I have just about begun my reloading of my .338-06 and am very curious about those that neck this caliber up from .06 brass. The tapered expander with the 3pc. Redding set -very good dies, a Forester press and headstamped brass like what Wthby offers up for the .338-06, should and can hopefully and safely load accurate rounds.
To the question once again, does the need of the Redding Type S bushing die or the Wilson offer better concentricity when reloading from non-headstamped brass or does the tapered expander in the Redding die set works fine.
I am just mulling before I actually begin loading up some rounds. I have ordered some Wthby .338-06 brass and may order some of Lapua or Norma to attempt this test if you will but this would require a Concentric/runout gage.
Am I fogged in here and is this a myth or do I need to concern myself with this? Any help you offer up would help clear this up with me.

regards,

quote:

I have ordered some Wthby .338-06 brass and may order some of Lapua or Norma to attempt this test if you will but this would require a Concentric/runout gage.
Am I fogged in here and is this a myth or do I need to concern myself with this? Any help you offer up would help clear this up with me.

Some people say you don't need to bother anyway, others tell that when you get a runout of more than .006 inches (measured at the beginning of the ogive), you will see your accuracy will deminish by 1/4 to 1 MOA.
I am using a Bersin Tool, look at www.kinneman.com and I'm shooting sub MOA-groups. My ammo is straight, no more runout than .002 inch at the ogive.
Jan.

thanks Jan. thought maybe I would not get blown by on this but I guess that is the general concensus. I went ahead early in the wee hrs of the morning an ordered the S neck bushing die with a couple of bushings. Who said reloading was cheap? Nothing ventured nothing gained and who you know and not what you know eh?

later

grizz, be careful on the bushing dies,redding addresses this in some of their instructions,if your fired round b4 sizing is .008 or more larger than your bushing,you will actually get more run-out,and it will resize smaller than the the bushing size.They really work best on minimum neck chambers,or do your sizing with two sizes of bushings.like a .004 smaller than fired brass,then the size you want to take it down to.

wtb, good pointer.

I'll second the Jan's vote on the Bersin tool. It not only is a concentricity gauge it will straighten the things too. It's helped me acheive some much better groups than otherwise.............DJ

Not being familiar with the Bersin tool, I can't comment on it, however, I can't complain about the RCBS version. Accurate and versatile, it lets me know when I need to check the decapping stem and other internal die adjustments.

As opposed to a tool to strieghten out an error in reloading, whatever the error may be, it makes a lot more sense to me to find out what is causing the runout and cure it. With all the time spent on uniform neck tension it does not seem prudent to be pushing a bullet around once it is seated.

You still need to try and use the best tools possible to acheice the least runout but it's still nice to be able to make the last final adjustment from say .004 to .001 runout. The nice thing about the Bersin tool is that it's a very accurate guage and can correct small problems. You correct larger errors by correcting your die setups etc. and then make the small adjustments with the bersin tool. You can also correct factory ammo. So far it's been my experience that any change in neck tension has a minute effect in group size compared with the benefits of concentricity. In an accurate rifle your groups might go from 3/4-1&1/4 to 1/2-3/4", some have gone to 1/4-1/2", it's a noticable improvement.
I can't say that improving neck tension consistancy won't help accuracy but I've never seen it demonstrated. I have seen concentricity improvements dramatically improve accuracy.............DJ

quote:

Originally posted by grizz007:
...is this a myth or do I need to concern myself with this?...

As long as you are determined to use "Neck Sized" cases, it probably will be a problem, regardless of all the time you waste trying to compensate for the normally inconsistent "Caseneck Stretch".

Think of the Caseneck as a flat piece of Brass. By that I mean having cut it off the Case, split it and formed it into a Flat piece.

Now think back to your "Strengths of Materials" classes where you performed Compression Tests and Pull Tests. As you Pulled the Sample, it NEVER thins in a uniform way, it always thins at the weakest spot on the Sample. Same-e-same with Seating a Bullet in a Case, the Caseneck will "thin" at the weakest spot and allow some degree of Cant.

So, what to do??? Expand the Casenecks, Turn the Casenecks, and Anneal. Now if you are still Neck Sizing in a "tight Necked Chamber" (cut for Benchrest shooting), it will do OK because the Expansion is held to a minimum. But use the same case in a normal Necked chamber and you still get Run-out because of the material thinning(creating the Cant) at whereever the weakest spot happens to be. And when it does, the only way to fix it(using the factory dimension chamber) is to Re-turn the Necks and Re-Anneal. Of course they are so "thin" now that they split.

Lay in a good supply of Bourbon and just keep fighting it.
---

Or, you could just Expand the Casenecks, use a robust Fire Forming Load, forget Neck Sizing and begin P-FLRing the cases and also totally forget about measuring for Run-out. As a right nice side benefit, the groups are normally smaller than Neck Sizing too.

Best of luck to you.

quote:

Lay in a good supply of Bourbon and just keep fighting it.

I've read so much about this runout and can't decide what the issue is. I've been reloading quite a while and never measured it and can't for the life of me figure why I'd do it. My groups are as good as most and sometimes better and I've never had trouble getting a gun to shoot fully acceptable groups for hunting accuracy.

Maybe we have forgotten what the gun is for in the first place!

If you cannot load a ctg. that has under .001 runout, something is wrong with what you are using or the way you are using it. I have cases that have been loaded over 25 times and have never been annealed, and never been sized by anything other than a Newlon neck die that I cut with the same reamer that I did the barrels chamber with. I cannot remember the last time that the runout has been over .001, and I do check them every once in a while. I am not trying to disagree with anyone, but think that anyone can do the same thing when care is taken in your loading procedure.

You don't HAVE to neck up an '06 case. You can neck down a 35 Whelen case.

No one ever checked the headstamp on my 338-06AI ammo in RSA or Namibia.