Bullet Seating Depth

[Lost Sheep]

Originally Posted by larzb93

Bullet Seating Depth
anyone have a good method to determine your bullet seating depth. i have heard so many of them but need one that works! Shooting a Remington 700 Target Tactical 308

Are you asking
1) how to determine what seating depth is best for your rifle or
2) are you asking how to determine the seating depth of a particular cartridge
3) are you asking how to pick what seating depth to use for a particular load.
?

I a not sure I know how to answer any of these as well as the other people who have posted here, but I wonder which of the various interpretations these guys applied to your original post when they formed the answers.

Lost Sheep

[Roland Thunder]

Originally Posted by Rangefinder

Assemble a dummy round and seat the bullet very long with just enough neck tension that the bullet doesn't move freely inside the neck. Chamber it. It wil hit the lands and push back into the neck. Eject it, measure it, and then adjust your seating die to it. Then make micro adjustments deeper to keep the bullet just off the lands. THAT is your maximum OAL according to chamber. Now, max OAL according to magazine may be somewhat shorter.

Will this method work for semi-auto's or just rifles. How about the Hornaday OAL tool, is that just for rifles?

[Brian Pfleuger]

"semi-autos"... You mean handguns?

No need for such a thing with handguns. You just use the barrel. It's a lot easier on guns with little tiny, removable barrels.

Semi- auto rifles (and levers) have a different version of the Hornady gauge that goes around corners.

[FrankA]

I used to play with bullet seating depth and found no improvement in accuracy being closer to the lands or farther back. Ended up going by simple factory overall length measurements and the loads always grouped just as well. Of course I was loading for hunting and not splitting hairs on a target. Per Warbirdlover

It depends on the bullet shape whether the seating depth affects the accuracy according to the Berger Bullet site. The tangent shape is not sensitive and the secant shape is very sensitive ( I think I have that correct , have CRS) .So if you were using the tangent shape bullets , it would not make a big difference . I just hunt also but do try to split hairs mainly for fun, but more importantly if I do get a long shot , that slightly larger group at 100yds, if I do not split hairs, becomes an unacceptable group at 3-400yd. Like I tell my friends, it also keeps me off the streets and out of bars with all the time I spend trying to perfect the best load for each bullet I can find

[jepp2]

I used to play with bullet seating depth and found no improvement in accuracy being closer to the lands or farther back.

This may be true for you, but this isn't true for most.