In other words, chambers cut to standard SAAMI specs? If so, then military chambers are also "reloader friendly" if I am not mistaken.
some are, some, not so much. Remember that SAAMI is a voluntary organization of SPORTING ARMS and AMMO Manfacturers, and SAAMI standards are not necessarily military standards or other nations standards.
One of the most famous military "unfriendly" rifles isn't a US rifle, its British, the SMLE, in .303 British.
And, it also shows the possible differences between military specs and commercial ones. Generally speaking SMLEs are often referred to as having "generous" chambers which is a polite way of saying "oversize". The explanation usually given is that the chambers are cut a bit large, to allow battlefield mud & debris "somewhere to go" and not overly hinder the working of the action.
This works ok for the .303British, because the round headspaces on the case rim, and as long as that space is in spec the rest of the chamber being "generous" doesn't harm functioning. The result of this, for the reloader with one of those rifles is that, the combination of "generous chambers" and normal resizing works the fired brass a lot and case life is short because of that. It is the unusually short case life that, to me, puts it in the "not reloader friendly" group.
Exceptions do exist, of course, and interestingly enough, COMMERCIAL .303 British rifles rarely have "generous" chambers, so case life with normal reloading methods is the normal average.
I found the HK 91 to be "unfriendly" to reloading, and curiously it was NOT the fluted chamber. It was the fact that the rifle wanged fired brass off the rear edge of the ejection port hard enough to seriously dent the case body with a sharp "crease" at the bottom of the dent. This worried me as a potential failure point if the case was reloaded. Addition of the "ejection port buffer (a hard rubber block) reduced the depth of the dent and removed the knife edge crease and cases were reloadable and functioned well.
Reloader "unfriendly" guns are not impossible to use with reloaded ammo, they are not "reloading impossible" they are just "unfriendly" meaning more work (brass prep) is needed than more "friendly" guns.
I do realize that the 9mm/40 cases bulged by a relieved chamber are reloadable, but personally I'm not comfortable doing so, I feel the extra stretch of the brass and where it is means the case is more likely to fail sooner than one fired in a "standard" chamber.
Do note that succeeding generations of GLocks and similiar guns have reduced the amount of "relief" in their chambers from what was originally made. Think there might be a reason for that???
