load 50 rounds of 270 for ladder testing. Next up is 22-250 to dial in my powder charge, then bullet seating depth. BTW, Varget outperformed H380 with 52gr pills. That was surprising. Varget gave me a .65 MOA 5 shot group. H380 best group was over an inch MOA. Them whistlepigs are going to be in trouble!

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Nice. Imr4064 has been my go to (very close to varget in many cases) in the 22-250 and 22-250ai for a decade and a half. Several 14 twist barrels have shot into the quarter inch range with 40s.

Loaded 300 rounds of 9mm over the last couple of days using RMR 124 grain "NUKE"s for use in my carry guns.
Found 15 coated cast 9mm bullets that were pulled from re-manufactured duds. Loaded them up just to get them off of the shelf and they cost just under $.05 each to load. Only costs were the primer and powder, both purchased before prices went up. Stuck them in a Glock-17 round mag for the next range trip.
Reload cabinet is getting full, gotta get to the range soon!

Fired up my casting pot finally, cranked out a few 125 gr rnfp for the old .357. my first time using a 6 banger. Not to bad after it got warmed up. Now they will cool while I get the yard cut. Then hopefully I get some time to coat them today.

GuitarmanNick said:

Loaded 300 rounds of 9mm over the last couple of days using RMR 124 grain "NUKE"s for use in my carry guns.
Found 15 coated cast 9mm bullets that were pulled from re-manufactured duds. Loaded them up just to get them off of the shelf and they cost just under $.05 each to load. Only costs were the primer and powder, both purchased before prices went up. Stuck them in a Glock-17 round mag for the next range trip.
Reload cabinet is getting full, gotta get to the range soon!

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I LOVE those bullets.

Annealed 7.5 x 55 Swiss PPU brass.

Loaded 300 9mm. Now I'm out of 124gr RN FMJ, and ordered another 3k from RMR. Also threw in 500 230gr FMJ just to keep the 45 Auto pipeline going. I have enough buffer to keep me going for maybe three weeks of shooting, so hopefully RMR will deliver soon. Ironically, I'm still fairly stocked with 124gr JHPs, so maybe it's time to start shooting more 9 Major in the meantime.

I really need to get back to loading up rifle rounds. I'm at about 500 rounds of reloads for 223, and I'm even lower on 300 BLK supersonic. The problem is that reloading rifle takes a real time chunk to set things up, and I just don't have that most days anymore. Maybe things will improve over the summer in that regard, or so I can hope.

trickg said:

You have competition now! I just did some looking on that website - they seem to have decent products for very reasonable prices. I bookmarked it on my browser.

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My only suggestions are, don't trust their mixed bullets. Not that they intentionally screw you, but I've heard reports.

Getting 500 bullets from 3 manufacturers, with 1-3 styles of said bullets from each manufacturer and possibly 1-2 weights of each style means you might end up with 38 150gr Winchester Silver tip, 41 165gr Winchester Silvertip, 30 remington Corlokts 150gr, etc. ad nauseum. That's not all that useful for most people unless they are loading a bunch of "premium" bullets for lower pressure blasting ammo. Or you have to invest a crap ton of time to work up accurate loads, to run out of bullets for that load...

Also some of the other mixes. Like 115/124gr 9mm. Those are PROBABLY from one manufacturer and only the two bullet types. But it could be more than two bullet styles for the same weight. So you might spend half an hour sorting 115s from 124s. That's on you if you don't mind doing that. For my pistol loads, I mostly don't bother reworking a load for the same grain weight of bullet, unless the style is radically different. I am almost never at max or near max pressure. Lead vs jacketed, yeah I don't use the same load data. FMJ versus JHP, I might use FMJ as a guide for JHP, but I still work up the JHP.

One 115gr JHP to another, or one 115gr FMJ to another, I usually keep the same load data and roll on with my life, unless I was at or near max.

Rifle I work up all loads again if I change bullets. Because I care about safety, but also most of my most accurate loads are at least warm for caliber. Few are at max, that also generate max accuracy. But .3gr off max pressure isn't much head room to switch bullets in a rifle cartridge. Half a grain off max in a 9mm load is a lot of latitude sticking to the same weight bullet and same COAL, with a similar style of bullet and when I care about accuracy measured in "all rounds in a pie plate at 25yds", most accurate load mostly doesn't matter weight. Consistency of the load appears to matter way more than the accuracy node of the powder charge there.

Commercial ammo, man those can vary wildly. Why you can easily see >100fps ES for 9mm and SDs measured in scores of FPS sometimes.

Anyway, I haven't tried any of their seconds that they claim are ugly. But most of their seconds, short of noted defects, have been nearly NOS quality.

I just realized maybe you were talking about RMR. They make good stuff.

I love their pistol bullets. Their 69gr match though have been meh. That just might be my Howa. My Howa seems to shoot most stuff extremely accurately, but I am struggling to get the RMR 69gr BTHP match to shoot much under 2MOA with it. I can get just over 1MOA out of my 20" AR-15 shooting with those bullets, but the best 5-shot grouping (and I shot several 5 shot groups) is right at about 1.5MOA out of my Howa. I finally tried some 69gr Sierra matchkings after investing several range trips and about a dozen different ladders playing with different variables with the RMR, and the Sierra's ran just over MOA for the worst groupings in the ladder and about .7MOA for the best node, it would have been .3moa except one flier that I think was me. Same in my 20" AR were also just under MOA. Just a tiny bit better than the RMR were out of the AR.

