Handloader. Mugazine. . Thomas J. Riddles. ... Don Zutz. .. Wallace Labisky.. Jim Carmichel. . John Wootters. . Maj. George Nonte

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1 er 29 %b. 1971

2 Handloader Mugazine DAVE WO LF E Publisher NEAL KNOX Editor ROGER T. WOLFE, Ph.D. Associate Editor MAJ. GEORGE C. NONTE JR. Associate Editor NORM LAMMERS Technica A dviser HOMER POWLEY Ballistics A dviser JAMES D. CARMCHEL Cast Bullets PARKER. ACKLEY Wildcats & Gunsmithing WALLACE LABSKY Sho tshells JOHN WOOTTERS Gun Tests HARVEY A. DONALDSON Historical Adviser KEN WATERS "Pet Loads" EDWARD M. YARD General Assignment DON ZUTZ General Assignment BOB HAGEL Hunting A d viser JOHN BUHMLLER African Cartridges DAVE LeGATE Production BARBARA LAFFEY Circulation Manager JANE CLARK Asst. Circulation Mgr. T NA TAYLOR Data Processing ROD GUTHRE Staff Artist POLLY STARBUCK Editoria Assistant ROY STARBUCK Promotion Jan.-Feb., 1971 Vol. 6-No. 1 Box 33, F'rescott, Ariz Features: Handloading, the.45 ACP. H- 1 in the 28 Gauge.. World's Hottest Handloader Long-Range.357 Magnum Weigh Your Powder Charges 'nside' Nosler Bullets... Little Things Mean a Lot. Crimpless Shotshells... New Weatherby 'Vanguard' Short 2-Gauge Magnums. Are.35's Brushbusters?.. Departments: John W. Rockefeller.. Wallace Labisky.. Jim Carmichel. Robert M. Milek Ken Waters Neal Knox. John Wootters. Thomas J. Riddles.... Bob Hagel.... Don Zutz. Maj. George Nonte Editorial.. 6 Propellant Profiles Lock, Stock, Barrel Answers Please 61 TiptoTip. 1 ProducTests. 63 Reader by-lines Harvey Donaldson The HANDLOADER. Copyright 1971, is published bi-monthly by the Dave Wolfe Publishing Company, P.O. Box 33, Prescott, z Arizona (Also publisher of Rifle Magazine.) Telephone (62)? Second Class Postage paid at Prescott, Arizona, and additional mailing offices. Single copy Price of current issue $1.. Subscription price: six issues $5.; 12 issues 59.; 18 issues Outside U.S. Dossessions and Canada 56.. $11. and Recommended' ioreign single copy price. $i.25. Advertising rates furnished on request. Publisher of The HANDLOADER is not responsible for mishaps of any nature which might occur from use of published loading data, or from recommendations by any member of The Staff. No part of this Publication may be reproduced without written permission from the editor. Manuscripts from free-lance writers must be accompanied by stamped self-addressed envelope and the publisher cannot accept responsibility for lost or mutilated manuscripts. Change of address: Please give one month's notice. Send both old and new address, plus mailing label if possible. to Circulation Dept., The HANDLOADER Magazine. P.O. Box 33, PieScott, Arizona Official Publication of Santa Earban, Reloading Association Your January-February Cover Like sparkling gold, clean brass rolls out of the Thumbler Tumbler. Tumbling, of course, is only one method of cleaning cases, but has proved very satisfactory in the handloading lab at Wolfe Publishing Co. This particular unit is available from J & G Rifle Ranch, Turner, Montana. Color transparency by W. T. Willis. 4 HANDLOADER - January-February, 1971

By Maj. George C. Nonte ppec:mon 144 Van Ness Ave, South Lans~ng. N Y 14882 by Outdoor Sportsmen 1 SANDER MOUNTAN, NC..O. Box 6, Dept. HL Nilmot, Wisconsin 53192 le,... rush my NEW, FREE No.

