Thread: About to start reloading... What consumables?

Originally Posted by shooternz

If you get into subsonic loading with Trail Boss use standard primers and don't drill out the primer hole like some people say is a good idea it's not,
Light bullets are not good in .303's the throat is too long the original bullet was a 215 gr RN later a 174 pointed flat base, in most of them the barrel is well worn
stay with heavier bullets even 150 gr some times don't work well, get the barrel slugged so you know what you are dealing with not many are close to the original spec
of .304"/.313" bore/ groove diameters but they can still shoot good enough for bush hunting and plinking,
start out with a 150 gr bullet in the .308 every bullet manufacturer makes a least one I have shot 150 gr bullets from Speer Hornady Sierra Norma all are accurate you don't need fancy
match bullets unless you get into serious long range competition, If you get AR2206H you can use it in both calibres and with cast bullets AR2208 is better with long barrels and heavier bullets
don't start out with to much stuff it will get cluttered enough in a very short period of time, pick a bullet that your suppler has a good stock off and learn to reload with it doesn't matter what brand
they are all good just don't run out or you have to start from scratch, Buy the Lyman reloading manual it's as good as any and has cast bullet data none of the other manuals do.

Thanks for that, I did manage to slug the barrel and then try and measure the slug.... not the easiest with 5 grooves, best I can tell is that it is somewhere between .311 and .314, the rifling doesnt look that flash at the chamber end but it did seem to shoot the 180gn Winchester rounds ok. Which leads to another interesting observation, it seemed that the Whincester brass was lighter than anything else I had on hand so I weighed some (and to have a play with the powder scales), with a sample size of one of each Win 166.5gn, PPU 171.1gn, S&B 181.7gn and FC 169gn, maybe thats why the Winchester brass is down the bottom of the list for reloading 303