been down in basement experimenting..........
hillbille
Member Posts: 14,393 ✭✭✭✭
didn't blow anything up so I guess thats a good thing. I was playing around on the reloader for my 28ga trying to get the crimp right so it will feed in my new shotgun. I think I found the problem I have 3 types of hulls, some from Ballistic products I think are chedditte? they aren't marked on the brass then some long brass federals, and some winchesters the federals are right close to the cheddites in length only few hundereths or so, the winchester are at least 1/8 maybe a 1/4 inch on some shorter. I finally read the instructions, please don't tell my wife, and found out how to set the crimp and starter crimp, and what the adjustments are for. the winchesters come out flush and mostly squared up, a few swirls. the longer shells wanted to crush and bulge so I got to adjusting again and ended up with a small lip above the crimp about1/32 or so and after a few more adjustment this lip is now crimped inwards sort of like a barrell from the side view. after a few trips up and down the stairs to try them in the shotgun, it hit me take the shotgun downstairs!
so now I have the best part of a box of shells with differnt hulls and I clipped a short piece from the wads and half a grain of less powder to get the crimp to fit the winchester, and the rest have the longer "barrell crimp". they slide right in and fall out of the chamber with no force so now it will be out to the range to see if they still pattern as good as factory. will try that tomorrow weather permitting. good thing I'm retired or I wouldn't have the patience to sit for 2 hours loading roughly 20 shells. and only had to throw away about 5 hulls that were crushed beyond repair. honestly I think my wads are just a hair to long but I have about 1500 of them so I figured I could trim each one as I load a box, only takes a second to snip off. and this time of year there ain't much else to do.........
Bob it is a mec 600jr, I had a hornady progressive I could never get to work right so went back to single stage as I only loaded a few hundred a year I could do that on a good day easy.......
Comments
Good work Dr. Frankenstein, reloading for 28 gauge is the only economical way to shoot it.
Try not to mix your hulls. Reloaders like Winch. AA and Remington Green ones.
I'm to cheap to throw any away, thats why I have been playing with the wads,hull combo. Trying to find something that will work and use up what I allready have.......
Winchester AA is by far the best to hand load.
I load magnum hunting loads in them with no issues.
I've never had a problem with clambering a slightly longer shell, or one that has an imperfect crimp. Shotgun chambers are at least 1/2" longer than an unfired shell to give room for the increased length after the crimp opens upon firing. Like you I am frugal, (cheap), and I probably load some cases more times than I should before discarding. The only chambering problems I ever had was when the base wasn't sized correctly, causing too tight a fit and needing that little extra tap to seat it in the chamber. Usually that happened with fired hulls that were used in someone else's gun that maybe had a slightly larger diameter chamber. Glad you are getting your reloads worked out because around here 28ga factory loads are way too pricy for me! Bob
Winchester AA has always been my choice of hull to reload
my problem is the crimp sort of flares out the top of the shell, and that is what is tight and won't chamber, I seem to have fixed it for now with the adjustments I made it makes the top of the shell and crimp flare in, instead of out without bulging the side or base of shell. I still think I will sort out the hulls and load them in batches as I can fine tune the crimp for the same length hulls that way. I had loaded these 10-15 years ago for a double barrell that would chamber about anything, including these flared crimps, I never had a problem till I got the semi-auto.
you have nothing to fear,,, until Ricci's van shows up in your driveway.........
O.K. now I understand. Just out of curiosity and not knowing what press you are using, could you increase your seating depth pressure? Sometimes that will partially compress the column below the shot cup allowing the wad mouth to sit lower in the case. Sorting the hulls always makes sense. I still have a bunch of the original AA shells and they have to be separated from the newer HS hulls or I can get crimping problems as well. Good luck with it. Bob
Same with .410's. My Baker Batavia with Savage .410er inserts likes ennything I put through her.
I haven't loaded shotshells for 25 years but the big factor I found was the height of the base wad or interior base of the shell. This is a more important measurement than the overall shell length.
The new plastic wads are very forgiving and versatile, more so than the old paper wads. For low brass I use the pink and high brass the white on all casings.
I have a progressive loader set up for 28 ga. I switched from AA to remington hulls as the remington hulls seemed to feed smoother.
As I have 40,000 12 ga AA hulls so I am not changing hulls for the 12 ga progressive loader.
Margaret Thatcher
"There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and statistics."
Mark Twain
What powder are you guys using in your 28's? I have an 8 pounder of 20/28 and love it.
I agree with the Remington green.
I use unique, but I use it for all my shotgun and pistol reloading, it keeps things simple and no way to mix powders up. as Varget is my powder for all my rifles. between flake and stick varget you can tell difference at a glance. only thing is unique is the pink unicorn of powders right now, but I have a half a bottle which should last me quite a while, it has a sticker on it for $18.99 don't know how long ago that was.
Im out of powder and primers for the time being, Crazy prices if you do find something.
I have a MEC Grabber for 12 and another one for 16 gauge. Sitting on 10 cases of reloaded 16 gauge now. I shoot 2 cases of 16 gauge a year to I am good for 5 years at current rate of expenditure.