Resized Cases Won’t Chamber

[Radosilver]

I am trying to work up loads for a Rem 700 .300 Wby my brother recently acquired. However, almost half of the cartridges I resize will not rechamber in his rifle. Even the ones that do rechamber require a lot of force to get the bolt to close. I tried two different dies with the same results.

I have resized brass a buddy had laying around with a Redding full length die that was shot through another rifle an unknown amount of times, as well as Rem brass that was factory ammo shot through this 700 once and then resized with an RCBS full length die. I have a decent amount of reloading experience and am resizing the same way I have for years for multiple belted and non belted cartridges.

Interestingly when he was shooting the Rem factory ammo there were several cartridges that did not chamber easily and required a lot force to close the bolt. I checked the case length and they are within 5 thousandths of book length when they come out of the resizing die.

At this point I feel like I’m missing something simple, but I’m at a loss for what is causing this issue. Any suggestions are appreciated.

 

[Pickettpuncher]

Clean the chamber. Could have debris in there. I’d also look into a comparator as you may not be pushing shoulders back far enough. You didn’t say if you were trying loaded reloads or just sized brass. If it’s been reloaded there’s some other issues that could be involved.

 

[Radosilver]

Thanks. This is just resized brass. I haven’t reloaded these cases yet. He did clean it but I didn’t verify for myself what it looks like so I’ll check that.

 

[Pickettpuncher]

If it’s just resized I’d look at how much the shoulders were bumped back. If you used multiple dies that sorta rules out an out of spec die, but chamber could be screwed up but also die set up could be wrong.

 

[hiker270]

Does factory ammo cycle in the rifle? If it does then its a sizing issue.

 

[Radosilver]

Factory ammo cycles but there were even several rounds of factory ammo that were very difficult to chamber. I’m going to color a case that won’t chamber with marker tonight and see if I can see where the issue is coming from.

 

[dreadi]

You might need a belted magnum collet resizing die https://www.larrywillis.com/

 

[fraz01]

Need to check the headspace at the belt first. If you don't have a belted headspace gauge you can try another belted case like a 300 WM or some other belted case. I would check the bolt face for any issues also, could be an ejector issue or piece of brass lodged some where. Factory brass is usually under sized at the shoulder datum by .010 or more. I would strip the bolt give it a cleaning and try to chamber a case with it.

 

[Cahunter805]

Do the fired cases chamber easily after being fired but not resized? If so it’s something in your reloading process.

 

[Hill Difficulty]

How do you resize a double-radius shoulder that has been fire-formed in a different chamber?

Did you set the FL die to overcam? If not, try a 1/4 turn extra when setting the die.

I have a 700 barreled action chambered in 240W. Tho the shoulders grow a bit per firing, they still chamber after 5+ firings without any overcam when sizing. Can't imagine they'd fit in another chamber without pushing the shoulder back.

What do you mean by "Rem factory ammo?" Or is it Weatherby factory ammo?