bullet seating ?

R

rebs

New member
When reloading 223 Remington. When the seater die seats the bullet it does so by the ogive right ? Not pressure on the tip ?
My question is when you get the seating die adjusted for a 55 grain bullet seated by the ogive, why can't you leave the die set the same for a different 55 grain bullet ? You would get a different measurement of over all length but the distance of the ogive from the rifling would be the same, right ?
 
U

Unclenick

Staff
That would be so if the seating ram contacted the ogive way down where the throat of the barrel contacts it. However, most contact the bullet a bit higher up to avoid the bullet wedging into the seater ram. As a result of seating up higher, if two bullets have different ogive radius values the final distance off the lands for the part that does contact the lands will be a little different when you use the same seater setting for both. Nonetheless, once it is set, you should be close to where you want to go and adjustments, if needed, should be small.

If you want to check where your seater ram is contacting your bullets, just paint one with Magic Marker and let it dry before seating the bullet. You will get a mark on it where contact is made. Once in awhile, with a long bullet nose, some seater rams may contact the tip, leading to uneven ogive location. Lee will modify a ram for you if this is happening with their Dead Length Seater. Redding makes special rams for VLD shapes for their Competition Seating Dies for this reason. Forster offers custom seater rams for their Benchrest Seater Dies when a customer has a bullet that doesn't quite work with the standard ram.
 
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M

MosinM39

Moderator
Very good explanation by the moderator. Bullet designs and dimensions vary, even among what are supposed to be FMJ mil spec bullets.
 
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