Fireforming .223 brass for my chamber with pistol powder and maybe filler?

[BHuij]

I have a bolt gun in .223 that shoots great with j-words, and am working on closing down group size as much as possible. To date I've only been running full-length sized brass, and I think shooting brass that's been fireformed to my chamber and then carefully sized so as to only bump the shoulder back 1-2 thousandths would make a noticeable difference.

Primers and powder are impossible to find right now of course, unless you want to pay 1000% normal market value (literally saw a brick of CCI 400 SRPs for sale yesterday from an online retailer for $234 + hazmat + shipping... disgusting). Unfortunately there's no way around needing to use a primer for fireforming. Powder however... well I have a couple of pounds of Accurate #2 that I have never been impressed with in any pistol load I've ever tried it in. Using that would let me preserve my dwindling supply of good .223 powder.

Burn rate of AA#2 is a hair faster than Unique and actually somewhat slower than Red Dot. I see cast .223 loads around various websites and forums in the neighborhood of 7.5ish grains for both of those two powders, both yielding velocity around 2k FPS. If even Red Dot doesn't cause a dangerous pressure spike in a .223 case at that load, that would suggest to me that AA#2 at that charge weight should be safe too.

Only concern is that 7.5 grains of AA#2 (a particularly fine/dense powder) is probably something like 25% case fill. Hence the idea of using the minimum amount of dacron I could get away with to hold the powder down against the primer, so I can avoid hangfires, bad ignitions, etc. that could result from powder being that loose in the case.

Reddit has ripped me a new orifice for even suggesting a pistol powder AND filler in a .223 case, never mind the charge. Is this as stupid of an idea as these people are making it seem, or could this be done safely with AA#2? I have some 2400 powder as well that I could use, and the loads I see for cast .223 over 2400 are more like 11 grains, so I'm guessing I'd be okay with no filler there. However, I actually have other uses for 2400, so if I can get the same results (50-100 cases of fireformed brass) with AA#2, I'd rather use that.

Anyone done this before and have some wisdom?

 

[fiver]

4 grains will push a 60gr cast bullet some over 2,000 fps.

JMO but when fire forming new cases I want to use a full pressure load, it's the only chance you get to align all the molecules properly.
whether you get there with a fast powder or a slow one doesn't much matter, but you do want to get the pressure up there.

the Dacron won't do anything pointing the gun up in the air won't do, but you need some back pressure so the pressure is used to expand the case, a load of powder and Dacron won't do that.

 

[Rick]

I've fireformed many thousands of 223 brass into 7TCU. Never tried anything like your suggesting, I used my normal 7TCU load and made sure the ogive contacted the shoulder so the firing pin didn't move the round forward and change the position of the shoulder. Worked great for me.

 

[RBHarter]

There's the faux shoulder method also . Neck up to 243 then size just until the bolt will close firmly shoot a load as above 5-7 gr of Unique I think and a 62 gr .

There are 223 neck dies available . Probably the best bet .

 

[Spindrift]

I’ve shot quite a bit with various pistol powders in my .223. This has generally worked very well. I have never used a filler or powder positioning agent, and I have never used Accurate #2. Based on the listed burning rate alone, I would not have any reservations to a load around 7 grs with a 60-ish grain cast bullet.

If I’m not mistaken, this is a ball powder. I generally avoid ball powders for reduced loads, due to their compact nature. This precaution is not based on actual observations on my part, only speculation.

 

[BHuij]

@fiver have you done Accurate #2 in .223? The load data I'm seeing is not official, but it's from beagle's article about cast .223 found here. It suggests that 7.5 grains of a slower powder than AA#2 (Unique) will push a 55gr RCBS 225415 (of which, my bullet, the Lee C225-55-RF is a near-identical clone) 2022 FPS. The same chart in that PDF shows that the same 7.5gr charge weight of Red Dot pushes the same bullet 2045 FPS. I realize there are a lot of factors at work and it's really difficult to predict FPS from charge weight, cartridge, and bullet weight. But I'd be surprised if 4.0gr of AA#2 will push a bullet faster than nearly twice that charge of either Red Dot or Unique. Which means either beagle's data is bad, your data is bad, or there is some incredibly important factor I'm missing here that would allow for this odd velocity discrepancy.

