Need a source for MILSURP .303 Brit ammo

[goon]

I am cheap but I am planning to pull together the cash for a pound of 4895. I already have some .311 123 grain bullets on the way and I can also swipe a few Hornadys and Winchester bulk 123 grain bullets from my brother.
I am hellbent on working up a reduced load for my SMLE that will give me some kind of life with my brass. I would be happy to get to 4 or so loadings at this point and I would be utterly ecstatic with six loadings.
Anyway, I am thinking that with a lighter bullet and less powder I should be able to work up a load that duplicates the trajectory and range (more than less) of the 180 grain handloads that I am currently using as my hunting loads. I'd love to get something worked up that will work on a pie pan or so out to 200 yards.
I'll let you know how that works out when I get a chance to try it.
I really like that old SMLE but it ain't cheap to shoot and it is determined to eat brass like you wouldn't believe.
Just hope I can outsmart it...

 

[Rob62]

goon,

I've gotten at least 4-6 uses out of the brass using the gallery loads I make. Now these are probably not as hot as you want but here's how I get these number of loads.

First off I only resize the neck. I adjust my resizing die until only about 80-90% of the neck is resized or just short of where the shoulder starts. This is easy to see if I do it with the brass still dirty from firing. I've also played around with opening up the flash hole a bit using a drill bit. I first heard about this tip from reading an article by CE Harris (IIRC).

SAFETY NOTE - if you open the flash hole you can only use the brass with these reduced loads, NOT full power of semi full power loads.

I know that even with resizing the neck only you still work harden the brass up front so I've played around with re annealing (sp) the brass. It has worked for me. However, I have never done any comparisons with non re annealed brass to see how many more loads I can get by doing this.

Here's some info on the web about brass annealing.

http://www.logicsouth.com/~lcoble/dir7/articlef.txt

http://yarchive.net/gun/ammo/case_annealing.html

Good Shooting,

Rob

 

[goon]

Rob62 - I only neck size my .303 brass too. I am using an RCBS neck sizing die. I do have some brass that I got for free that I had to FL size (with a set of Lee dies that I got for $12), but I adjusted the dies so that they were only kissing the shoulder enough to make it chamber in my rifle.

The problem with my brass is that upon firing it gets a noticeable bulge right about where the case head ends. This shows up sometimes after the second firing and sometimes after the first firing. I am trying to work up a load that will start with lower pressure and maybe not stress my brass as much. If I can come up with something like that using a reduced charge and a 123 grain .311 bullet I might have a half decent plinking/varmint load. I am sort of thinking something that will roughly approximate the 7.62x39 ballistics out of my SMLE. I have 30 peices of virgin brass that I am going to try this with when I get enough change scrounged up for a pound of 4895. I was told that it is generally the best powder to try this stuff with because it keeps a consistent burn rate even with a charge as low as 60%. I would have liked to found some data for the powders that I already have used but you gotta work with what you got I guess.
Anyhow, I'll let you know how that works out too when I finally end up being able to try it.
Might be awhile though with Christmas coming up...

I also have some .310 diameter 90 grain bullets that were pulled from 7.62x25mm rounds. They might end up finding their way into a backstop too.

 

[rbernie]

The problem with my brass is that upon firing it gets a noticeable bulge right about where the case head ends.

Uh, I may be completely off base here but I coulda sworn that this behavior was a sight of excessive headspace.

 

[Zeke Menuar]

Uh, I may be completely off base here but I coulda sworn that this behavior was a sight of excessive headspace.

Enfields have a rear locking bolt that is a little spongy. Some Enfields have their chambers cut a little big to help functioning under battlefield conditions. Enfields are going to strecth cases as a result of the design. There are replacement bolt heads available(if you can find them) that are used to adjust headspace. My No1MkIII shoves the shoulder quite a bit forward compared to a new factory round.

ZM

 

[rbernie]

Having the fire-forming of the cases shove the case shoulder forward is expected. But bulging at the case HEAD should be viewed as far mo' serious than just fire-forming the brass to the chamber. I'd have the headspace checked, post haste.

 

[Rob62]

goon and rbernie,

My fired brass also gets a noticeable bulge right about where the case head ends. My headspace has been professionally checked and is OK.

As previously mentioned Enfield chambers are notoriously cut big so that dirty and damaged ammo could still be chambered and fired in combat conditions. I believe the chambers are cut wider than other combat rifles of that era. My previous FTR'd No4MK2 also displayed this characteristic with fired brass.