3 By Maj. George C. Nonte ppec:mon 144 Van Ness Ave, South Lans~ng. N Y by Outdoor Sportsmen 1 SANDER MOUNTAN, NC..O. Box 6, Dept. HL Nilmot, Wisconsin le,... rush my NEW, FREE No. 11 Catalog. NAME ADDRESS CTY STATE ZP *USA. only-foreign request (ref. only) rend $2... Also send a FREE Catalog to my friend... NAME ADDRESS CTY STATE ZP 1 HE QUERES WE VE GOTTEN T over the years on military surplus ammunition would fill the back room to the ceiling. They range all the way from the fellow who wondered why his decapping pin stuck in Berdan cases (it pierced the web and stuck there) to why all ammo isn t packed in the 2 or 5 round cartons used in the U.S.A. More often, though, questions have been about price, quality, safety, components used, etc. By far the most common has been (and still is) How can tell if it has corrosive primers? We ve answered that as well as possible in past editions, so won t go into it here. People buy military surplus, (a) because it s cheap, and (b) sometimes it s all that s available in a particular caliber. n the former instance, we have the 3-cents-per-round 9mm and 8mm ammo that used to be offered; in the latter, items like 7.35mm Carcano and 6.5X53R Mannlicher. Unfortunately many shooters seem to be under the impression that surplus ammunition is top-grade stuff; that it should conform to the same standards of performance and safety they are accustomed to in fresh commercial fodder. This is especially true of US..3 Carbine,.3-6, and.45 ACP where they feel the surplus item is even superior to the commercial. Well, lads, let me tell you something that shouldn t be a deep, dark secret. Surplus ammo is not better than fresh factory stuff. The mere fact that some military ammunition is made to higher standards than the commercial item doesn t mean that all are. Nor does it mean that those originally superior items are still so when sold as surplus. Think logically for a moment. Why does ammunition becomc surplus? There are several reasons. First, if it is declared surplus by a government quite likely it: (a) no longer meets performance and reliability standards; (b) is obsolete because of caliber or weapons changes; (c) there is simply too much of it on hand; or, (d) a particular loading has been found to be unsatisfactory for mechanical reasons in some new weapon. n (a) above, no other government wants the sub-standard ammunition, so it is sold at whatever price it will bring to international organizations who eventually sell it to you. n that case you might get anything from 1 percent misfires up through 1 percent reliability. Such ammunition is generally a good many years old, may have been owned by several different countries and may have been stored and shipped under unfavorable conditions. n short, to some degree it has deteriorated. Also in this category is relatively new ammunition which through some quirk passed acceptance inspection, but exhibited faults in the field. An example is one lot of 7.62mm NATO tested a few years back. n the field it produced occasional misfires (due to no flash hole) which had not shown up in acceptance testing. t was condemned and sold quickly and wound up on the surplus market here. t was superbly accurate, but those misfires killed it for military use. n any event, in (a) above, you may expect substandard performance-that s why the stuff is so cheap. nstances of substandard performance may be rare, perhaps only one in several thousand rounds-you may never encounter them, but they will occur. n (b) above, the ammunition is perfectly good-and in such instances, it is often sold or transferred to another government which can use it. t will bring a higher price that way than on the civilian surplus market. An excellent example of this is some of the.33 British ammo sold surplus when Britian WANDLOADER - January-February, 1971

and other.3o3-armed countries converted to 7.62mm NATO. The situation in (c) above seldom occurs except at the end of a major war when vast stocks have been generated.

