I have a 270 Rem 700 that I inherited. I think the rifle is around 30 years old and have no idea how many rounds have been shot through it. My problem is when I use my new Stoney Pt OAL gauge and Comparator(Xmas present ) with 130 gr Nosler Ballistic tips the bullet is barely in the neck of the case making measurements difficult, I come up with 3.101" to the Ogive. This measurement was repeated several times. Also tried several bullets, all with the same result. I am confident that I am not pressing too hard(pushing bullet into lands)and have also checked a fairly new 6mm also with what I think are reasonable measurements. Is this normal for a 270 and 130gr Ballistic tips or do you think the throat is worn? I read a post in earlier that "Ready on the Right" seated his 130gr Ball tips .010 off lands so I have a feeling that the throat is eroded. Before I have a chamber cast made I thought I would get some opinions. Thanks in advance

Relax. Many factory rifle barrels have throats too long to reach the lands with the bullet. Check that statement--most factory rifles are thus...

Loading to the lands is probably the most over hyped maneuver that reloaders do. 99% of the people who do so cannot tell you why they're doing it, other than to say "Well, benchrest shooters do it."

So long as the runout numbers are low (.003" or less), you'll have no problem with accuracy with deeper seated bullets. Folks whose loads have high runout numbers can benefit from loading close to the lands, but the best solution is to load straight to begin with.

Distance to lands, or bullet seating depth as I like to refer to it, should be used as a fine tuning point after you've arrived at a good powder charge for your load. Take a look at this link, where I describe this concept better:

http://www.loadyourown.com/ubb/Forum11/HTML/000384.html

I would simply work up to either 55 grains of IMR 4350, or 60 grains of H4831 behind the 130's in your rifle. Seat the bullet about a caliber's depth into the case. Once you have concluded that the charge you're using is safe in your rifle, then go to seating depth adjustments to tune the barrel time to release the bullet on a stable portion of the harmonic whip.

Dan Newberry
green 788

Very good. Thanks Green!

I would also consider longer bullets, i.e. 140-150gr bullets. My relatively new Remington 700 (7yrs old) is the same way. I was seating 130gr bullets WAY OUT to get .005 off the rifling. The 150's helped and I get more knock down anyway.

thanks for responses. I measure bullet and neck concentricity, have a hard time keeping bullet runout less than .003 or .004. I do not turn necks yet. Think I need to look into a set of competition dies to try to get better runout consistency. Might invest in a neck turner but have my doubts whether or not turning necks helps much on standard factory throats.

One of the main reasons I wanted to get accurate distance to ogive was to try to get an idea what extent the throat has eroded. I will pick up a box of 150gr bullets to establish a datum.

I use Lee Collet dies (about 25 dollars a set) for my .270 win. With fire formed Winchester cases, I can get runout numbers well below .003", averaging .002" or even better.

Contrary to popular opinion, you don't have to spend 100 dollars a set for loading dies to make good ammo.

Stick with good cases (like the Winchesters), fireform those cases, and you should do well. By the way, I buy the Winchester factory 130 grain "Super-X" Power Point ammo from Walmart, and use those cases when the box is all fired. This factory recipe is nearly impossible to beat with handloads. Try it and you'll see what I'm talking about. I'll bet it will shoot sub MOA in your rifle. More good news is that it's only 10.87 per box at Walmart.

I have three or four targets with three shot groups of the Winchester Super-X Power Point 130 grain ammo, all at 1" to 1 1/4" at 200 yards.

Best of luck,

Dan Newberry
green 788

You have to check whether you can camber multiple rounds into the magazine smoothly too, I always load 3 dummys (no primer or powder) and feed them into themagazine and cycle them

Its great to have the projectile touching the lands, but not so great if you load 50 rounds and find out you can only single shot fire your hunting loads...