You've helped me a lot over the years, and I've never had any reason to believe that your advice is bad. Just trying to reconcile what looks like incompatible data from different sources.

Unfortunately firing the gun up in the air will be out of the question. I will likely just be tacking the "fireform 50 pieces of brass in the bolt gun" task onto an otherwise normal visit to my 25 yard indoor pistol range.

If you think the filler is unnecessary for such a light charge, I'll skip it. Only concerned about bad ignitions with such low case fill.

@Spindrift You are correct, AA#2 is not only a ball powder, but the finest and densest powder of any kind I've ever used personally. It meters like water and it's very cheap (under normal availability circumstances), so I have on more than one occasion hoped it would win out in a Pepsi challenge for one of my handguns. Unfortunately, no load with any bullet I cast for .380 ACP or 9mm has ever shot very well out of any gun I've ever fired, over any charge from min to max in 0.1 grain increments. So now I have about 1.5 pounds I'm sitting on with no real use other than, perhaps, fireforming some .223.

I have a tendency to over-theorize and overthink stuff like this while I'm waiting to actually get to the range and do live testing. Everything I've read, with the exception of fiver's comments about 4gr and 2000+ FPS, suggests that 7.5gr of AA#2 under a 55gr cast bullet in .223 would be well within safety margins. As I keep noting, my only concern with that load is bad ignition as a side effect of poor case fill... and perhaps the load being so under-pressure that it doesn't get the job done fireforming and ends up just being a waste of 50 primers, which might as well be made of pure gold right now. Likelier than not, it's a nonissue. I'll probably just load up the 50 bullets over 7.5gr with no filler and take them to the range. If anything seems amiss in the first few shots, then the worst case scenario is I have to spend some quality time with my bullet puller.

Perhaps my best bet would be to have someone with Quickload find me a hypothetical load of AA#2 that would get me in the neighborhood of the 54.8k PSI Ramshot lists for their max load of TAC under a 55gr bullet. Be willing to bet it's more than 7.5gr.

 

[fiver]

I was thinking you were just going to put the powder in and shove some Dacron on top without a bullet.... I don't know why I was thinking that.

the 415 is a lighter bullet [probably all of 50grs in the real world] so you have a lot of latitude to work with, even with the faster powders like red-dot and the number-2.
your 7.5gr. [R-D] load is certainly within the window I was talking about as far as pushing the pressures up to expand the cases fully. [close to 40-K psi]
and you could probably even exceed it some if you really want to get the pressures up near a normal load.

number-2 like number-5 really does it's best work when it's pushed up to the top end anyway, so I wouldn't get too concerned about exceeding pressure limits by using red-dot data.

 

[BHuij]

Seems I'm walking a fine line here. Underpressure and I don't get a good fireform, just wasted a bunch of time and primers. Overpressure and, at best, I ruin my rifle.

Is it a safe assumption that Red Dot will yield a similar max pressure as AA#2 at a given charge weight? AA#2's pressure curve would be slower, but they should peak in the same zip code, correct?

Is the estimated ~40k PSI from 7.5gr of Red Dot (or, hopefully, AA#2) enough to get a good fireform? I'm not trying to blow out a case mouth or set a new shoulder angle or anything, so it seems like 40k might do it.

If not, does anyone with Quickload want to help a brother out and find me a load that will get in the neighborhood of 40k-45k with AA#2?

Thanks all in advance. I think I will just skip the filler and see what happens.

 

[popper]

Don't shoot pointed to sky, just tip up and then normal. Ball powder is heavy coated and doesn't ignite/burn right at low density. Dacron MAY help that. You already have 'fireformed' brass from full loads, just get a proper neck sizer or partial neck size with your die. Check your fired brass against sized to see how much change there is. You can leave some flare on the mouth if chamber neck is too big. In reality, if your 223 shoots good and you want better groups, buy better bullets.

 

[obssd1958]

My version of Quickload doesn't have data for any cast bullets in .223 Rem, so I used the data for 55gr Mil FMJ:
Red Dot 7.5gr. 39303 psi 2153 fps
Unique 7.5gr. 29686 psi 2119 fps
AA 2 7.5gr. 29715 psi 2102 fps
AA 2 8.5gr. 37083 psi 2255 fps
AA 2 9.5gr. 45375 psi 2400 fps

I'm very new at using Quickload, so use the above at your own risk!!

