Hello all, I'm new to this forum and have just come back to reloading. I'm loading mostly varmint and target loads for .223 rem and wanted some input on the importance of case prep on accuracy. I'm shooting ground squirrels mainly and they can be pretty small, so accuracy is important to me.

So, right down to the question. to keep maybe 1/2 MOA groups with a factory Rem 700 how much time should I invest in case prep. I have about 1000 once fired winchester brass that are relativly uniform. What should I do, and whats going to pay off the most for accuracy?

-Case trim to length
-case mouth inside/outside chamfer
-primer pocket cleaning
-primer pocket cut to uniform depth
-inside flash hole debur
-Neck turning (I'm not currently setup for this but was thinking about doing it)

Also, with my inside flash hole debur tool (from Foster I think) is the goal to simply remove the burr, or to put in a countersink effect? If I use the tool in a electronic chuck I can not only remove any burrs, but cut sort of a countersink in the bottom of the inside of the case, is that a good practice?

Thanks for your time

quote:

Originally posted by MustangGreg66:


-Case trim to length
-case mouth inside/outside chamfer
-primer pocket cleaning
-primer pocket cut to uniform depth
-inside flash hole debur
-Neck turning (I'm not currently setup for this but was thinking about doing it)

Trimming - necessary for function in rifle, affects accuracy very little or none except if you have vastly different lengths which would affect bullet grip
Chamfer - not very important, as long as your case neck mouth does not vary bullet grip by digging into bullet
Primer pocket cleaning - not very important as long as the hole is clear
Primer pocket uniforming - not very important
Deburring flash hole - not important at all
Neck turning - Don't do it unless you have a custom chamber with tight tolerances

IMPORTANT

Bullet seating depth
Concentricity and runout of loads
Case shoulder position and amount of crush fit
Bullet release consistancy
Bullet selection
Powder and charge weight

There are probably others, but IMO you should be able to get your 1/2 MOA without doing anything on your list other than what is necessary for function.

I know I am the odd man out… but I do all of the listed "steps" and noticed an improvement for each step with the exception of Neck Turning.

I also weigh every bullet & charge and use Fed Match Primers.
Honestly I saw no difference between Standard Feds and their Match primers.

I believe there is value to case prep… but I might just have too much time on my hands

My two cents; I believe case preparation is an extremely important ingredient to accuracy. And the reason to case prep is to create uniformity. Also, I believe case prep helps the mental side of shooting. Therefore I spend considerable time prparing cases for my target/varmint rifles. I wash my brass in an RCBS Swinder and oven dry at 170F. Not higher temp because Don't want to anneal case body.

1. Neck size only and "bump" shoulder when chambering gets difficult.
2. I use neck bushing dies.
3. Yes, trim all to length and measure overall length using ogive for bullet seating depth.
4. Yes to chamfer mouth inside to eliminate any bullet deformation while seating. Outside chamfer after trimming to remove burs.
5. Yes, clean primer pocket by using uniform pocket cutter after each load to maintain primer seating depth. Brass flows into this area.
6. Yes, to inside flash hole debur for uniform powder ignition. Only need to do this once.
7. Anneal case neck every third loading.
8. Neck turning controls concentricity and runout, however, if factory chamber only turn enough of neck to clean-up 85% of neck. Not mandatory to neck turn for factory rifle and you can create more problems than you solve with factory rifle because of neck chamber tolerances by turning neck to thin. I do neck turn for my factory varmint rifle.
9. Use best quality brass to start with.
10. Match bullet weight to rifle twist.
11. If have access to chronograph make use of it to finalize powder selection focusing on standard deviation of test rounds.
12. Keep rifle front rest and rear bag consistant.
13. Use proper cleaning interval and cleaning technique.

Bottom line for accuracy: Consistancy, consistancy, and consistancy.

Good shooting.

Imo the importance to case prep is safety (too long cases) and the importance to ID OD case mouth chamfering is to avoid scraping the bullet and all the rest of the things don't mean squat!

If you're a benchrest shooter they might mean something.....but not to a hunter or varminter.

Thanks guys for your replies. It seems there are two distinct opinions on this.

