OK, I got these dies???

W

William Suter

Well-known member
I don't have a rifle yet and not sure if I ever will but I have these dies, 17-223. How do I use them? I have tones of mixed 223 so messing up a few is no big deal.
My dies are RCBS and I have a FL size, neck size, seater, form and trim. In what order should I use them? Figure i have them should know how to use them.
 
When I was in high school, my friend and mentor had screwed together a mod. 98 Mauser and a brand new Mod 1917 Browning MG barrel which he inletted into a burl walnut stock blank, ready for shaping & finishing. He sold it to me for what he had in it and "helped me" (really let me help him) complete the first .308 Win. in this end of the world.
Brass was not readily available for the .308 at the time, so we formed .308 from readily available M2 ball brass by running through the form & trim die, then the FL sizing die. Did not have a neck sizer but did have to run inside neck reamer to thin the necks. Not sure if you're moving the neck back far enough on the .17 to affect wall thickness or not????
 
I have a bunch of brass I have gathered from the club. All different brands. I thought I would at least get to know what I was doing. Its an interesting round and I like light and fast so who knows?? LOL.
 
How much, if any, are you shortening the case, Bill? That is key as to whether you need to thin the neck area a bit.
 
From what information I gathered, case length should be 1.76. I got my form die set and case length with once fire LC after running it through the form die was 1.764. You can just barely see it above the die. I did about 6 pieces of brass. I shouldn't have. LOL, this is gonna cost me money. Such a cool looking little case. I was thinking abut rebarreling my Sako but I also have a No3 Ruger in 22 K-Hornet that might just be the ticket.
 
I measured two case before running them through the form die. One was 1.762 and came out 1.775. The other before was 1.752 and came out 1.759, so the are actually stretching a little.
 
That's good; you won't have to ream the neck, all you need to do is trim a few thousandths and you're ready to FL size. All you need now is a pair of tweezers to handle bullets and a rifle to shoot them in. :ROFLMAO:
The .308 was, of course, 1/2" shorter than the 06 so I was getting back into the thicker case wall.
 
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