 

[Ian]

You already have 'fireformed' brass from full loads, just get a proper neck sizer or partial neck size with your die. Check your fired brass against sized to see how much change there is.

^^^^^THIS.

 

[462]

Unless you are trying to do something I don't understand or am missing, I'm with Popper and Ian.

 

[waco]

Redding Body Die 6mm XC (midwayusa.com)
RCBS Gold Medal Match Series Bushing Neck Sizer Die 6.5 Creedmoor (midwayusa.com)
I like and use these, if you can find them in stock.

 

[CWLONGSHOT]

I have never really been a fan of any fillers... But even when used I wont ever use them in a bottle neck case.
JMHO

Cw

 

[BHuij]

^^^^^THIS.

I don’t have the brass unfortunately. I have so much .223 brass that until I realized there was a good reason to keep it, I wasn’t bothering to pick it up.

 

[BHuij]

My version of Quickload doesn't have data for any cast bullets in .223 Rem, so I used the data for 55gr Mil FMJ:
Red Dot 7.5gr. 39303 psi 2153 fps
Unique 7.5gr. 29686 psi 2119 fps
AA 2 7.5gr. 29715 psi 2102 fps
AA 2 8.5gr. 37083 psi 2255 fps
AA 2 9.5gr. 45375 psi 2400 fps

I'm very new at using Quickload, so use the above at your own risk!!

Thank you, this is very helpful.

I’m going to aim for 8.5gr I think. Generally I’ve found cast loads to be lower pressure than jacketed loads of the same charge and weight, all other things being equal. I am guessing this is due to powder coat and lead engraving more easily in the rifling than copper or gilding metal.

8.5 should land me high enough to fireform effectively, but well below the threshold where I start getting into the danger zone.

 

[popper]

I have a bolt gun in .223 that shoots great with j-words, and am working on closing down group size as much as possible. I have shot AR15 a couple times, don't see the problem. IMHO without spending $$$ it will not be a competitive BR gun. Most are acceptable accuracy with junk (normal factory) ammo. You won't get great accuracy with pulled Mil or standard bullets. Buy good match bullets! No way around it, period. Play with touching the lands. Find the 'node' you gun likes. Sort for H.S. and case weight. Trickle powder. Anneal after 2-3 reloads, etc. Too many other things to fix before worrying about fire forming cases. Hard to accept but if fire forming makes any difference in your rifle, get a different one! Now if you have cheap dies that are wonky, replace them. Or send some cases to the custom shop and get proper dies made - and wait a long time.

 

[popper]

Or just get a 1:10 barrel.

 

[BHuij]

I have a bolt gun in .223 that shoots great with j-words, and am working on closing down group size as much as possible. I have shot AR15 a couple times, don't see the problem. IMHO without spending $$$ it will not be a competitive BR gun. Most are acceptable accuracy with junk (normal factory) ammo. You won't get great accuracy with pulled Mil or standard bullets. Buy good match bullets! No way around it, period. Play with touching the lands. Find the 'node' you gun likes. Sort for H.S. and case weight. Trickle powder. Anneal after 2-3 reloads, etc. Too many other things to fix before worrying about fire forming cases. Hard to accept but if fire forming makes any difference in your rifle, get a different one! Now if you have cheap dies that are wonky, replace them. Or send some cases to the custom shop and get proper dies made - and wait a long time.

I am using match bullets, using high end dies, have worked up a load inside the node my gun likes, played with seating depth, and have hand weighed my powder. That got me to 0.6 MOA. I believe that spending some time on my brass is the next best thing I can do to increase accuracy. Once they are fireformed to my chamber, I will anneal them to make neck tension uniform and try loading for accuracy, and, specifically, consistency in muzzle velocity. I'm not trying to make a benchrest gun, I'm trying to make a gun I can shoot out to 800 yards and maintain sub-MOA accuracy.

 

[fiver]

if it were me I'd invest in some LaPua brass.
why?
because even after all the whittling and massaging 90 sum percent of the others will still have striations in the case and other little uneven spots that will make them not the same.
you can weigh them, which will show that you weighed them but not where the weight is.

the key is to have an even thickness to the case walls [all the way up to the case mouth] equal thickness to the web area, along with square bases.
LaPua has that.