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Old May 19, 2012, 08:24 AM   #14
Slamfire
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Join Date: May 27, 2007
Posts: 5,261
You know bolt gunners get away with sloppy ammunition practices that will absolutely jam a semi automatic. These guys get used to beating their bolt handles down with rawhide hammers, or knocking them open with 2” X 4” 's never questioning the problems they create by neck sizing, or partial neck sizing.

Function is always better with properly sized cases compared with cases that are an interference fit in the chamber. As you are experiencing, an interference fit in the chamber will cause stiff loading and even after firing, are so jammed in the chamber that they cannot be extracted. I carry a cleaning rod to rifle matches and that cleaning rod has had an exceptionally long career knocking fired cases out of competitor’s match rifles.

Look you have a gas gun. The first thing you need is a cartridge case gage, you can see two types in my pictures. The first type is a Wilson gage. Wilson gages are cut large between shoulder and base so you can drop a fired case inside and get a rough measurement of chamber headspace. The other pictured gage is a reamer cut gage. This gage was cut with a chamber reamer and is exactly the same dimensions as a rifle chamber.

The next thing you need is a small base die. Standard sizing dies do not necessarily size cases enough for them to drop in the chamber. This can be a safety issue in semi automatic mechanisms.

I rummaged through my brass bucket and found two fat fired cases. These cases were obviously fired in a military chamber. As you can see one will drop in the Wilson gage, the other is clearly an interference fit in the reamer cut gage.







This case was sized in the standard Lee Sizing die.


As you can see, a standard sizing die did not have sufficient case reduction for the case to drop all the way in the reamer cut gage.

God help you if you are firing these cases in something like a 308 Garand or a M1a. If the bolt has to stop, to crunch the case to the chamber, you have created the ideal conditions for an out of battery slamfire. This much case head sticking out of the chamber was similar to the 30-06 rounds that caused two out of battery slamfires in my Garands.

One of those out of battery slamfires blew the receiver heel into my face, shattering my shooting glasses and cutting my face.



Both cases sized in a small base die will drop right in.

The next thing to do is stop crimping bullets. Bullet crimping does not improve accuracy and it causes malfunctions when the crimp buckles the neck, and it also buckles the case shoulder. You can’t see it, but buy a reamer cut gage, and you will see the interference due to buckling when the case won’t drop all the way in.
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