Good find today!

with many ammo selections being so scarce, I stay on the lookout for a couple of rounds. Today I walked into an area gun shop to check out what he had in Auto 410's; which was a strikeout but he did have 223wssm in the grey 55 and the black 55 boxes, bought 5 boxes of grey and 2 of black boxes! I really love the WSSM but they are extremely hard to come across, I am set up to reload but even under factory pressures the cases still swell on most shots. For this reason I just have tried to buy up a good amount of factory loads.

---- I wasn't specific in my post---- the necks on the brass has a very short life 4 shots on most reloads and the cases wrinkle or crease on some shells even factor loads. I'm just not comfortable reloading them knowing the issues and can buy factory loads close to one off handloads. The wssm's are notorious to have issues. This particular gun shoots extremely well so as long as the barrel holds up I'll put up with the quirks.

Good find indeed.

Is there as issue with you rifle that causes the cases to swell or is that common issue with the cartridge?

<>< Fish

All cases swell upon firing. That's what your sizing die is for...well, unless you only have a neck sizing die.

Big ten is spot on. The case is supposed to swell. Full length resizing should take care of that. Congrats on scoring some ammo

bigten said:

All cases swell upon firing. That's what your sizing die is for...well, unless you only have a neck sizing die.

Click to expand...

Yep they do swell and then contract. I don't have a bolt gun that wont rechamber a fired case fired from the rifle it was fired from.

I was referencing this part; I am set up to reload but even under factory pressures the cases still swell on most shots. It sounds like there's an issue not just the regular firing expansion/contraction cycle.

<>< Fish

Fish, they do have pressure issues with these rounds and necks cracking and cases wrinkle/swell is a common issue when you search these on the web. I'm just not comfortable working on the shot cases knowing the issues so many have had

How do the fired cases measure, compared to spec?

Have annealed some necks before reloading?

Looking at the SAAMI specs the 22-250 and the .223 wssm both have 65000psi as max chamber pressure. Certainly you could start low and be cautious, but it seems like the .223 wssm is pretty hand loader friendly as long as you don't hot rod it. Certainly an over bore cartridge and will wear the throat out more quickly.