4 and other.3o3-armed countries converted to 7.62mm NATO. The situation in (c) above seldom occurs except at the end of a major war when vast stocks have been generated. t existed for a decade after World War 11, but not today. The situation in (d) above seldom occurs and then only by accident. An example would be the quantities of ball powder.223 (5.56mm) ammunition produced in this country which later proved to produce undesirable results in the M16 rifle. Note, though, that ammunition wasn t dumped on the surplus market; it was relegated to training use where its behavior was not hazardous. Neither is a split neck, substandard velocity, slight primer or case leak, incipient case separation, poor or non-existent reloadability, etc. ve seen all of these defects and more, dozens of times, in surplus ammunition. n all fairness, though, we must admit that generally the importers describe surplus ammo fairly. And they usually make good on anything out of the ordinary. f it s loose or repacked, they say so; if it gives a high percentage of misfires, they say so; if it s in sealed original containers and of recent manufacture, they say so. They also price it according to condition and quality as determined by their tests. The best stuff comes high, the junk is cheap. Then, it might be that the ammunition in question was never accepted by a government, perhaps even have been rejected as substandard. n that case, the maker might prefer to dump it on the surplus market, especially if it were already in official-looking packages that gave the impression it had been government property. n some countries this is possible, in others not. But where it is, the maker won t burn that pretty new stuff and sell the brass for scrap unless he must. On the other hand, a commercial manufacturer or a government arsenal sometimes does find itself with hundreds of thousands of rounds of brand-new ammunitionrfor which no requirement exists. Perhaps production scheduling has screwed up; or contracts have been cancelled. t may then be sold on the surplus market-but if so, will certainly command a high price and is likely to be snapped up by another government needing same. So, in the long run, if you want recent-date, boxer primed, n on-corrosive, brass-case ammunition that is bright and clean in original packing, you ll pay through the noseand probably have little trouble with it. t will cost substantially more than the cost of handloading comparable ammunition. One more comment regarding safety. We have had reports of guns damaged by surplus ammo. As near as can recall, they involved ammunition from a single source which has since been exhausted and were caused by split or perforated cases. n 2 years or more of surplus ammo, that s not a bad record. i Du Pont Explosives Dept Room 8889 Wilmington, Delaware Please send me the Du Pont Handloader s Guide, including loads for Hi-Skor 7 X Name- ~ Street City- Statep-Zipp Better things for better living L-,,-, A through chemistry 1 So, you can see that the chances of getting perfect, first-grade surplus ammunition are rather slim. Especially if you shop for the lowest prices. On the positive side of the ledger, the reputable importers do take precautions to insure that they don t sell dangerous ammunition. Generally, they have numerous pressure/velocity tests and function in g t e s t s c on duct e d by in dependent laboratories and consultants. t is only logical that they do so; after all, lawsuits by injured shooters could wipe them out overnight. However, those tests are for safety only. A misfire is not dangerous. REDDNGHUNTER, NC. THESE ARE JUST A FEW of the many flne reloading tools made by REDDNG. All are expertly designed, precision made and fully guaranteed. We ve been making them that way for over 2 years! Ask your dealer - he should know! For rifle, pistol, and shotgun. Send for FREE catalog on HANDLOADER - January-February,

you re not Old Fashioned if you still weigh your powder charges! By Ken Waters OES ANYONE KNOW what it takes to qualify as an expert in this reloading game-especially a nonsensical expert?

5 you re not Old Fashioned if you still weigh your powder charges! By Ken Waters OES ANYONE KNOW what it takes to qualify as an expert in this reloading game-especially a nonsensical expert? Maybe m one, being foolish enough to still believe in that out-dated nonsense of using a scale to bring powder charges to a uniform weight for better accuracy in handloads. At any rate, if that s what it takes to qualify as such, then d better admit to it because after doing it for more than twenty years, m not just being stubborn in saying intend to continue the practice-and for what consider to be good reasons. First of all, m well aware of what bench-resters do and do not do and why. As one who tests loads and components from bench rest during some forty-odd weeks of each year, (that is, when not 4 hunting) naturally make it a point to be familiar with the most advantageous procedures. also know, however, that bench rest shooting is a specialized sport or skill quite apart from other forms of shooting, with its own techniques and modus operandi, and as the old game of Schuetzen shooting was different years ago. Precisely as the equipment varies with the many forms of shooting, so do methods, and those 28 which are suited to reloading for bench rest maximum accuracy shooting are not necessarily appropriate for average reloading. An example of this is the practice, popular among breech-seating benchresters, of using a single cartridge case for an entire match, reloading it at the bench between shots. For just about all other forms of shooting, this is obviously impractical. Getting down to specifics of the case in point, would observe that a typical bench rest shooter uses cartridges of comdaratively small capacity, loading them with ball-type or other easily- metered small granule powders. n many instances he will be found using a Belding & Mull powder measure, which has a separate, graduated charge tube. With this type of measure, bridging of granules is eliminated, and ball powders especially measure out with great uniformity. Under these conditions where variations between charges may run no more than one percent, it is admittedly feasible to load cases directly from the charge tube without weighing each time. However, this is far from being an average handloading situation, and John Q. Shellpacker should not be led to believe that because the bench-resters use this system it must be all rights for him to do the same. Big capacity cases stuffed with coarse-grained slow-burning powders thrown from a rotary-drum measure produce an entirely different situation. Checking on an accurate scale will quickly show substantial variations between such charges, capable of materially affecting pressure, thence velocity and bullet strike. By no means an uncommon occurrence, this type of situation calls for the use of a scale to verify the powder measure s performance and to balance out loads. Even with a Belding & Mull measure, the handloader should check to see what charge he s getting at each reloading session-for at least a couple of very good reasons: (1) The setting of his measure may have changed. can recall several incidents where a check with the scale has revealed a wrong setting of the measure. HANDLOADER - January-February, 1971

(2) A change in lot number of the powder being used can sometimes make a substantial difference in the weight of charge measured out with a given powder measure setting.

