Reloading for 7.5 Swiss: tips, tricks, suggestions?

Mine likes Hornady 165grn SP bullets over a mild load of H4895. Unless you like lots of extra work, make sure you pick up some boxer primed brass. It takes forever to load the Berdan primed GP11 casings.

Use the Redding Dies. DO NOT BUY THE LEEs! The Lees are sized for the K11 chamber and will give you nothing but issues with your ammo. Once I switched to the Redding FL sizing die, no more issues. Had tons of failure to fire with Lee dies or chamber wouldn't close. Mine likes 168gr Sierra Match Kings over 4320. I've heard 174gr Berger VLDs closely approximate the GP11 bullets. Prvi brass is good to go for reloading, and Wolf ammo uses Prvi brass anyhow. Its a crying shame the GP11 brass isn't boxer primed because it looks like really good stuff!

Will also add that the K31 is VERY sensitive to OAL, most the data in the books are too long and again for the K11 chamber. Recommend loading up a dummy round at the book value, trying to chamber it and working down a bit at a time until you can get the chamber closed. The serial # on the bolt should be at 12:00 and the back of the bolt should be flush with the receiver. You'll love the K31, the trigger breaks perfectly and you can drive tacks with it.

Tagging for followups.

I'm just about out of boxer primed 7.5 swiss factory ammo, and plan on loading some of my brass for it for the first time.

I've used the Hornaday 155gr A-Max over Varget with great success in my K31s. Starting load from 41gr., I keep velocities mild to keep recoil down, don't need full military ballistics to punch holes in paper at 200 yards.

COL to suit your rifle, I found this combination also shoots close to the factory sight settings.

I just posted photos of the tool I use to remove Berdan primers from GP-11 brass. If you know anyone that has a metal lathe it shouldn't be that difficult to come up with something similiar for removing the spent primers. After that, prep work on GP-11 brass is just about the same as Boxer primed military brass.

http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=701145&referrerid=96988

Lee dies will work

I have loaded hundreds of 7.5 Swiss cartridges for my K31 using Lee dies. What I learned is that when sizing the bottom of the die must come into contact with the shell holder. There can be no light between them. On the cheap Challenger press I use this means giving the sizing die one more complete turn in addition to what the instructions call for. If the cases are sized correctly you will not experience failures to fire. Lee dies (being cut for the 1911 chamber) may work the brass more but they do work for K31 loads.

My match load is a Hornady 168 gr A-Max over 47.4 grains of AA4350. I am using Prvi Partisan cases and Wolf large rifle primers.

Jenrick said:

Parker51, when you get a sec can you mic the diameter of the decapping rod?

Thanks,

-Jenrick

Click to expand...

It measures .308 and should be slightly rounded on the end so it starts easy in the brass.