4and1
Member
I have shot the 6PPC in short range benchrest since the mid 90's, jacketed benchrest. It rules the roost, for a reason. I shot mostly score shoots, and when the 30BR came on the scene, that bigger hole made a big improvement, pardon the pun. Consequently, I shot the 30BR in score shoots from then on until bullet prices ended that.
Anyway, when I started cast benchrest, I had all the 30BR stuff I needed, so it wasn't much of a choice. But lately, I've been thinking about a 30PPC. With a 30BR, there is still plenty of unused case capacity, the smaller PPC case would help with that. Again, I have all kinds of PPC stuff, so I went at it. I set back a 30 barrel and chambered it with a 6PPC reamer. Since I opened up the neck diameter on 30BRs using my reamer (my reamer has a .330" neck, but with the .310" cast bullets, I have a .332" neck reamer to open up the chamber) I used it to cut the neck portion on the chamber, then throated it. A bit unconventional, but it came out fine. Did the same for a seater die and opened up a 6PPC sizing die with a carbide drill.
Onto the brass. For a 30BR, you neck up a 6BR case, I did it in two steps, never had an issue. The 6PPC is made from 220Russian brass, so there is another step involved there, I actually did 4 steps in sizing up the case necks. For some reason, some of the brass had quite a wobble to then when it came time to start turning necks. They had a very thick neck portion too. I had to really push the shoulder back just to get them to chamber. I have shot this brass maybe 4 times now, and over half of them have formed to where they chamber and extract easy, but there are about 5 out of 12 that still stick.
So today I tried something. I took a virgin 220Russion case, filled it with Tight Group powder and stuffed a piece of paper towel in the neck, and fired it in one of my PPC rifles, and that blew the shoulder out nice and the neck to 6MM. I decapped and reprimed, put the same amount of pistol powder in and a wad, and fired it in the 30PPC rifle. That blew the neck out great! Nice looking case, and so much easier! The doughnut is on the inside now (it ends up outside when you neck up brass with mandrels), which I'll inside neck ream, then turn the neck to size. But the part that amazed me, is the case formed about .040" longer by fireforming than it did when necking up the case using mandrels.
And by the way, the 30PPC shoots quite well, it can easily acheive the velocities the 30BR case does, with less powder. This has me thinking a new rifle!
Anyway, when I started cast benchrest, I had all the 30BR stuff I needed, so it wasn't much of a choice. But lately, I've been thinking about a 30PPC. With a 30BR, there is still plenty of unused case capacity, the smaller PPC case would help with that. Again, I have all kinds of PPC stuff, so I went at it. I set back a 30 barrel and chambered it with a 6PPC reamer. Since I opened up the neck diameter on 30BRs using my reamer (my reamer has a .330" neck, but with the .310" cast bullets, I have a .332" neck reamer to open up the chamber) I used it to cut the neck portion on the chamber, then throated it. A bit unconventional, but it came out fine. Did the same for a seater die and opened up a 6PPC sizing die with a carbide drill.
Onto the brass. For a 30BR, you neck up a 6BR case, I did it in two steps, never had an issue. The 6PPC is made from 220Russian brass, so there is another step involved there, I actually did 4 steps in sizing up the case necks. For some reason, some of the brass had quite a wobble to then when it came time to start turning necks. They had a very thick neck portion too. I had to really push the shoulder back just to get them to chamber. I have shot this brass maybe 4 times now, and over half of them have formed to where they chamber and extract easy, but there are about 5 out of 12 that still stick.
So today I tried something. I took a virgin 220Russion case, filled it with Tight Group powder and stuffed a piece of paper towel in the neck, and fired it in one of my PPC rifles, and that blew the shoulder out nice and the neck to 6MM. I decapped and reprimed, put the same amount of pistol powder in and a wad, and fired it in the 30PPC rifle. That blew the neck out great! Nice looking case, and so much easier! The doughnut is on the inside now (it ends up outside when you neck up brass with mandrels), which I'll inside neck ream, then turn the neck to size. But the part that amazed me, is the case formed about .040" longer by fireforming than it did when necking up the case using mandrels.
And by the way, the 30PPC shoots quite well, it can easily acheive the velocities the 30BR case does, with less powder. This has me thinking a new rifle!
