Fun with a 41 Swiss

[smlemon]

Re: belted cases, no I'm not in charge but do have knowledge of them that can also be found by any reader of classic British rifle texts and has even been covered several times in Handloader.

Belted cases as designed by H&H way back when were designed to headspace on the belt. That allowed the case body to be made considerabley undersized. As those were the days of hunting with corrosive primers, cordite powder in nasty, dirty wet places trying to kill animals that fought back, the ability to chamber a round was rather important. You might also note that the British 303 military cartridge used a rim for the same reason and cases bodies are considerably undersized.

Take a look at a 300 or 375 H&H rifle from back in the days that spent it's life on Safairi.
Chamber and bore may be no thing of beauty but when you slammed the bolt home it closed. The "odd" shapes of those old timers like the 300 H&H also contribute to slick as a greased banana feeding.

Reloading was almost unknown so the condition of a fired cartridge either belted or military was of no interest.

Fast forward to post WW II. Almost all cartridges headspace on the shoulder. There is no rational reason for any hunter who maintains his rifle with all the modern wonder products to have a belted cartridge.

However, the cartridge companies producing belted cartridges still headspace them on the belt. When fired the cases expand to fill the chamber, mostly stretching. That weakens the case. Non reloaders don't care, those who do and know it is best for any cartridge to headspace on the shoulder take measures to ensure it does.

All new belted brass is checked for proper chambering as is.

Passing this test, the necks are then opened up to the next caliber. I do all my 300 H&Hs (5) and 300 WinMag (1) to 8mm using a Lyman cast bullet neck expanding die.
(annealing the necks is wise)

Next they are fed into a the original caliber FL sizing die. Moving the die gradually down, you reduce the neck back to it's original caliber. The objective is to create a "false shoulder" ahead of the factory one. It's a test and try procedure until you can just close the bolt with positive resistance. Now the cartidge is headspaced beween the bolt face and the false shoulder. Fire a full load and you have case perfectly fitted to THAT chamber. Neck size only and the cases last forever. If they eventually chamber hard, just touch them with a shoulder bump die. Trimming a bit short never hurts anything either.

This 300 H&H was made in 1948 and still happily uses brass marked "300 Magnum" as back then there was only one ..... one was enough and still is.



Hope some knowledge was passed along.

[Patrick Chadwick]

Thanks for the explanation. What you are doing is similar to my treatment of cases for reloading - deliberately incomplete necksizing, to leave the fire-formed shoulder untouched AND to leave a very short "neck ring" that helps (???? well I think so) to center the loaded cartridge in the chamber. Your method seems to me to be even better, in that the case will be better centered for the first firing.

[smlemon]

That's also true. Back in the day when the 25-06 was still a wildcat, we made cases from LC NM 30-06 cases. Necked down to leave a false shoulder, filled case with 50 cent a pound war surplus 4831, carded it off and seated an 87 gr Sierra SP.

His was a redone P17 w/a 1.25" 28" bbl, mine a commercial FN with a 1.5" 27" bbl. Never lost a case, popped a primer, killed a zillion chucks and eventually set the barrels back 2" and killed a zillion more chucks. (also a lot of feral cats).

Both sat in Heter's "seconds" stocks that we inletted and glass bedded. Crude and deadly.

His wore a 14X 1.5" Unertl mine a BalVar 6-24 that I still own.

Still use the same method with my 22-06 except with expensive Redding collet neck sizing dies. A deadly killer on deer sized game with a barnes TSX @3650 fps. Have yet to recover a bullet.

It's the bottom one, the upper is a 6.5x55. Both built by RF Sedgley in the mid 1930s and refreshed by the late Dick Collins.

[mmppres]

now those are some great looking pieces of wood

[smlemon]

Will happily admit to buying guns just for the wood.

The most interesting one is the remington above the 3 single shots.

Bought from an estate in Illion, probably a "lunchbox" rifles as the action is 721, the barrel 257 Bob (722) and the stock a Premier grade (never used on an unengraved rifle) that had a slight defect in the wrist (now repaired invisably).

[smlemon]

The history of belted cases is that they were developed back in the day of nasty powder and corrosive primers for rifles used in damp dirty places (Africa and India). Chambers were often dirty and/or corroded. Cases that headspaced on the shoulder could fail go chamber with bad outcomes for the hunter. H&H in their genius, came out with the belted case to allow headspacing while allowing the case body to be undersized and the shouder to be set back. As nobody reloaded back there back then, the stretching and swelling of the case was not a problem. Fast forward to modern times. Chambers, powders and primers are all clean. Belts are relics and not needed BUT ammo manufacturers still rely on the belt for headspacing and the cases are still undersized and the shoulder too far back. Easily fixed by necking up new cases, say 300 Winmag to 33 caliber. Then neck down to 30 but not all the way back. You want to create a false shoulder for the case to headspace on. Bolt should close with some effort. Then when you shoot it, the case is fire formed, fitting the chamber perfectly. This method of case forming is hardly "new news" and can be found in hand loading texts back to at least the 1920s. While I am not "in charge", I have been handloading for almost 60 years and own/have owned many rifles where cases had to be "made". I hope some find this information useful to extend case life in belted cartridges used in bolt action or single shot rifles.

[jamie5070]

What 320 gr bullet are you using and what is the length of your brass? I have fire formed my brass with 240 gr bullets but haven't gotten anything in the 300 gr size so I can use the magazine.
john

[smlemon]

The bullets I am using I bought at a gun show 20 years ago. Down to a few and will start using NEI 429-335-GC-DD and has the wonderful NEI front driving band that aligns the bullet with the throat. NEI molds are expensive but when you can buy a four cavity gang mold that is +- 2/10 for all four, you have something.

The rifle also shoots well (2 moa) with the Berry 240 gr 44 hollow point.

There are also a bunch of heavy 44 cast bullets available from Midway if you don't cast.

Make you cartridges 2.2 " long and almost anything will work.

[smlemon]

.44 Caliber Bullets Available From Penn Bullets

the 320 gr one at the bottom.

Kills things very well.

https://www.milsurps.com/vbpicgaller...do=view&g=1073

(can't seem to get the photo to embed, pls click on link)

[browningautorifle]

They're not always fully finished and ready to load, most will require FL sizing

I've had to do that many times too. Size before loading and check for OAL.