.303Br with Cast/Preliminary Results

[robertbank]

I have pertty much settled on 18.5 gr of 4227 under a Lyman 314299 boolit sized .313 in my Longbranch. Accuracy is excellent considering my eyes aren't what they used to be. AT 100 yds I can keep them in a 4" circle if I do my part. Another load that I like is 16 gr of 2400 under the same boolit.

Take Care

Bob

Information

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[10x]

I have pertty much settled on 18.5 gr of 4227 under a Lyman 314299 boolit sized .313 in my Longbranch. Accuracy is excellent considering my eyes aren't what they used to be. AT 100 yds I can keep them in a 4" circle if I do my part. Another load that I like is 16 gr of 2400 under the same boolit.

Take Care

Bob

I use 13 grains of Unique under the Lyman 314299 bullet unsized but lubed with a gas check. This is very close to a max load with this bullet according to the lyman manual. I have found these bullets are more accurate unsized than sized.
I have also found that one martine 303 and two No.4 rifles will cause the bullet to tumble with every cast bullet I have tried. All have bores larger than 0.314".

[buffdog]

.
I'll have to go back through my "Handloaders Digests" to find a good article on cast bullets for most Surplus rifles.

I believe the article was written by C.E. Harris, who contributed many articles to the "American Rifleman", and leaned toward cast bullets. In this article, he suggested a load of 13 grains of Red Dot. I have used this load as a reference or starting load for most military rifles such as .303, 7.62X54 Russian, 7mm Mauser, 8mm Mauser, .308, 30-06, 30-40, and various other calibres of the same case capacity.

WARNING....DO NOT USE THIS LOAD IN SMALLER CASES SUCH AS 7.62X39.

Back many moons ago, when I was shooting targets, I used up a lot of cast bullets in .303 calibre. I had one rifle set aside for cast bullets only, and used it for practice. With proper sight adjustments, I could shoot about as well with a cast bullet to 300 yards as I could with issue Mark 7 ammo.

One critical thing you have to do. Clean out ALL the copper from the bore. If you fire cast bullets, then jacketed bullets or vise versa, you will not get the best accuracy. Really clean out the copper fouling.

I used to shoot cast bullets out to 600 yards with the .303. I used the Lyman 311299, about 205 grains, unsized, and Texaco Hot Box lube (used on railways). The rifle had a minimum bore diameter, the mould cast a 1/15 lead mixture bullet a bit oversize at .314.

I found heavier bullets tend to group better. Possibly the lighter ones do not stabilize well in the military bores. You should slug the bore and measure it. For the .303, I have seen bores running up to .319 diameter. A bullet about .002 oversize has worked best for me under most circumstances.

Lyman MADE a lot of bullet moulds in different sizes. They have cut down to a few calibres now. In the .30 calibres or .303 you could once get .308, .311,.313,.316, and .319 moulds. Also, Lyman moulds can be marked with the number and the letters "U" or "US" or "OS" meaning the mould will throw the bullet UNDERSIZED or OVERSIZED. You can still find the older Lyman moulds on E-Bay.

Lubricator-sizers such as the Lyman and RCBS, etc., do not give the best sizing accuracy. This type sizer pushes the unsized bullet downward BASE FIRST. If the nose punch is not perfectly aligned, it can tilt the bullet and you size more on one side than the other. Also, the older Lyman sizer dies had a step on them. When you pushed the bullet into the die, it shaved off a lot of lead. Newer ones were tapered, and worked better. I found the best dies at the time were home made ones that mounted in a reloading press and pushed the bullet up NOSE FIRST. There seemed to be less distortion to the bullets. LEE later made sizer dies of this design.

I still play around with cast bullets. My latest use is in a 9.3x57 Husqvarna. The larger bores seem to work better with cast bullets for accuracy and hunting. Millions of Buffalo were taken with cast bullets, so they are effective.

The way things are going pricewise and availability of components for reloading, and ammunition, I keep lots of primers, enough powder, and bullet moulds for most of my favorite rifles and calibres. It is a cheap assurance that I can still enjoy firing my rifles if need be.
.

[Warren]

try 11.2 grains of UNIQUE with dacron or kapok filler. Should be able to pick the fly **** out of the pepper at 100 yds but again, all rifles vary. Found this load worked well in most of the ones I tried it in.

[billw_willy]

I use 13 grains of Unique under the Lyman 314299 bullet unsized but lubed with a gas check. This is very close to a max load with this bullet according to the lyman manual. I have found these bullets are more accurate unsized than sized.
I have also found that one martine 303 and two No.4 rifles will cause the bullet to tumble with every cast bullet I have tried. All have bores larger than 0.314".

I'm just now reading this thread on the 303 Brit. I have a #1, #4 and #5 that taught me many lesson on bullet size after I slugged the bores and used Cerrosafe to cast the chambers and throats. The #1 5-groove worked perfectly with the 314299 casting at 0.313/0.303 body and nose, and lubed in a 0.313" size die. The #4 Long Branch 2-groove bore was 0.317"/0.303" and although the 314299 shot OK sized in a 0.314", it wasn't as accurate as I wanted and so I had a custom mould made in 0.318"/0.305" with a 0.318" lube/size die and incidentally this bullet solved the #5 keyholing with the 314299. Temporarily, I shot the #5 with Nabisco Instant Cream of Wheat (COW), granulated, not flake as a filler with a carefully reduced load of rifle powder and this took care of any keyholing. I was so happy I kept pushing the target frame from 50 out to 400 yds and got a 14" group on the 24" square frame. The #5 5-groove bore was of normal 0.313"/0.303" dimensions but the throat was larger and longer than the #4 rifle but tool marks indicated that the throat was not worn. I have not shot a jacketed bullet in any of them although I have some modern factory loads. I had no trouble getting the bigger diameter bullet to shoot in either rifle. I used Lee Collet dies to only neck size in order to preserve the limited brass I had for 3 rifles. The #5 had been "bubba'ed" by cutting off the rear sling attachment and the barrel was blued; all else was about normal other than 4 tapped holes on the left side apparently for a mount of some kind. After having cataracts and didn't know it, I designed a scope mount of aluminum to fit a Weaver base for a scope in order to see better. I now have lens implants and have distant vision vs. severe myopia (that has its advantages) and have to use reading glasses to see the FS. I made a tool to loosen the #4 FS set screw in order to adjust the FS; it is the reverse image of a flat head screwdriver made from a junk screwdriver. The #1 and 5 FS must be forced to move with the proper tools and a vernier caliper is useful to measure the amount of adjustment. I use a drift and mallet.

My powder charges have ranged from 12.0 gr Unique or AA#2(two), 17-4227, 18 gr 2230-S with COW (no airspace!) and all loads were about 1400-1500 fps and comfortable to shoot. I really like these old warhorses and I have a bunch of other military rifles and handguns I load with cast bullets.

I have found some alloys (wheelweights with arsenic) can be hardened with water dropping from the mould or heat treating in my kitchen oven at 450F for 45 minutes and quickly quenching in tap water, aged for at least 30 hours and then lubed and seating of gas checks. I usually add an equal amount of soft lead sheeting lead to my WW metal to get the sprue cuts cleaner and sharper without any tears or bumps. If the bullet needs any major sizing or other forming, it should be done prior to heat treating with gas checks seated (my best method) or immediately after heat treat with gas checks seated and lubed. The hardening process starts within 30 minutes of quenching and final hardness is reached between 30 and 72 hours. An oversized bullet after aging is a booger to get through a size or taper die and I know that for sure.
Bill McGraw