Can anyone tell me a clean, consistent way to cut the nose off of a jacketed hollowpoint spitzer rifle bullet?

Here's why: I recently acquired a 7x33 Sako. If you're not familiar with the little cartridge, it was made from "stretched" 9mm Parabellum brass and factory loads use a 78 or 80 grain RN bullet. The cartridge was designed for shooting seals on the ice and small game.

At any rate, the lightest 7mm bullets I can find are Hornady or Sierra 100 grain HPs. They can't be seated deep enough to work through the magazine. But if I could find a way to cut the jacket material off of the nose back to even with the internal lead, they might work fine.

So, how about it? How do I cleanly and consistently cut these noses off? The best answer wins a used lottery ticket from last Tuesday's Texas lottery plus a book of S&H Green Stamps.

You might look at a meplat uniformer. You would have to alter it to allow enough bullet nose to be cut off. But it may work. May be able to modify a case trimmer too.
How about one of the "mini" lathes 7x10 from harbor freight and tools, homier or other retailers. Just some thoughts.

muck

You might try contacting Hawk bullets.

They might be able to make you the right bullet.

www.hawkbullets.com

Also Layne Simpson wrote a magazine article on the 7x33 Sako, have you seen it?

It was in Rifle or Handloader.

quote:

You might look at a meplat uniformer. You would have to alter it to allow enough bullet nose to be cut off. But it may work. May be able to modify a case trimmer too.

Stonie,

Hey Bud; I think Muckie's on to something for you.

Call Sinclair International and inqure about their "Meplat Uniformer" I took a serious gander at them but decided not to pursue my idea; perhaps they will work for your intended purpose.

I chose an alternative to do something similar to what you are considering.

I've got a Forester Case Trimmer. Don't use it too awful much anymore since I've gone almost exclusively to the little Lee Case Length Gauges but it's still got a place in my reloading scheme.

I had my German Gunsmith make a bullet "Hollow-Pointer & Nose Trimmer" out of a 1/4" Wood Drill Bit for the Forester Case Trimmer for me. He cut down the bit (the one with the little pointy spike in the bit end) so I could turn 9.3 (.366") 270 gr. Speer Semi-Spitzers into 250 gr. Hollow Points for my 9.3x62 Piggie Basher. They work great & are accurate after being "shortened". The 9.3 bullets just happen to fit on one of the notches on the Forester chuck and it holds them O.K. while I sorta eyeball the set-up, then trim. I can imagine a professional bullet maker is probably rolling their eyes about right now but WTF - they work.

Have fun with your Sako 7x33 bullet quest.

Hey send me the used Texas Lottery ticket - I'll use the numbers for the German Lotto - if I win I keep the money....

Thanks to all for the suggestions!

NE 450#2: I take both Rifle and Handloader, but I missed that article. About how long ago?

Muck & Gerry: I've got a Forster case trimmer(actually a forty year-old identical knock-off from Herter's), and surprise, surprise, its collet will actually hold a 7mm bullet! I'll check the drill bit idea tomorrow. That could just work.

Along those lines, I also have an outside neck chamfering tool that chucks in a drill press. It might do the trick if I could dream up a proper way to hold the bullet uniformly and without damaging it.

quote:

Originally posted by Stonecreek:
Can anyone tell me a clean, consistent way to cut the nose off of a jacketed hollowpoint spitzer rifle bullet?

Here's why: I recently acquired a 7x33 Sako. If you're not familiar with the little cartridge, it was made from "stretched" 9mm Parabellum brass and factory loads use a 78 or 80 grain RN bullet. The cartridge was designed for shooting seals on the ice and small game.

At any rate, the lightest 7mm bullets I can find are Hornady or Sierra 100 grain HPs. They can't be seated deep enough to work through the magazine. But if I could find a way to cut the jacket material off of the nose back to even with the internal lead, they might work fine.

So, how about it? How do I cleanly and consistently cut these noses off? The best answer wins a used lottery ticket from last Tuesday's Texas lottery plus a book of S&H Green Stamps.

This is fall down dead simple.
Find someone with a tool room lathe set up with a set of 5C collets. If he does not have the right size collet pay for one, they are about $15. The add a stop to back of the collet and adjust the stop to locate against the base of your bullets.

With the collet in the lathe your bullets can be precision trimmed to what ever length you need and they will all be the same length.

quote:

This is fall down dead simple.
Fins some one with a tool room lathe set up with a set of 5C collets. If he does not have the right size collet pay for one, they are about $15. The add a stop to back of the collet and adjust the stop to locate against the base of your bullet.

With the collet in the lathe your bullets can be precision trimmed to what ever length you need and they will all be the same length.

precisely.....good post

It was quite a while back. I recently moved and that info is still packed away with a "mountain" of stuff.

There is a lot of loading info on the web.

