Author Topic: Bullet seating depth/velocity?  (Read 1263 times)

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Offline MINNESOTA DICK

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Bullet seating depth/velocity?
« on: April 11, 2004, 02:47:04 AM »
My question is does the bullet seating depth affect the velocity for a bullet?

If so, how does the seating depth affect it?

Just trying to learn from others?
Happy shooting, may you hit what you aim at.

Minnesota Dick

Offline onesonek

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Bullet seating depth/velocity?
« Reply #1 on: April 11, 2004, 05:20:29 AM »
Hi MD,
  Man this is one those question's, with no definitive answers. The answer is yes, but as to why. There are so many variables that it's difficult too say, the when's, why's, and what for's. Literally volumes could be written on this subject, and likely has. Powder, bullet, and throat length and diameter, all play a part, not to mention other aspects.
As a rule, in my practices, I like to seat the bullets as within .005-.010" off the lands. Some bullets are way off though, Barnes are the exception, and accuracy is my goal. Also I use a bullet/powder combination that gives me the highest possible load density (full case), without major compression. This, I find gives me the least amount of extreme spread in velocity, aiding accuracy. Top end speed is secondary in my opinion, tight averages on speed is foremost.
But for an example, you take a .308 with a 180gr. seated to  
sammi specs. you get a certain velocity. Then say in a single shot with a long throat. You can seat the bullet out, and your case capacity increases. If you do not change the charge weight velocity will drop. But if you increase the charge weight, back to acceptable pressures. Your speed will increase. This is an extreme example, but you get the idea.
Generally, in a standard chamber if you take a given bullet/charge combination. The deeper you seat the bullet, the more pressure is developed, resulting in higher velocities. And the opposite is also true.

Offline Duffy

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Bullet seating depth/velocity?
« Reply #2 on: April 11, 2004, 10:28:01 PM »
MD
I did a little testing on this a while back and here's a few examples. In my 708 encore .010 off the lands gave me the highest pressure and erratic vel, as I backed away in .010 increments the pressure dropped and so did vel until I reached .040. It stayed pretty much the same until the bullets were seated .085 off the lands then vel started to climb a bit but not that much. I think the total vel swing was from 2610-2580.  Now on the other hand in the 45 acp I seated a bullet only .045 deeper and gained 75 fps. It just goes to show that its not the same for every case and powder.

Offline MINNESOTA DICK

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Bullet seating depth/velocity?
« Reply #3 on: April 12, 2004, 04:17:06 AM »
The reason I asked the question was I loaded the following and got these results from my Contender 22" hvy VVCG barrel.

17 rem 20 gr v-max

1st load w/10 shot avg.  
Powder = H380 25.3 gr
COL     = 2.201
Velocity= 3762 fps

2nd load w/10 shot avg.
Powder = H380  25.5 gr
COL     = 2.182
Velocity= 3740 fps

You notice that seating by seating .019 deeper and adding .2 gr more powder resulted in 22 fps less.

I did notice that with load #2 there was less spread in the velocity readings.  I had more dup's as to velocity readings.  It also seemed that load # 2 had a speck thighter groups, but would had been hard to measure though.
Happy shooting, may you hit what you aim at.

Minnesota Dick

Offline onesonek

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Bullet seating depth/velocity?
« Reply #4 on: April 12, 2004, 01:21:57 PM »
Just goes to show, that each barrel and chamber has it's own rules and personality. It suprises me some that you lost velocity while adding .2 gr. of powder.  Who knows? it one of those mysteries that can go either way. What was the air temperature difference on those 2 loads?