Reloading for 527 in 7.62 x 39

[54rndball]

My 527 shoots the russian steel cased ammo great, but I had to see if I could work up some better reloads with brass cases. That was a epic fail, as the kids say. Put 5 rounds in the magazine and had two failures to fire with light primer strikes, 2 rounds fired, and the last one was chambered but could not be extracted retracting the bolt when a cease fire was called on the range. It fell out of the chamber when elevating the muzzle. In short, I think this brass was not equivalent to the Russian cartridges. I have had success shooting Federal Fusion out of the rifle. So maybe some Federal cases would work. Any other recommendations on brass to use for reloading. The current stock I have looks to be a bust. I think it is PPC. Any advice is appreciated.

[mauserand9mm]

Was this new brass? Sounds like it was undersized (too much headspace).

[Wobbly]

You didn't say which brand the brass was or where you got it. That makes a HUGE difference in bolt-action rifles.


Additionally, if you did a full-length re-size on the brass before loading, then YOU might be the issue. With "straight walled" pistol brass we try to get the Sizing Die to go all the way down to the shell holder in order to "size" as much of the brass as possible. But with bottle neck rifle brass, things are a lot different.



In a bottle neck cartridge, the shoulder is used for "head spacing".... which is really nothing more than holding the cartridge tightly inside the chamber, which then allows a good gas seal. So the brass has to be sized by slowly lowering the FL Sizing Die in very small increments until the bolt closes... but just barely. That resistance you feel is the shoulder of the case being smashed tightly against the shoulder of the chamber... forming a primary gas seal.

It's actually a GOOD thing your cartridge DIDN'T fire, because all that pressure that normally pushes the bullet down the barrel would have come rushing back toward the shooter. In other words, the gas would have taken the easy way out of the chamber... possibly blinding you.


So let's talk about the source and brand of the brass, and how you Sized it.   

[Ron M.]

I reload a good amount of 7.62x39 for hunting or feral animal destruction and 99% of the time neck size only. Usually I need to very slightly trim the cases after each reload, but haven't seen the shoulder move. The cases get reloaded 4 times and tossed. I've had very good luck with Federal brass and don't recall trouble with PPU.

Please note this is ONLY from my 527 carbine. I don't try reloading brass used in an auto-loader, base expansion can be excessive.

[Wobbly]

I reload a good amount of 7.62x39 for hunting or feral animal destruction and 99% of the time neck size only.

True. In a bolt action rifle only.... if the cartridge brass was last fired in your rifle, then most of the time you can "neck size" only. Lee makes a fairly neat Neck Sizing Die that seemed to work for me. Since that die works in a completely different way from a standard Full Length Sizing Die, there is no need for case lube or a lot of muscular effort.

[armoredman]

How old is your carbine? The firing pin spring is known to not ignite some primers reliably, and I replaced mine some time ago. Hard primers generally will give it fits, which is interesting since it will work just fine on steel case Russian junk. I've been shooting nothing but reloads through mine for years, and the brand of brass generally means ery little, except Lapua and S&B are a huge PAIN to get primers seated, especially my CCI ones.
I up the ante too - I shoot powder coated lead reloads, makes people nuts just seeing it.

[mauserand9mm]

I'm thinking now also likely hard primers. I originally though undersized cases since a round got stuck in the chamber (ie too short headspace for the extractor to clip into the extractor groove of the case), but the rifle is controlled feed so the extractor would have had a grip on the case from the start, irrespective of headspace issues, and wouldn't allow the case to get stuck the way it was (bolt could be opened but round stayed behind). I think the stuck round was a feeding fault unrelated to soft primer strike issue.

(I know technically it wasn't a stuck round because the round felll out when the rifle was tilted up. It was a feeding issue - operator or rifle?)

Insufficient headspace can cause ejection failure on a live round if the rifle has "uncontrolled" feeding.