Check with Hawk, give them a call, they are nice folks to deal with.

quote:

This is fall down dead simple.
Find someone with a tool room lathe set up with a set of 5C collets.

That's a little like saying that finding "true love" is fall down dead simple. It is if it just happens, but I'm not sure where to start to look for someone so equipped who would be willing to do this task or let me use their equipment to do it. Perhaps I could start with the personal ads in Craigslist; the ones captioned "Shooters seeking Machinists (platonic only)".

But thanks for the suggestion; it makes good sense if I can find the right guy.

quote:

Originally posted by Stonecreek:

quote:

This is fall down dead simple.
Find someone with a tool room lathe set up with a set of 5C collets.

That's a little like saying that finding "true love" is fall down dead simple. It is if it just happens, but I'm not sure where to start to look for someone so equipped who would be willing to do this task or let me use their equipment to do it. Perhaps I could start with the personal ads in Craigslist; the ones captioned "Shooters seeking Machinists (platonic only)".

But thanks for the suggestion; it makes good sense if I can find the right guy.

guns and lathes go together like
well powder and bullets.

Talk to a gun smith or
I am sure there are 200 guys on this forum that are set up to do this.

You can set up a mini lathe to do this task also.
Make your own collet out of brass stock. Machine the stop where you want it to be. Not as precise as a tool room lathe no doubt.But I think quite up to the task. And a 7x10 mini lathe isn't going to break the bank. You could buy lots and lots of powder and bullets for the price of a good tool room lathe. Even at todays prices for powder and bullets.
IMHO

muck

Gerry, I checked into using a half-inch drill bit in the place of the cutter in my Forster-style Herter's case trimmer. The cutter measures .489" in diameter while a "half-inch" bit measures .499" -- no go, obviously. (I wonder where the devil Herter's came up with .489" round stock? Maybe you machinists will recognize it as a common size? 12.4mm -- nah.)

However, I can chuck the bit in my drill press if I can successfully invent a way to uniformly hold the bullet.

I appreciate all of the suggestions, guys.

I wonder how a Wilson case trimmer would work for this? Have Wilson make up a case holder for the 7x33 (heck they may even list it) or have a machinist make one. They're pretty simple afairs- I've made a few myself over the years. Anyway, load the cartridge as before, insert the whole thing in the holder, and trim the bullet back to the pre-determined length. Those trimmers are pretty slick and once set up, extremely accurate. As long as the seating depth is maintained uniformly the exact same amount would be removed from the bullet nose each time. Just an idea.

I would use a case trimmer with pilot removed, then "nip off the nubbins" with a knife blade or razor blade.

quote:

Originally posted by El Deguello:
I would use a case trimmer with pilot removed, then "nip off the nubbins" with a knife blade or razor blade.

I had not thought of trimming the bullets after the cartridges were loaded. It seems a little dicey to be creating that much friction on the bullet (which has gunpowder sitting against its base), but I don't suppose the amount of heat generated in the process would be anywhere close to enough to ignite the powder.

My pilot shank is about .20" in diameter, so the "nubbins" might be significant.

This method is certainly worth a try, however. (Methinks I'll use a dummy round to experiment! If that works, I'll have my mother-in-law process the live ammo.)

Well, I must say my above stated idea is just that- an untested idea. I can't imagine a case trimmer cutter generating enough heat from friction to ignite the powder in the case. The Wilson trimmer is pilot-less, which is what gave me the idea (although there is a tiny hole in the center where the pilot would be in other trimmers- ~1/16").

I have detonated powder in a case by friction heat, however. It was an old .25/20 Single Shot cat'g that I was trying to pull the bullet on to salvage the case for use in my R2 Lovell. Anyway, it resisted all attempts to remove it so I- honest to god- drilled down through it with an 1/8" drill bit with the aim of using a tiny Easy-Out on it. I figure it was the hot drill bit that touched the powder after i broke through the bottom of the bullet. There was a REALLY loud bang, case peeled apart like a banana, and the bullet disappeared never to be found. (You figure that out, I can't) No injuries except to my pride but I did have a lot of 'splaining to do to the then wife. I keep that shredded case on a little shelf over my bench to this day- a 25 year old reminder to "thimk".

gnoahhh,

That's kinda the scenario I was imagining for my mother-in-law, however with more signigicant consequences

I did find that my case trimmer's pilot hole is just too large to allow the trimmer to work effectively. However, Gerry's idea about the flat-cutter drill bit looks as if it might work. A preliminary run produced a slightly hollow-pointed bullet of 94 grains that only needs a little work with a neck chamfering tool to clean up nicely. If I can find a way to consistently jig it for the drill bit, I'll be in business.

I bought one of the Sinclair Meplat trimmers, and to get consistent bullet lengths after trimming, I had to make up a die plate to control the depth the bullet gets seated to in the trimmer housing. Without that, there is no way you can load the bullets in the trimmer housing to consistent depths using you thumb.

Don