Home Forums Reloading Varmint Rifles 17 Fireball

What Did you find for dies? If you are working with Redding or RCBS you most likely will get along very will with your bullet seater die after removing the bullet seater stem. Design of the Hornady bullet seater die does not lend itself well to this preforming operation.

I and many others have done have used the bullet seater die for a 1st of 2 die process for necking down 221 brass with good success.

Note: Polishing the inside of both the full length and the bullet seater/1st form die with flitz polishing compound will improve the function of these dies for forming purposes.

http://www.varmintal.com/arelo.htm#Polish

+1 on the use of the seater. I have one fully collapsed 221 case, sitting on my bench, where I tried to neck it down in one step.

I later used my 20 BR FL die for the first forming die and then the 17 cal. seater die, worked slick.

Hunterapp, thanks for the link. I visited Varmint Al's page many years ago and always polish the inside of my new dies with flitz. The dies I found are Hornady so it's likely I'll need a forming die, I suppose unless I can find a seating die somewhere.

To make sure I understand, you are using a 221FB seating die with the stem removed for the 1st pass at reworking 221 brass to 17 and the final stage with the 17 FL die?

This was my method for making 17FB from 221. Run the case into the 221 sizing die with the expander removed this reduces the neck to the smallest diameter possible with my equipment. Then run the case into the 17FB seating die with seating stem removed and finally into the full length 17FB sizing die. Still lost a few cases especially if I hurried the process a little. Since that time I purchased a 20 Vartarg rifle and now use the 20VT sizing die as an intermediate die and case loss has been zip. Without the 20VT die I would be tempted to buy a used set of 204 Ruger dies and shorten the sizing die to use as the intermediate die,

If forming from 223 brass cut to length the 221 bullet seating die is where I would start. When forming from 221 as you have mentioned I start off with the 17 Fireball bullet seater w seater removed. if that makes sense.

I have went the form die rout also. still have the Redding form die. Shoot me a pm if interested in the redding form die.

My 17Mach IV/17FB experience is with an Encore/MGM rifle setup first and now a Rem 700 SPS Sporter and in addition to the powders mentioned I also had some success with Reloder 7. I have mostly used the 20gr VMax and the now discontinued 20gr Berger but am starting to play with the 25gr VMax now that I have a 9 twist.
I haven't had to form cases yet but I feel that day coming soon with the status of brass production lately.
I had a friend who swore by the Bullberry double-ended form die for stepping down the necks while making 17 Ackley Hornet cases. It seemed to have a more gradual transition that made for less neck collapsing with the thinner Hornet brass.

1K.

Thanks for the information JSH. I appreciate it.

I had one. It worked great. I sold it because someone wanted one more enough to pay more than I'd spent on the gun, brass, dies, etc. Despite more than getting my money back I regret getting rid of it.

The rifle was a standard 700 blued SPS, nothing fancy. I put an aftermarket trigger in it and threw on an old Leupold 4.5-14X AO in dual dovetail B&R.

I used Remington brass and Remington 7-1/2 primers. I settled on H335. I don't remember what I shot with the 25 grain bullets, I mostly shot 20s ... 20 grains with a 20 grain bullet, easy to remember. 5 shot groups were around 3/8ths of an inch.

After about 100 rounds, copper fouling completely ceased.

Tom

Thanks Tom.

I did find some ammo so it's now on the way and when I get home from this trip I'll be putting some glass on it and seeing what she'll do.

Do any of the factory 17FBs stabilize 30 grain bullets?

Yes. The Remington 700's have 1-9 twists so shoot 30's well.

I've been using a .17 MachIV for nearly 20 years. It's my favorite PD. rifle. Mine has a 1:9 twist, shoots the 25 grain bullets better than 22 or lighter. I got the best accuracy, by a little, with the original 25 gr. Hornady and H335, but the higher B.C. of the 25 gr. Vmax, and cleaner burning of Viht. N133 won me over. I suppose I'll have to go back to H335, though, because I haven't seen any Vihtavuori powders for quite a while.

As I mentioned in a post early on, TAC works really well in the .17 FB/MV, and is fairly available right now. It's far cleaner burning than H335, as well as very temperature resistant.