HighDesertSage
Well-known member
What do you guys who have been reloading for awhile consider to be an acceptable OACL variation from road to round. I was thinking +/- .005 is acceptable for rifle cartridges. Thoughts?
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I don't measure OAL to the ogive, don't know anyone that does. Generally OAL is measured to keep the case mouth from entering to lands and raising pressure! But for re-sizing and making the case work in the chamber with the OAL in limit's, I use the chamber of the rifle to determine if the case fit's properly. I neck size with FL dies two or three time's till the case will no longer allow the action to close. Then I FL the case down a little at a time till the action close's without rubbing on the shoulder, partial sizing. At that point the case fit's your chamber. That FL die is locked in right there and dedicated to that rifle only. From then on, that dies will always size a case to fit that rifle and to heck with all that measuring. I suppose it's nice to be able to tell someone the actual size of your chamber from bolt face to ogive but it serve's no useful purpose at all.
You are way out in left field on this one. He’s not talking about measuring to the shoulder, he’s talking about measuring the length of a loaded cartridge. Measuring to the ogive gives you the most accurate and most important measurement when determining seating depth.