I was wondering temmi, what kind of noticable improvement did you notice from the extra steps?

vapodog - about how many loadings do you get before you see case length trimming as necessary? keep in mind I"m shooting .223

I have to agree w/ vapodog. I have tried my best loads in once fired brass w/o any prep. & once fired w/ all the above mentioned techniques. Accuracy varies more when I switch primers.

quote:

vapodog - about how many loadings do you get before you see case length trimming as necessary? keep in mind I"m shooting .223

I usually buy once fired milsurp brass and trim them to .030 under max and never trim them again.

My .223 rifles are chambered with .001-.002 over my FL sizing die so I see very good case life.

My load is 27.5 grains BL-C-(2) and 50 grain TNT and I know most of these cases are reloaded over seven times and still looking good. I know I've shot some cases twelve times before tossing them for split necks.

When it comes to the .223 case life seems to be spectacular for some reason.....maybe the military brass is better stuff. But I think mimimal chambering dimemsions are more important.

One more important comment is to weight sort your brass and then organize your loads accordingly. This will aid uniformity. The time for testing powder, primer, and bullet varibles are after case prep. Keep two of the three varibles constant in the load development stage.

Good shooting.

I think the best practice is to have a good routing and repeat it. Brass will last a lot longer if you use a die that does not overwork the brass. Mine give me .003 neck tension and I don't use an expander that can create accuracy problems. You have to use it in most dies that squeeze the neck down about .010 and then you have to stretch it back out.

Some people do way more than necessary though. Reminds me of the guy that I played golf with in Monterey that bought all kinds of golf gadgets and a lot of putters but he could never beat me. I took lessons and practiced.
If you want to throw money away on gadgets go ahead but I have 2 rifles that shot in .1s Sunday without weighing brass, and not turning necks and not deburing flash holes.

You will shoot better with lessons and practice.

Greg,you can spend the rest of your life preping cases and the majority of factory Rem. guns will not shoot .5 MOA.
Dwight, if you have 2 guns that shoot in the .1s you should be cleaning up at a BR match somewhere.

I am doing okay and one of the BR guys with his custom BR rifle told me that I had the most accurate factory rifle that he had ever seen. I have two of them. One is a 1982 Rem 700 in 7mm08 and the other is a 1971 Rem 700 action with a 1990 Rem barrel in 7mm08.

Seriously, you should go to a match and shoot in the factory class that most matches have. That a Rem can shoot that well is one in a million. You should consider yourself very fortunate.

I have found most things to not mean much except Primer,powder charge(I do not weigh after setting the Powder measure up).Bullet to lands.I dont even waste my time breaking in Barrels anymore.I look through my Boresope and if the barrel is rough I firelap it.If it doesnt shoot after that its gone.I do Glassbed and freefloat the barrels on all my Rifles.All that anul stuff is alright if your BenchResting,but for Busting Prarie Rats its not needed.

Bob,
I had rather just hand out with the guys at the range and shoot for pleasure. The guy that I got the barrel from keeps trying to push me into matches and I shot with them last week but I don't really want to get caught up in it. I got too competitive with golf and I overworked myself. I played my last round with my neighbor and I shot a 73 and told him that I enjoyed the fellowship but was bored. That was two years ago. I don't want that to happen to my shooting fun. I want to keep it fun. I don't need recognition or trophys. I just like the fellowship with friends.
I have 3 Rems that shoot great. I had a 700ADL in 3006 back in the 70s that did not shoot very good but that is the only one that I have ever seen that did not shoot good. That was before I learned about the importance of bedding and floating and pillars.

You know Dwight, I can see your point. I have had matches that I felt as though I really should go to, and didn't feel like it. I am old enough to have hit the point that I do not shoot in the rain or if it is too cold anymore. Any hobby can become almost a job if you are pushed. I made brass cannons for a while, and enjoyed it until I sold a few and had a dozen guys on my case to get one. You more then likely are smarter then all of us comp. shooters. Good luck and take care.

Mustang,

I missed answering your last question. Sorry about that.

The flash hole deburing tool is to remove any excess brass inside the case that may have resulted from "drilling" or "punching" the flash hole. A few brass manufactures drill the hole to keep down the probability of burs. That potential bur acts as a shield blocking powder ignition on a side of the powder column. So, you want to remove it for uniformity of ignition.

