Had a custom LH .375H&H made last year. Shoots factory 300g very well, and some 350g loads that I worked up.

Last month I tried working up a load for 235g TSX. Some reloading site listed various loads for 235g TSX bullets. I used RL15, and the table said for this powder: Minimum load - 73.4g, Maximum load - 81.5g (c).

So I loaded 5 each at 74g, 75g and 76g before going out, and took my reloading equipment with me.

The 74g - only 0.6g more than the table's "minimum" load - would not extract without smacking the bolt handle quite hard. I had crimped all my loads, so I loaded 8 more with 73g of RL15 and 235g TSX. Crimped 3, and left 5 uncrimped.

Attached is the target - no sticking of the brass, crimped or uncrimped, and very nice group. Unfortunately my chronograph gave up and would not register a single shot so I have no idea what the velocity was.

Why would I have sticking issues at 74g - the very low end of the range? Very tight tolerances on the chamber? Brass issue (Norma)? Also - since I'm relatively new at this - what criteria is used for determining a "minimum" load in many reloading tables?

Thanks,

Your brass is soft.
Your powder lot is hotter than normal.
Your scale is broken.
Your barrel is tighter than normal. (what brand is it)
Your bullets are larger, harder, or softer, than normal.
Your temperature is hotter than normal.
Your chamber is very rough.
You just attract bad luck.
None, or all, of the above, is your problem.

Your brass is soft. - Maybe. Is Norma known for that?

Your powder lot is hotter than normal. Maybe, but I had the same issue with IMR 3031 - I doubt both where "hotter than normal"

Your scale is broken. No. I calibrate with known weights before each load change.

Your barrel is tighter than normal. (what brand is it). Maybe. Shilen barrel.

Your bullets are larger, harder, or softer, than normal. Maybe, but Barnes has been pretty consistent.

Your temperature is hotter than normal. No. Cool December day.

Your chamber is very rough. No. Would have seen this with other rounds.

You just attract bad luck. No. I've been blessed so far in life. I do, however, seem to attract immediate sarcastic responses from assholes.

I had this with a rifle of mine and tried different loads and powder but they all stuck some times the brass would twist ended up being a bad bag of brass. If you dont have a differnet
battch of brass to try you might try factory shells.
be sure of you lenght on your shells if you have them a little long and they are jamming in the lands that will raise the pressure. Check the primer after you have shot to see if they are cupping.

No need for name calling; nothing I said was meant to be derogatory nor hurtful toward you, personally. Anyone can see it was humor, after I seriously laid out some potential causes to help you resolve your problem. Your problem is usually soft brass, but I outlined other possible causes.
Your name calling, in response to my just trying to help, is not necessary. I don't understand it, at all.

the chrono would have told the tale.
did you have any wipe marks on the cases or brass flow?

It was not a cheap shot, it was obviously a joke! Your comment that you are new to reloading? If that is the case, two of the common tell tales for a hot load are flattened primers and obvious case head expansion just above the belt. Take a dial caliper and measure the diameter of the case and compare the problem load to the mild load. Usually you can discern it by eye. Sometimes when loads are over pressure, it can leave a mark on the case head where the brass tried to extrude back through the ejector. I don't know what data you used, but some rifles are more sensitive to loads than others, a tight/short throat combined with a long bullet seated to the point of engaging the rifleing will sure bump up the pressure, what overall length are you using? Any resistance at all when closing the bolt on a round? Lots of possibilities here.

It is at least possible that the brass "grew" due to the chamber dimensions. It does not necessarily have to be over pressure for this to happen.

quote:

You just attract bad luck. No. I've been blessed so far in life. I do, however, seem to attract immediate sarcastic responses from assholes

All of dcpd's responses could be true.

I was going to post some of them my self.

Each rifle is different.

quote:

Originally posted by nhoro: Unfortunately my chronograph gave up and would not register a single shot so I have no idea what the velocity was.

DPCD gave you a pretty exhaustive list of possibilities.

An anecdote. Had a .300 Win Ruger 77 tang. Decided to work up some 180s with IMR-4831. Increasing charges (4) starting with book min/starting. By the third increment I had lots of recoil but normal primer appearance and bolt lift. Groups were fine. Final charge, first round gave sticky lift. Stopped.

