I have never heard of this..Is it ok to pull say a Factory loaded250 gr.nosler bullet from a 338 and replace the bullet with another 250gr.speer bullet of different brand or possibly lighter weight like a 225grhornady. ?Of course the brass would be resized.But would/could the powder charge be wrong or unsafe?AAnyone ever done something similar or hear of this?
Iam not planning on doing it -but never seen the question asked before...

Many years ago, when milsurp WW-2 30-06 ammo was available and cheap, I used to pull the 150 gr. bullets and replace them with the 150 gr. Sierra. I used a Lyman 310 tool to resize the neck and seat the bullets. Never had a problem and the loads were accurate and killed deer well.
You don't have to do a full length resize on the brass, just use a neck size only die with the decapping pin removed.
Considering however, that the Nosler is a very good bullet to start with, why would you feel the need to switch bullets? Just curious.
Paul B.

I was just looking in my reload manual and noticed the lighter weight bullets have higher max loads than heavies.I was just useing the 338 as a example.I dont understand how factory loads are safe in all rifles but reloading manuals say to work up from starting loads.are most factory loads pretty much maximum for a given weight bullet with in a couple grains max?I thought i had heard of the trick you did ,just wasnt sure...i know some of the reloading oldpros here have a lot of good solid answers and advice for us newbies.......Thanks

Replacing bullets of the same weight can still cause pressure spikes with the same powder weight and type. It depends on the thickness of the jacket and the length of the bearing surface of the bullet. I would think that if the bullet used was a Remington factory Power Point or Corelokt and the bullet you were going to replace it with had the same general construction and bearing length you would be OK. As for Paul B's statement that he replaced M-2 Ball bullets with Sierra 150's, I'll go him one worse. I used to replace the M-2 Ball bullets with 168 gr. Match Kings and never had a problem. This is a case of, if you do it and run into a problem, I won't take responsibilty for it but, I would try it myself. Powder is cheap, however, compared to a blown firearm.

I've never done it but I've heard its common practice down in oz to replace the bullets in milsup ammo with proper hunting bullets. Chicken littles aside, I can't see how it could be any real problem.

We used to do it back in the day, they called it "Mexican Match" ammo.
The reason factory ammo wokrs in just about everything, is it is generally downloaded a bit from what max. you can achieve. You could do this but why? Just handload your own recipe, working up of course.

Grab an old reloading handbook and it was simple 150grs was any jacketed bullet that weighted 150grs, they did not say 150 gr nosler or speer or sierra, I for one can't see where the thickness of a jacket or the conture of a bullet will change the pressure of any load as long as your with in the stated powder charge and if it does it's not enought pressure to matter, but I never load higher then book and 90% of the time i'm at least 2 grs under max.

In many of the old reloading books 4831 did not say H or IMR just 4831 same went with 4895 4350 and other powders.

quote:

Is it ok to pull say a Factory loaded250 gr.nosler bullet from a 338 and replace the bullet with another 250gr.speer bullet of different brand or possibly lighter weight like a 225grhornady

as long as you replace the old bullet with a bullet of similar construction this will work...

Don't go putting Barnes in place of Hot cores or other conventional bullets.

US1, your old reloading manuals have little to do w/ reloading current production powders. Nice collectors items but powder formulas change a bit ever few years. I buy at least one new manual every couple of years, new powders, new calibers, etc.
A note, the current Nosler manual shows the same load for all of it's bullets in a given weight. The only time you need tobe really carefull is when you are loading near the max.

Yes you can.. But I would only do it when I can replace the factory bullet with a bullet of the same weight, type, shape and seating depth.

iwzbeeman,

There was a time when alot of Aussie shooters used 303's or wildcats based on it. About 13 years ago a friend bought a case of surplus 303 ammo which was loaded with 150 gr SP's.

I pulled one of the bullets and found that it was loaded with Cordite, so it must have been quite old.

He is an avid pig hunter and never experienced any misfires or problems with that ammo.