300Win Mag Reloading

[scsims]

This will be my first time reloading for an Encore, I have reloaded for bolt guns for years and only neck resize for accuracy.

Is there any differences that I should know about when reloading for an Encore?

Thanks,
Scott

[KiyoteeKiller]

You better know your headspace when bumping your shoulders back.

[fanner50]

I believe you said you were reloading for the 300 WM. If that is correct you should know the 300 WM head-spaces from the belt and not the shoulder. Make sure your cases will fit back into the chamber and size the way you need for best accuracy making sure the shoulder isn't pushing the case back of course. Hotter loads in this cartridge swell just in front of the belt. I just purchased a special die for belted cases that claims as much as 20 reloads on a case. It cost me $98 to find out if this is a gimmick or not.
"Good Luck and good shootin." - F50

[Lone Star]

Experienced reloaders know that belted bottlenecked cases should headspace on the shoulder, not the belt.  This improves case life and accuracy, and reduces the risk of head separations.  Speer is clear about this in their manuals (#14, pg 602) but who bothers to ever read anything in a reloading manual besides the load data?    I have headspaced my belted cases on the shoulder for decades and have never lost a case to an incipient head separation.  I can reload my cases as many times as I want to, some have exceeded 20 cycles using my standard sizing dies.

Because the Encore lacks the strong caming action that a bolt rifle has, you may find that neck sizing will eventually result in cases that are hard to chamber, or an action that refuses to close all the way.  The solution is to just bump back the shoulder in the sizing die - smoke the shoulder so make it easier to see when your die makes contact.  This will help eliminate tight chambering or a gun which will not lock up.


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[encore3006]

 

[Lone Star]

Contrary to popular legend, you'll find that most high-powered competitive shooters FL size their cases, or at least bump the shoulders back if they do not FL size.  This allows the cases to lay in the bottom of the chamber in the same position for each shot instead of being forced into inconsistent positions as most neck-sized cases will.  Neck-sized cases may be consistent, or not, depending on the quality of the chamber and how square the bolt face is to the axis of the chamber.    But whatever works for you...


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