Didn't have the chronograph.

Loaded another batch, same specs. Returned with chronograph. Starting load gave about 3050 fps (24" bbl), about what max should be. Like a dope, kept going. First shot at the third increment went mid-3300s. That was enough....more than enough.....really.

Now always have a functional chronograph when working up loads.

.375 H&H brass varies in internal capacity. The Barnes site data employed Jamison brass. Not familiar with it. If you have other mfg .375 brass you might check internal capacity. Barnes suggests being a certain distance off lands. Did you check?

quote:

Originally posted by lee440:
It was not a cheap shot, it was obviously a joke! Your comment that you are new to reloading? If that is the case, two of the common tell tales for a hot load are flattened primers and obvious case head expansion just above the belt. Take a dial caliper and measure the diameter of the case and compare the problem load to the mild load. Usually you can discern it by eye. Sometimes when loads are over pressure, it can leave a mark on the case head where the brass tried to extrude back through the ejector. I don't know what data you used, but some rifles are more sensitive to loads than others, a tight/short throat combined with a long bullet seated to the point of engaging the rifleing will sure bump up the pressure, what overall length are you using? Any resistance at all when closing the bolt on a round? Lots of possibilities here.

Thanks. OAL was 3.570", same as the factory 300g TSX loads I have, with no resistance closing the bolt. I can't see any difference in primer appearance between the sticking loads (74g) and non-sticking loads (73g). Diameters of cases are the same above the belt. The only difference is the spent case length - which I attributed, right or wrong, to crimped vs non-crimped.

Whatever it is, I've apparently found the max for this bullet, brass, powder and rifle combo. Next trip I'll hopefully have a reliable chronograph and see what the velocity is.

It just surprised me to have the lightest load, which was only slightly more than the table's "minimum", result in sticking brass. Apparently that's why they say start with the minimum and work up ....

When I was a boy Norma brass did seem to be known for being soft. However, this was often thought an advantage as it allowed you to finesse pressure estimation - hence it might point to some other problem in your rifle or ammo.

nhoro, I have the same trouble with my 22/250Rem. I used a go-to load that I have used in several other rifles and the brass would require a cleaning rod to remove, even with a reduced charge. The odd thing about it is that the brass shows no other signs of high pressure. The rifle is wearing a custom barrel and initially I blamed it on the chamber but it will fire factory Federal ammo without a glitch. I have switched to FC cases but haven't fired them yet so I don't know how they will work. Oh, I forgot to mention the first time out with my original load that I worked up to the rifle shot 4 rounds into a ragged hole at 200 yds, and the cases ejected without a hitch. I don't get it because I used the same components in all loads.

Norma shows 72,5gr of 203b as max for a 270gr Hornady bullet.

https://norma.cc/sv/Ammunition...land-Holland-Magnum/

quote:

Originally posted by Nordic2:
Norma shows 72,5gr of 203b as max for a 270gr Hornady bullet.

https://norma.cc/sv/Ammunition...land-Holland-Magnum/

This is the table I was using. Not exactly sure what criteria they (or any table for that matter) use for "minimum" load - what makes it "minimum"?

I find it interesting when I have some time, but it can be frustrating.

This topic just got even more personal to me as I had a similar experience at the range yesterday. I loaded up some 350 Rigby ammo with 225 grain sierra's and RE-15. I have been using RE-15 for years in various calibers with great results. I looked in the Woodleigh manual which I used in previous loads for this gun. They noted that the Rigby has about 2% greater capacity than the 358 Norma Mag and that the Norma data can be used as a baseline to work up loads. I looked in my current Hornady manual and they showed a load using RE-15 which I was loading some 318WR with, so all I had to do was adjust my powder measure and load. I used the bottom load listed in some Remington twice fired 375 brass that I had turned the belt off and deepened the extractor groove on and had used succcesfully on moderate loads using AA4350 and 250 gr. Hornady's. I also felt confident in using this bottom load as, in my experience, Hornady data has been pretty conservative for many years now. I fired the first round and had slightly sticky bolt lift and removed the case. The primer was as flat as you could possibly smear it, there was an ejector slot(Mauser) mark and about 1/8" above the belt it had a partial case head separation. Imagine my surprise! Before I loaded, I compared loads from several of my many manuals and they all compared fairly consistantly using 358 Norma data like woodleigh said, as a baseline, and with the same powders woodeigh used for the Rigby, the 358 Norma starting loads were all a lower charge.
The point is, there was nothing wrong with the manuals, nothing wrong with the powder, it is just a bad combo for my rifle. I have to say, that with 50 years of reloading for over 65 different cartridges, that is the first time I ever had trouble with a starting load from a manual. I posted this as I thought it was pertinent to the original post. I broke down the remaining shells and measured the charges and they were all correctly 64.0 grains, Go figure! It was also 68* so temp was ruled out as a factor.