Based on feedback from not RMR's website, I've read similar things from other people. Some people who rave that they are as good or better than Sierras. Some people who can't get them to shoot for anything. MOST cases both seem to be very single example. I have one (very accurate) rifle and the bullet shoots fantastic in it. Or one guy with one (very accurate) rifle and I can't get it to shoot for crap.

Of note, I've tested bullets from two lots, and both I can't get to shoot great. I mean, don't get me wrong, the accuracy is okay. 69 and 75gr PPU match are a little over 1.5MOA out of my Howa. Not that I'd consider PPU match as fantastic.

The Howa shoots 62gr and 75 Gold dots to about half MOA. It shoots 55gr blitzking handloads to under half MOA. Those Sierra 69gr well under 1MOA. Etc. So its a very accurate rifle in general.

Anyway, off soap box. I would suggest RMR rifle bullets, don't buy big at first. Validate it'll shoot well out of your platform, because it might not. Or it might be fantastic.

I have many thousands of their pistol bullets, and until I stumbled across American Reloading, they are most who I went with. High quality product, very good prices. American just has even better prices, and if mildly picky the quality is okay.

Not your normal topic here, finally able to start the edge repairs of my dagger boards, racing starts next Tuesday evening. Side note, over the next 8 days I'll be on the sailing, Fri shake down sail, Sun with Coach, Tue race, Wed race, Thur sail with sailmaker, Sat Bay Race... Finally back on the water.

Decapped a bunch of .223 and 7.62x25 cases while running some polish through the Frankford Arsenal tumbler. Went to put some brass into it and discovered media all over the pan under the tumbler.
Further investigation revealed a large crack in the bottom so it is officially, deceased. Got it with my rig from another member when I began reloading, and it has served me well.

I had a free afternoon so I worked up a load ladder for my old Rem 78 30/06 that my father bought new in the early 80’s. I have plenty of BLC-2 and 155 custom comps so let’s see how well they shoot in the old ‘06. Got done it time to hit the range for an hour. First 3 shot group min charge under half inch. Second load under a half inch. Three loads in the middle right around an inch. Max load under a half inch. Well that was easy. Now I can load light or hot and get great groups. Not bad for a factory barreled 200$ Ames special.

trickg said:

That's awesome!

Here's a question for the group - how many of you wear gloves the whole time you're reloading? I don't - I've never seen the need. Once I'm done in the reloading room, I wash my hands really well, and that's all I do.

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I wear mechanics gloves when I’m reloading.

So my reloading gear was in storage for a while. When I got a new bench set up, I found that my D-Terminator scale wouldn't zero (it was stored in original packaging.) Otherwise it it looked like it was working but I couldn't trust it. So I contacted Dillon and was told the D-Terminators didn't carry their great life time warranty. It was $85 to swap it for a replacement, plus $18 to USPS to send Dillon the faulty unit. Package from Dillon arrived today, scale, my check and a note saying that since it was purchased before 1999, it did have a lifetime warranty. And because my original purchase had the warranty, the new scale does as well. Woo hoo.

That's good stuff, it's always nice when a company does the right thing.

Started running brass through the new Frankford Arsenal dry tumbler that arrived yesterday. Took the old one apart and found the bottom of the bowl had a 3" long split where the center rod is screwed in. I might try some JB weld to repair it as replacement bowls are not available anymore.

What type of plastic is the bowl made of? Solvent or heat welding might work better then JB.

smdub said:

What type of plastic is the bowl made of? Solvent or heat welding might work better then JB.

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Plastic welding is relatively easy and effective if the plastics are compatible. I’ve repaired a few kayaks that way, and they are functionally good as new.

Loaded up 150 rounds of 1-1/8oz #4 shot for varmints

Cast another 60 fullbore (625gr) pellet slugs for powder coating, and finished off the lead pot with some .690” round balls and Lee keyslot 1oz slugs

smdub said:

What type of plastic is the bowl made of? Solvent or heat welding might work better then JB.

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Not really sure. No markings on it for recycling.
There are a lot of mini-cracks in the bowl, too. Thinking about using a thin metal plate to reinforce the entire area and just epoxy the crap out it inside and out.

85MikeTPI said:

Loaded up 150 rounds of 1-1/8oz #4 shot for varmints

Cast another 60 fullbore (625gr) pellet slugs for powder coating, and finished off the lead pot with some .690” round balls and Lee keyslot 1oz slugs

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I hope the hulls I gave you are working well for what you need. Get a varmint for me.

This may be different, but I did it on my reloading bench. Wife has a Tudor Mini-sub we got in 1996 for $400. The acrylic crystal is aged and is cracking. I took the movement out, removed the old crystal and pressed in a new sapphire crystal. Looks a lot better. She’s thrilled. I did not take pics along the way.