6 (2) A change in lot number of the powder being used can sometimes make a substantial difference in the weight of charge measured out with a given powder measure setting. Just recently, saw an example of this while working with two different lots of 4831 powder. At such times, it is the weight of powder that governs the potency of a load rather than its volume, and all any measure can be expected to control is volume. So far, we ve discussed weighing charges solely in relation to accuracy, but checking charge weights on an accurate scale has another even more important purpose-as a safety precaution against excessive pressures! t should be understood that the typical bench rest match shooter generally operates in a load zone with which he is highly familiar and which is seldom maximum. His concern is therefore one of maximum uniformity rather than maximum velocity. The field shooter, by contrast, in his never-ending quest for higher velocity and flatter trajectories, frequently loads up against a ceiling where an additional half-grain weight of powder inadvertently loaded can easily mean a spilling-over of pressures into the danger zone. Frequent checks on a scale are his best protection against such an occurrence, and this writer has made it S.O.P. to check every maximum load on a scale. t doesn t take long at all; just dump the powder from the B&M charge tube or other measure into the scale pan, and if it checks out within one to two-tenths of a grain-which it will most times (except with coarse-grained powders)- empty the pan into your funnel. Time lost, perhaps 5 seconds per round. t s the best and cheapest insurance know of, and doesn t hurt accuracy either, believe me. Finally, if you re still in doubt, have a series of pressure and velocity tests run on your best accuracy loads in comparison with a couple of loads you ve found to be not-so-good. When you see for yourself the greater uniformity of recorded pressures and instrumental velocities delivered by the load which has already proven most accurate, think you ll be convinced that consistency in charging cases can make a difference. Now since handloading is my specialty d like to comment on a couple of HANDLOADER - January-February, 1971 other statements ve observed recently in print, again pertaining to the practices of bench rest shooters. consider it poor advice or even inference, when directed to the average reloader s attention, to discuss minimum neck tolerances in a rifle s chamber as a seeming advan- Check your powder measure setting every time you sit down to load. Do you KNOW what the last setting was? Lot number characteristics vary; a setting for one lot may throw a heavier or lighter charge of another lot of the same powder. ALWAYS weigh charges when working in the *maximum range. You might be lucky to come away suffering ONLY from surprise. tage, whether by reason of increased accuracy or the elimination of the need for a resizing die! Those of us who have been experimenting with rifle accuracy for twentyfive or more years are well acquainted with the special tight-throating and chambering methods tried out, particularly with.22-caliber varmint rifles during the 3 s and even much earlier. Yes, they provided fine accuracy then as now-when cases were selected, prepared and loaded by a skilled reloader who knew exactly what needed to be done and took the time and pains to do things just right. Because tight-throated chambers will raise pressures, require otherwise unnecessary steps and precautions in re.. loading, and possibly even prevent an occasional cartridge from chambering under conditions of field usage, feel that handloaders should be warned specifically NOT to have their custom rifles so chambered. There is also the distinct possibility that case necks not resized will fail to grip a bullet with sufficient tension to hold it firmly in place. Lastly, a word concerning the use of hand dies. t should be clarified, think, that the hand dies used by bench resters are not better because they re handoperated, but because they are precision reamed for minimum sizing, thereby eliminating over-working of brass and the case neck distortion that often occurs with standard assembly-line resizing dies. Given a tool-mounted die made with equal precision, used in a quality bench press with accurate ram alignment, see no reason why cases can t be accurately resized. t s a matter of obtaining precision-made tooling, rather than any magic connected with hand operation. This is what self-centering sizer dies and those custom-made dies based on sample fired cases from an individual rifle s chamber, are all about. Nothing have said here is to be construed as criticism of bench rest loading practices. The sole purpose of this treatise has simply been to point out that for most handloaders, certain of those methods are ill-advised and best avoided. The specialist generally knows the tricks of his trade (or hobby), but most of us arc better off sticking to accepted and proven standard procedures. 29

Load Development. Brian Pearce

Load Development. Brian Pearce Load Development Brian Pearce In I 1964 the U.S. military adopted a new service cartridge known as the 5.56mm Ball Cartridge M193, while Remington announced the.223 Remington cartridge, a commercial version,