Do not countersink the inside of the flash hole. It is hard to countersink uniformly on all cases and you can remove to much brass. Set your pilot stop to give a smooth even deburing. If you're not using a stop then try to "feel" an even cut. Remember, this is a one time operation. Once that bur is removed it won't come back.

quote:

Originally posted by b beyer:
Greg,you can spend the rest of your life preping cases and the majority of factory Rem. guns will not shoot .5 MOA.
Dwight, if you have 2 guns that shoot in the .1s you should be cleaning up at a BR match somewhere.

Thats a great point, my remington will shoot 1/2" groups if I concentrate. I had a nice croup going on sunday, got excited because it was all falling into one clover and then on my 9th shot I pulled it wrong and it ended up 1/2" low of the group I was working on... I calmed back down, having ruined my group, and had the 10th shot fall right back into the group. I havn't measured but its hovering around 1/2" at 100 yards. Now if only I could come close to that offhand.

I did a test a number of years ago testing the reduction in group size with each individual step and with combinations of several.

The only procedure that gave a significant reduction with you average hunting rifle was deburring the flash hole. You trim cases for safety.

There is a time factor involved with this amount of work also. If your rifle truly gets 1/2" groups, a reduction of 10% will still not give you a full bullet diameter reduction. I don't think you can get that much reduction by case prep alone. The time involved to do 1000 cases by hand is more than I want to spend.

Shoot it, enjoy it, and spend the effort and money on a better barrel when you finally shoot that one out.

I didn't read all the previous responses but my opinion is that 90% of the work in case prep gives you 10% of the accuracy.

quote:

Originally posted by MichiganScott:
I did a test a number of years ago testing the reduction in group size with each individual step and with combinations of several.

The only procedure that gave a significant reduction with you average hunting rifle was deburring the flash hole. You trim cases for safety.

There is a time factor involved with this amount of work also. If your rifle truly gets 1/2" groups, a reduction of 10% will still not give you a full bullet diameter reduction. I don't think you can get that much reduction by case prep alone. The time involved to do 1000 cases by hand is more than I want to spend.

Shoot it, enjoy it, and spend the effort and money on a better barrel when you finally shoot that one out.

Yea, thats the step I was thinking of doing, the nice countersink that the foster flash hole debur tool is pretty cool, and I definitly found some burs on the new brass I had. But the old brass not so much. I think I can go without for now... especially since I already neck sized most of my once-shot lot.

With my 338WM & my Son’s 30-06 From the Bench... Weighing each Powder Charge Groups began about 1 inch +.

After
Case trim to length
case mouth inside/outside chamfer
inside flash hole debur

We were getting about ¾ inch + Groups

After
-primer pocket cleaning
-primer pocket cut to uniform depth
-Weighing & Sorting Brass into .5Gr Lots

We hit a fairly consistent ¾ - ½ + group (My Son is more consistent than me)

Neck turning, I do it but noticed no change

I weigh Bullets, but noticed no real change at 100 Yrds

I do understand this is not scientific… I did groups of things and got results, not one thing at a time… but that’s the way it worked out for met
That’s my story & I’m Sticking to it

Yea, I was thinking flash hole debur sounds like it makes a diffrence and I'll have to get a digital scale before I weight and sort brass, I can't imagine how much time it would take to do it with my current ballance scale.

Good post temmi. That took a lot of effort to conduct your test.

Mustang,

I weight sort using a RCBS 1010 scale. Look at the electronic scales Sinclair International carries if you go that direction.

Before you get too much invested in case prep gadgets make sure the rifle is first bedded and barrel floated. Otherwise case prep is a waste of time.

I agree with ( Woods ) I've tried every single case prep trick known to mankind . I saw very little if any improvement !.


IMPORTANT

Bullet seating depth
Concentricity and runout of loads
Case shoulder position and amount of crush fit
Bullet release consistancy
Bullet selection
Powder and charge weight

I'll add one ; Bullet weight as well as style for twist rate it some times makes a huge difference .

Shoot straight know your target ...