Thread: Incipient head seperation and a possible mitigation method.

Better pic with case thinning just above the belt. Case fire 5 times. It might be good for 2 more but why chance it.

Hi Woody,
What you have described is exactly what was written by ,( I think) Layne Simpson in an article in rifle magazine or handloader a few years back.
Some of the latest lapua (?)brass is available “long” so the you can adjust the headspace before your first firing , or at least to mitigate that thinking problem forward of the belt.
Larry Willis die in the USA is a sleeve collet system that allows one to resize the body of the case without touching the shoulder.

Yes, i've of that Larry Willis die and gave it some thought. My rifle is 308 Norma mag from 1960s era and the only brass is from Norma. Howevet, I figured I may ad well try a low cost solution as an experiment. The rifle shoots sub moa so well worth looking at extending case life. Thanks for yr input though.

Originally Posted by Woody

Yes, i've of that Larry Willis die and gave it some thought. My rifle is 308 Norma mag from 1960s era and the only brass is from Norma. Howevet, I figured I may ad well try a low cost solution as an experiment. The rifle shoots sub moa so well worth looking at extending case life. Thanks for yr input though.

Greetings @Woody,
Have not heard of the .308 Norma Mag for a while. Some time ago my friend had developed a burning desire for a .300 H&H but could not find anyone with a reamer but found someone with a .308 Norma Mag one. He had a Parker Hale magnum action and had scrounged up an old .308 target barrel so the Norma would need to be it. He also scrounged up some cases which unfortunately would not chamber even after FL sizing. The tight spot as you will likely know was right in front of the belt. Bugger. This was in the days when bulge buster kits were not available so after a bit of head scratching a stripped .300 Win Mag die was tried. This was better but not much so the next step was to size the case with the case on top of the shell holder which allowed it to enter the die just that little bit more. The cases needed to be tapped out of the die with a rod but it worked a treat.
Regards Grandpamac.

maybe you should neck size only less stress on brass i run pmc brass in 7RM havent had any brass issues so far

I should also have explained that I set the resizing high for the 8mm neck expansion process and also for partial down sizing to 308 at the final stage. Same with bullet seating die so ad not to accidentally stuff up the new shoulder.

Lee collet dies are perfect for this. I use them for .303 and have got 11 or 12 reloads and counting. Some people only get 3 reloads when full length sizing.

The idea is soley for first firing of virgin brass.

My brass (7RM and .300WM) last well. Normally case life end due to cracking necks, loose primer pockets.

Be interesting to see how much of a issue it is with loaders more broadly?


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Yes. Most of the older belted magnums can be formed from the HH parent case. There were certainly variations in the american made reamers in the old days when they converted 30-06 actions to 7*61 and 308 Norma mag nums.