C.O.A.L well over book recommendation for .308

my savage likes bullets seated out long, not like that though

you'll have to seat bullets way out there to reach the lands in most production rifles

I have a factory Remington that has to be seated to 3" to touch the lands with most bullets. Don't bother chasing the lands unless you know why you're doing it and that it's applicable to your intended use.

Gunner27 said:

I'm handloading .308 cartridges for a Ruger American. I've compared many books (Hornady X edition, Lee, Lyman) and the max C.O.A.L is far too short for my rifle. When I run a dummy round down into the chamber and get a measurement I end up running the bullet into the case where the cannulare is an 1/8" from the case mouth. Anyone else experience this?

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So you are saying the cannalure is into the case by 1/8" ? That does seem short. What is the measurement ? Is it within SAMMI specs, between min and max ? If so that is your rifles COAL for that projectile.

-jeff

I seat all my Lee cast bullets (113g, 170g and 200g) to 0.300" seat depth. The throat in my 788 is 0.309 and having several 10th's of an inch of 0.309" driving band causes the bullet to line up perfectly in the chamber before the bullet engraves into the lands. That makes the C309-200-R bullet 2.866" which is longer than SAAMI spec, but they still fit in the magazine and shoot beautifully.

All that matters is that the loaded cartridges fit in the magazine, feed properly and jacketed bullets do not jam into the lands. The rest is up to you.

As long as you are not jamming the rifling or falling out of the case, I would load as long as you need to in order to get proper function. For repeaters I usually load to mag length for function. Many rifles have a lot of free bore, but it is not always a problem. Some bullets are picky about proximity to the rifling, but many are not. My AMAX loads for instance, as far as I can see do just fine at book length or .005 off the rifling. BOTH lengths shoot plenty well for my purposes. Benchrest shooting may be another ballgame, but as far as practical shooting I would not worry if my cartridge had some jump to the rifling.

When I load bullets with a cannelure, the cannelure is always some distance out of the casing. I never crimp rifle cartridges, so it doesn't matter.

Of course if you're loading for a tubular magazine you generally want to crimp into the cannelure.

Orcon said:

I have a factory Remington that has to be seated to 3" to touch the lands with most bullets. Don't bother chasing the lands unless you know why you're doing it and that it's applicable to your intended use.

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Well said. Would add that re: Weatherby/Howa...all bets are off regarding chasing lands.