I am new to reloading. My brother loved to reload and did all of our reloading, but he died suddenly last year. Now I'm trying to pick up the slack. I got back a rebarrel job I had done and have started to get ready to shoot it. Before he died he had loaded new brass I ordered, they were full length resized and bullet just seated. When I got the rifle I seated the bullet to fit the magazine and attempted to chamber it but was unable to close the bolt more than half way. After seating the bullet deeper with the bolt not closing any further I stopped. Any suggestions?

Welcome to the forum.

Blacken the tip of one of the bullets with a magic marker. Make sure and get the black on the ogive where the bullet will first touch the lands. Chamber the bullet and look for marks on the bullet left by contact with the lands.

Also measure the OAL and then measure again after chambering to see if the chamber seated the bullet further.

One other thing, since you say these are new cases, check the headstamp on the brass and make sure you have the correct brass for the caliber.

If your bullets are not hitting the lands and you have the right cases then there is some kind of mechanical or physical anomaly in the chamber. If the gunsmith who installed the barrel is available take the rifle and the loaded rounds to him.

pull the bullets and resize the cases again,you might need to screw the sizing die down a litttle more.

1 Check for obstructions.

2 Check to be sure the cartridge you have is what the gunsmith chambered your rebarrel in. It is possible the smith and you had a miscomunication.

3 try to chamber a piece of empty sized brass.

just some random thoughts

muck

Sounds like you either bulged the cases when you reseated the bullets or the chamber aint right.
Do you have any factory rounds to try?

I am sorry for your loss.

What cartridge is your new rifle chambered in?

thanks for the tips. The rifle is a Win Mod 70 originally in 300 Win Mag rebarrelled to 358 Norma Mag. The gunsmith is several hours away and in his note says he shot the rifle. The rifle came back to me right after my brother died and I'm just now starting to work on it. I had ordered 100 rounds of unfired brass and he loaded all of it for me to fire form. I have a bullet puller but can I deprime live primers to run the case thru the resizing die? I ordered a box of factory Norma ammo and will see how it goes when it arrives.

quote:

Originally posted by jckabry:
thanks for the tips. The rifle is a Win Mod 70 originally in 300 Win Mag rebarrelled to 358 Norma Mag. The gunsmith is several hours away and in his note says he shot the rifle. The rifle came back to me right after my brother died and I'm just now starting to work on it. I had ordered 100 rounds of unfired brass and he loaded all of it for me to fire form. I have a bullet puller but can I deprime live primers to run the case thru the resizing die? I ordered a box of factory Norma ammo and will see how it goes when it arrives.

Unload five of those cases. You CAN remove live primers with the decapping pin in your die. If you do, do it slow and gently!! But, you can leave the primers in. Just screw the primer punch rod up into the die to where the punch tip is inside the mouth of the die. Now lube the cases lightly and run them into the FL die with the die screwed down to about 2mm shy of touching the shellholder when the ram is all the way up. Then try them in the gun to see if they are going to let you close the bolt. If they don't allow the bolt to close, then screw the die all the way in until it touches the shellholder at the top of the ram stroke. The purpose of this exercise is to see how much you have to size a case to get it to chamber - (actualy, new cases will normally chamber freely without needing any sizing at all. Sizing should only be needed for fired cases.)

If the sized cases fit, then reload the powder and seat a bullet. The reloaded rounds should chamber if the empties did before you added the powder and bullets back. DON'T TRY to chamber the live ones until you are at a safe shooting location and can keep the muzzle pointed toward the targets as you chamber the round and close the bolt!

IF the empty cases won't go into the chamber and let you close the bolt after they have been FULLY SIZED, something else is wrong! You will need to have some experienced person look it over to figure out what's happening!

BTW, that .358 Norma is one of the world's excellent cartridges!

quote:

Originally posted by jckabry:
thanks for the tips. The rifle is a Win Mod 70 originally in 300 Win Mag rebarrelled to 358 Norma Mag. The gunsmith is several hours away and in his note says he shot the rifle. The rifle came back to me right after my brother died and I'm just now starting to work on it. I had ordered 100 rounds of unfired brass and he loaded all of it for me to fire form. I have a bullet puller but can I deprime live primers to run the case thru the resizing die? I ordered a box of factory Norma ammo and will see how it goes when it arrives.

Maybe the smith made it a 308 Norma Mag instead???

If it is a 358 then a 30 caliber bullet will fall through the barrel