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Old March 30, 2006, 09:04 PM   #1
drdirk
Senior Member
 
Join Date: July 1, 2004
Location: houston, tx
Posts: 179
Unable to resize for antique mauser??

I have an antique 1891 argentinian mauser that was converted at some point to 308 caliber. The gun is in great shape and it looks like whoever did the conversion did a nice job.

It shoots well with factory ammo and I have had no problem loading 3 different kinds of factory ammo so far.

Given that the action is so old and that 308 may be too much pressure, I started reloading some ammo with 37 gr of 4895 and whatever bullet I had lying around. To my surprise non of my reloads would fit the chamber. Thats when I started to check empty brass in the gun and noticed that NONE would fit ?!?!

No big deal I thought, since I had shot the brass in my other guns and they were resized to my other 308 rifle, I figured that I just need to turn down my Lee resizing die. Guess what, after trying 4 different kinds of brass in my Lee resizing die, I was still unable to close the bolt! Even with the die turned down as far as it would go!

My reloads are certainly within specs and I have always used my Lee die to load my 308 hunting loads.

So, what is the problem here? Is factory loaded ammo really so much "smaller" than SAAMI spec???

This is what I could come up with as my options:

1. I can try to shoot some brass thu the gun and then reload it. This probably would work but not for long since I am unable to full lenght resize them afterwards with my current Lee die. Besides, it defeates my original goal of NOT shooting much factory thru it!

2. Find a die that can resize to a smaller size... any suggestions?? Are the lee dies somehow on the large size?? I guess once the shellholder hits the die, that is it and I can't push the shoulder down more.

I am loading on a single stage RCBS with Lee dies.

Thanks for any suggestions!
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