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Can 303 Br be formed into
victorj19
Member Posts: 3,642 ✭✭✭
30/40. A friend wants me to load up some 30/40. He has to buy the brass but is balking at the price and doesn't see it come up for auction.
I did a little research and found that RCBS sells, or used to sell, a form die to turn 303 Br into 30/40. I don't recall seing this form die over on the auction side in the past 2 or 3 years.
Would a standard 30/40 die work? Would the brass also need to be fire formed after running it through the die? Any neck turning or inside reaming needed?
Thanks,
Jim
I did a little research and found that RCBS sells, or used to sell, a form die to turn 303 Br into 30/40. I don't recall seing this form die over on the auction side in the past 2 or 3 years.
Would a standard 30/40 die work? Would the brass also need to be fire formed after running it through the die? Any neck turning or inside reaming needed?
Thanks,
Jim
Comments
Considering how hard it is to find ammo and or components these days I would let them look elsewhere rather than fool with cheapskate. My time is worth may more than that to me.
I have their catalog (from a few years ago) and they list 30-40 Krag brass at $28/100. Doesn't seem too unreasonable to me. Of course the price may have gone up some by now.
Their website is www.buffaloarms.com.
I also think you would probably be OK using reformed 303 British cases. The 303 cases are only slightly more than .1" shorter than 30/40. Since the 30/40 has a relatively long neck I don't think this would be a serious problem.
I have a 40 2 ? " Remington. Eventually I got some 40/70 Sharps Straight cases which just needed a little trimming to make good 40 2 ? " cases. But what I used before that were, coincidentally, 30/40 Krag cases. At that time factory 30/40 Krag ammo was still available. I simply bought loaded 30/40 and fired them in my 40 2 ? " (not sure if this was a really good idea but the result was fire formed cases that I could reload). And they were considerably more than .1" shorter than original 40 2 ?" cases. So a little more of the bullet was showing when loaded. But they worked fine.
Hope this may be of some help.
If your friend has lots of 303 brass, clean it up and sell it on the auction side, that should pay for his 30-40 brass.
W.D.
Jim