We ALL make assumptions about EVERYTHING in this game and MANY of those assumptions don't pan out!!!! or we are blind to what the results are telling us.

"(You DIDN'T give the COAL)" SORRY on dial up and that info DIDN'T come through. or the barrel length NOR if you actually measured the "touching the lands" measurement so...MAYBE...

The 'smith cut a non-standard or short throat chamber which means you might be inadvertently jamming the bullet into the lands and causing high INITIAL pressures...ALL the mentioned are possible/PROBABLE and need to be addressed in individually starting with a barrel/chamber chamber cast and slugging the barrel. Slugging ONLY gives you the smallest ID wherever it happens to be in the bore...could be ANYWHERE.

Running a "standard set of parameters" for that cartridge/bullet COAL AND 24" BBL through QL and Load from a disk shows that load is considered a 'WARM TO OVER WARM LOAD"

Picking a load off "some site" is tantamount to playing Russian roulette unless checked against a known reliable source. That information is only telling what THAT PARTICULAR rifle happened to produce.

I've had rifles that WOULDN'T even handle low end reloading manual loads without locking up and I've had rifles that I can go WELL OVER the same reloading sources.

How many time must it be said the EACH RIFLE IS AN ISLAND UNTO ITSELF and must be treated a such.

BOTH QL and LD show a velo of 2860 fs to ≈2900 fs for a 24 " bbl and ≈2920+ for a 26", pressures from ≈54 KPSI to 57.5 KPSI.

And the way you describe the bolt lift makes me think the pressure is WAY up there...WELL over MAX. GET YOUR CHRONO WORKING and "anal-ize" your reloading procedures.

You could also have a headspace problem. I guarantee AFTER reading your tome I would send it back to the 'smith AFTER I looked up it's backside to see if it had piles or the sphincter was clenched tight.

I don't see any accuracy problems so you could just leave it there, go hunting and not even think about what "the other information" says...OR NOT...everyone here is telling you the results of literally hundreds if not thousands of years of cumulative experience...LISTEN.

Actually, I use RL17 for the same bullet in my 375 H&H, 375 RUGER and a 375 JDJ, COAL 0.020" to 0.45" off the lands depending on the rifle. Hornady, WW, RWS or Lapua brass, doesn't seem to matter, giving higher velo's and MUCH lower pressures for ALL the rifle iterations.

OLD POWLEY COMPUTER online FREE internal ballistics program: http://kwk.us/powley.html

YOU asked for advice...no need to get touchy...this forum can be worse than a Saturday night cowboy bar after a rodeo and many times VERY direct...like it for what is available or go somewhere else...lotsa of other good forums out there.

TRYING to diagnose rifle/pistol problems without ALL the data is like trying to fix a modern vehicle with only a hammer and a screwdriver for tools.

Good Hunting

This may not relate to the situation, but:

I had sticking brass on two of my custom chambered big bores, so I polished the chambers and that fixed it.

Piece of wet/dry sand paper, first 400 grit, then 600 grit on a split wooden dowel spun on a cordless drill. Use honing oil. Move back and forth in the chamber while honing.

Its not that complicated, hot loads in many cases are your best accuracy hands down, so that does not surprise me..

What you do need to do is cut that load by one or two grs. and be done with it, you won't lose enough velocity to make any difference..

When a case sticks your load is too hot..let it go at that, too much over thinking on such things.