Quote:
Originally Posted by Mississippi
One of the reasons I began seriously reloading was because of a .338 Lapua Magnum.
I started with the RCBS starter kit that came with a rock chucker supreme, 5-0-5 scale, hand primer, uniflow powder measure, and some other stuff.
Some advice.
Buy Lapua brass. It will last longer and give better results. Without annealing, at max load pressures, I got 9 reloads.
the 300 grain match king and 300 grain Lapua scenars gave me the best accuracy without having to worry much about seating depth. The hornady 285's were ok, but didn't group as well as the match kings or scenars.
Retumbo powder gave the most consistent results for me.
My rifle has a 1:10 Twist so if yours is slower, i don't know how the 300 grain bullets will perform. I did find that the lighter bullets like the 250's and even the 270's didn't perform as well as the heavier 300 grain bullets.
I couldn't get the Berger's to shoot in that gun and still feed from the magazine so I gave up on them. They might work fine if I had been content to single load, but feeding from the mag was a requirement.
Some folks recommend using Federal 215 primers as they are hotter, but I found CCI-250's to work great with 91 grains of powder. My load is right around 2,880 fps with a 27" barrel.
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Mississippi, question for you.
I have been purchasing sellier and bellot 250 grain ammo to plink with before I got the reloading kit. Seemed to get good accuracy out of it considering how affordable it was.
I saved the brass. Before I start loading premium lapua brass, do you think it'd be a good idea to clean the sellier brass up and start with that? I figure it gives me something to practice on.
I ordered 200 lapua 300 grain scenar bullets (they were out of the lock base) and I have like 20 sellier brass. Possible/safe to reuse it?
Also a bonus question. Do you think I should get a crimper for the neck of the cases? From what I've read so far it seems with bolt action you don't need to worry about it. I have an m1a scout that eventually I'll reload for I'm sure so maybe it's worth it? I know it's probably not the case but I'd hate to have bullets falling out of cases or getting pushed in lol