Home Forums Reloading Big Game Rifles 243 Win reloading issue

Loading for my grandsons marlin xs7 in 243 win. Using once fired Hornady brass and 100 grain hornady bullets along with new Hornady dies. Full length sized 100 cases, cleaned, charged and seated bullets like I have been for 40 years. Rounds won’t chamber. So, I made some dummy rounds, full length sized and trimmed to 2.030, seated bullet, round won’t chamber. About the only thing I can figure is this rifle will require a small base sizing die, but very open for suggestions as I have never experienced this in many many years and many multiple calipers. Am I missing some this simple.

How much did the case head to shoulder distance change from before sizing to after?

See if a resized brass will fit prior to powder and bullet. If it will, then your bullet is jamming into the lands preventing the bolt from closing. The last rifle I bought was super short throated. I have to seat those bullets WAY down in the case.

CKAT. Thanks, I already thought of that and initial seating depth was slight below a factory load. No luck, but that suggestion makes perfect sense

Maybe measure the "width" of the neck without bullet and with bullet? Thick neck/slightly over diameter bullet combination?

A few thousandths

Which way? If it shortened then that shouldn't be the problem.

Problem solved guys, thanks for all the suggestions. For 40 years I put the sizer die down to touching the shell holder. In this case, I finally touched the shell holder then turned the die down another half turn. Chambers perfectly. Now I have to pull 100 bullets and do it all over,

If you have a 308 die [better yet 7mm08 or 260] pull the expander/decapper out and run the loaded rounds into this. This will move a bunch of the shoulder, maybe enough to chamber.

You didn't say which rifle the once-fired brass was fired in. It sounds like the brass was fired in a different rifle. Always try the sized brass in the chamber before going farther in reloading, especially if the brass came from a different rifle. You can buy a shell holder that will allow brass to enter the sizing die farther.

Which are those? The Reddings are made in increments of increasing height which correspondingly decrease how far the brass goes into the die.

I have done this with my 308 die.

My 308 die does double duty as a 7-08 body die, my 7-08 die ... as a 260 & 243 body die. Works great.

I had the same problem when I bought a Ruger Hawkeye ultralight 7mm-08. I have had a Rem 7600 for several years and the brass from the 7600 wouldn't chamber in the Ruger after I FL resized it. A 1/4 turn down with the die solved the problem.

If one encounters this issue in the future, a solution is to use a shell holder from the same manufacturer to match the dies, or one with a lower height.
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I believe Redding used to catalog shell holders of varying heights, or one can machine a few thousandths off the current unit.

Or, if you don't have access to a lathe or mill, fasten a piece of 1500 grit wet/dry sandpaper to a piece of flat glass and slowly work the top of the shellholder down, measuring frequently until you achieve the needed shoulder bump.

Ed

That's a typical 243 problem. If some of your rounds still don't chamber, it's because the inside of the neck needs lube. The 243 has a long sloping 20 degree shoulder, when the ball pulls back through the neck it pulls the the shoulder forward if that makes sense.

A Redding Body die would allow you to bump the shoulder back, without having to pull the bullets...

or you can do the suggested using a 260 or 7/08 die with the spindle pulled out... like us cheaper guys who figured out that after buying a couple of Redding Body dies...

Try a neck sizing die.

Most reloading manuals suggest 1/8 or 1/4 cam over when setting up your FL sizer. 1/2 a turn is probably a bit extreme. But hey, if you're happy with that go for it.