Sites like the below linked offer good reloading info. Goon – you may find a load using the powder you have on hand.


http://www.303british.com/, http://www.reloadammo.com/ and
http://www.chuckhawks.com/303British.htm,

Regards,

Rob

 

[rbernie]

I've never seen an Enfield chamber that would actually leave a bulge in the case above the head. That doesn't mean that they don't exist - it just means that I've not run into that yet.

On the left is a stock 303R round (PMP brand), the center brass is from my No4Mk1 and has been fired and neck-sized six (6) times, and the brass on the right is from my No4Mk1* and has been fired/neck sized eight (8) times.

You can see the shoulder pushing forward slightly as the case fire-formed to the chamber, and you can see a faint wiff of expansion just above the case head (most obvious in the center brass as a slight burnished look). But certainly there's nothing about this brass that can be termed a bulge and nothing that would cause the case to NOT be capable of withstanding multiple reloadings. These rounds are generally set up to push a Sierra 180gr spitzer backed by either 48gr of RE19, 41gr of RE15, 47gr of H414, or 46gr of H4350 - all of which are pretty stout loads (reduce by 10% and work up) but all of which should be within spitting distance of normal pressures in both of my Enfields.

Both of these rifles have been checked for headspace by me, by the way, and are between a GO and NO-GO gauge. I actually have a collection of bolt heads ranging from #0-#3 - the Mk1 uses a #2 while the Mk1* uses a #0, the #3 and #1 heads were bought to deal with any 'aging' of the receivers.

Andrew Wyatt - the brass in the pic is the PMC stuff that I was talking about. You can see that the relief cut above the rim is thinner than the thickness of a rim. This is why I use this lot of PMC brass - it doesn't tend to 'hang up' the rims in the rim relief the way that, say, the PMP brass on the left can.

 

[goon]

rbernie - Thanks.
My brass usually doesn't have the "bulge" after the first firing. All but 50 rounds of mine is once fired Winchester Factory. I have 20 new cases loaded with 180 grain Speer RNSP bullets over 42 grains of Win 760 with a CCI LR benchrest rifle primer. They shoot well and to my point of aim at 100 yards and I have no doubt that they will KO a deer. I worked these loads up in once fired brass and there were no signs of any trouble other than the slight bulge after the second firing. I have seen poor headspace before and in every case I saw the primer also backed out slightly. I didn't have that.
That leaves me with about 50 rounds of once fired that I got free and 30 peices of Win virgin brass left to experiment with.
I haven't noticed the bulge on most of the once fired factory stuff that I fired in my rifle, but I almost always find it on the second firing. It looks just about what you have in your photo, almost like the marks left by a FL sizing die. I generally can't really see the bulge, but I can feel it when I run my fingers over the case near the case head. It had me scared before. I have read enough about the loose chambers on the Enfield that I figured that was the cause.
I just figured better safe than sorry and pitched the questionable brass.
I am thinking that I am going to take my rifle to a smith and get it checked as soon as possible. I am also thinking that I am going to find out what bolt head I have now and look for the next tightest size. Even if it isn't totally necessary, maybe I can put a "tighter" bolt head on and get myself some better case life out of it.
If that can be done safely, that is.

 

[rbernie]

maybe I can put a "tighter" bolt head on and get myself some better case life out of it.

The most expedient way that I've found to check headspace was to go one size up on the bolt head and then cycle (not firing - just cycling) all of my brass thru the rifle. For example, my Mk1 will easily close on a no-go gauge with a #1 bolt head, will close with minimal (almost no) effort with a #2, and will stop short of closing (with easy pressure - no forcing) with the #3 bolt head. Ah ha, says I - I need to use the #3 bolt head. Only when I did that, I found that maybe one case out of ten would have a rim just thick enough to make the bolt a bit hard to completely close. It didn't take a huge amount of force to close the bolt in these instances, but it was clear that it wasn't quite right. Stepping back to the #2 bolt head restored enough headspace to allow for the occasional slightly thick rim.

Considering that I can buy a replacement bolt head for the cost of one no-go gauge, were I to do this again I'd strongly consider NOT buying the go and no-go gauge set and just buying the next size up bolt head. In that instance, I'd set the headspace by installing the upsized bolt head and seeing if the rifle/brass would cycle it without issue. If so - run it. If not - keep the head for a rainy day...

Anyway, if your bulge is similar in appearance to the brass in the pic - I can tell you from experience that you can get many more reloads out of the cases. Just tumble the cases between loadings and do a quick once-over of each case to check for cracking in between reloads. I had been tossing the cases after 8 reloads, but I'm thinking that I'm gonna keep reloading 'em until I start to see signs of case distress. It'll be kinda interesting to see when the brass finally cries 'uncle'.