Home Forums Reloading Big Game Rifles Bullet contacting rifling at standard overall length?

I'm reloading 25-06 for a Browning BAR safari using Sierra game king 117 soft point boat tail. I full length sized the brass, trimmed brass and seated bullets to cartridge overall length of 3.160 (this is shorter than any recommendations I can find). They fit in magazine easily but are contacting rifling and causing bolt to not want to close/ fire. I load hornady interlock 117 btsp to 3.200 with no issues. Does this thing just have a really short throat or are Sierra game kings just wierd? Or am I missing/unable to find Sierra recommending shorter overall length?

Are you sure it's not your case shoulder contacting the chamber?

Pretty sure that's not the case since I used brass from same reloading session but with hornady 117 btsp and they functioned/grouped great.

Set your calipers to .257 and use them to mark one of each bullet with the knife edges where they approach full diameter. I'll bet you'll be able to see the difference. Data specifically for the Sierra bullet should reflect the shorter OAL, if needed.

Alliant data for the Sierra shows the min. OAL as 3.110. Hornady gives a COL of 3.160 for the BTSP.

Thanks for that info. I couldn't find Sierra COL load data anywhere. I'll seat them on down and see what happens.

Every different brand and weight of bullet has a different ogive length. Take a sharpie and color the shoulder and ogive of the bullet that should leave a mark were your touching. Might not hurt to do it on the .200 line of your brass also.

Sierra data for 117 gr. Is 3.130 COL.

I've found quite a few Sierra bullets that must be seated deeper than other manufacturer's bullets of similar design and weight. Nothing wrong with that as the bullets shoot quite accurately. Some old loading notes of mine show the Hornady 117 BTSP can be seated with a considerably longer OAL that either the 117 Sierra Game King or the ProHunter. OAL for the Speer 120 is between the Sierras and the Hornady. I've had several .25-06s since 1965, but I think my notes may be for a Ruger 77V that I purchased new about twenty-five or so years ago and still have.

one of the best tools to solve the question is the Hornady OAL gauge its easy to use, measure the chamber once and then any bullet change will be easy to set correctly

If it really is the ogive on the bullet stopping the bolt from closing on a bar I would have to say there would be about 6 notches all the way around the bullet at that point showing the rifling was pushing there. I would be of the opinion that it's a 50/50 deal either it really is the bullet needs to be seated deeper or the shoulder of the brass needs to be pushed back further.

Thanks to all for the information. I'll update within a few days once get to do some more reloading. The BAR is grouping the hornady 117 btsp with Hogdon 4350 right at 1" at 100 yards if I take my time and don't heat the barrel up. Just thought I'd try the game kings since they have a great reputation. Thanks again

Well thanks again for all the replies. I was finally able to take the rifle with me when I reloaded recently and I measured from bolt face to tip of Sierra 117 game king while just touching threads. Also measured by putting bullet into fired brass and closing bolt. It measured 3.108 give or take .001 since my caliper isn't real nice so yeah it has a shorter throat and needs to be seated deeper than manufacturers recommendation. I contacted Sierra and they said it was fine to seat deeper since it isn't a compressed load. I seated them to 3.102 to be safe. I'll be testing for accuracy soon and will update.

If you'll look at the two bullets at the same time you'll see the Hornady is much more trim in the ogive. The Sierra is fatter or more round if that is a good explanation. You just need to seat the Sierra a little deeper until it chambers. While the shoulder might be the problem, if the case chambers as an empty it doesn't have a problem. Sizing it down more just causes other problems. powdr

You really need to have the correct tools to measure what your doing the correct way. You are playing with fire. Can you chamber one of the sized cases? Pull one down if need be to check.

You don't need a tool, outside of a set of calibers and a trigger finger

The cases/resized brass is fine. I reloaded some from same batch but with Hornady 117 BTSP and they worked great. I also checked brass measurements with caliper and made sure they chambered easily. I'll update when I get a chance to shoot.

Finally got a chance to test them now that they are seated deeper and they shot great. Not quite as accurate as the hornady btsp which were right at 1" at 100 yards but the game kings were just under 1 1/2". I've got some nosler partition 115 grain ordered so looking forward to testing them out next. Thanks for all the responses and great information. I'll definitely always check every bullets ogive overall length from now on instead of just going with general factory recommended oal.