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A Reference on Reloading

Introductory Materials

• Intro to Reloading
• Projectile Naming Abbreviations, essential reading if you don't know FMJ from BTHPW/C.
• If you don't understand what a loaded round consists of, read Anatomy of a Bullet.
• About various "22" calibers - 22LR, 223, and 5.56mm.
• For 223 / 5.56mm cartridge related questions, read http://www.ammo-oracle.com/body.htm
• Tumbling Brass
• Making Time to Reload

Overview of Available Reloading Gear

• Reloading Gear Checklist
• Capabilities of Various Reloading Machines - what range of calibers each machine can handle.
• Brands of Reloading Dies - about the current vendors, and the general differences between their dies.
• About Chronographs - about the current vendors, and what their various chronographs provide.
• Annealing Techniques and Equipment
• Casting Bullets

Maintenance and Upkeep of your Equipment

• Organizing your Reloading Workspace
• Cleaning a Vibratory Tumbler
• Cleaning Deposits from Reloading Bins
• How I tapped out a stuck case from a die

Reviews of Specific Items

• RW Hart's Bullet Puller
• Lee's Perfect Powder Measure
• Forster Co-Ax Shot Show Preview

Reference Material for Reloaders

• Brass reference
  • 223 / 5.56mm brass reference
  • 6.8SPC brass reference
  • 7.62x39mm brass reference
  • 45ACP brass reference
• Reloading Cost Analyzer javascript applet.
• Shopping for reloading supplies
• Caliber Conversions on the Dillon 650
• Interactive Caliber Conversion Application
• A collection of powder manufacturers

Notes on Specific Calibers

• 5.7x28mm
• 7.5x55mm Swiss
• 7.62x45mm Czech (but 7.62x45mm Indonesian gets mentioned too!)
• 50 Beowulf
• 50 DTC / 510 Europ (almost, but not quite, the same cartridge)

Cautionary Notes

• If your primers are seated 'high' - i.e. they're protruding from the back of the round - it's entirely possible that in a semi-automatic rifle, the firing pin may strike the primer before the bolt has locked into battery. The results would be what's known as an out of battery discharge, which is almost guaranteed to damage your gun and may even blow it up, sending parts of it into you.
• Double Charges - if you're loading with a single stage press or dippers, it's fairly easy to accidentally forget what stage of loading you're at, with a pistol cartridge, and dump another charge into it. Given that you've just given it twice the normal powder charge, you should not be surpised if your gun becomes a hand grenade. This is unlikely in rifle cartridges, as they normally take so much powder that a double charge would spill out the top.
• Light charges - Similar to double charges in effect, but this affects rifles as well. It is possible to have a load light enough that the powder lays more or less horizontal in the case. When the primer fires, a jet of flame is sent over all of the powder at once. Instead of a controlled burn, you have a detonation that can kill, even when the bolt is locked into battery correctly. Such a load is reputed to have blown the bolt backwards out of a bolt action rifle, into the skull of the little girl who was shooting it, killing her. Her father had decided he was going to set up some gentle, light 223 loads for her to shoot, without knowledge of what a light charge can do.

Obtaining load data for your ammunition

http://www.reloadersnest.com/

However, contributors to thegunwiki.com are welcome to keep logs of their reloading activities on this site for the benefit of others. These logs will, by their very nature, include load data and performance results. No guarantees are made by thegunwiki.com as to the safety or function of these loads, as we have no control over what people write down.

-- SeanNewton - 16 Aug 2006