8mm Nambu Cartridge Conversion

[Sieger]

Originally Posted by rhuff

I can fully understand your approach and the reasons why. For some reason, my experience has been totally different. I handload 30 luger, 357Sig, 38-40, and 44-40 brass. I use a mild flair/bell to help get the bullet started, whether lead or jacketed. To date, I have not destroyed any bottleneck brass with this method.....maybe just lucky!! The mild flair/bell avoids any shaving of the lead when loading lead bullets, and the firm interference fit prevents set back and bullet pull.

It is sort of funny how folks that have been doing this handloading thing for "a while" find techniques, loads, powder, bullets,etc. that suits us and our weapons, and we stick with it. It is hard to argue with success. Is what I do the best?? It seems to be for me and my handguns, but might not be for others.

Hi,

With the cartridges you have cited above (.30 Luger exempted), I can fully agree with you, as these particular cartridges don't have much of a neck built into them to "give" and should, thus, not experience the buckling I've described.

My buckling experiences have been with both the 7.65mm Luger and the 8mm Nambu, that do, indeed, have quite an angle between their body diameters and their neck diameters.

As to lead bullet deformation, my experience has been very different with tight necks. Back in the late 1970s, when I first started casting and loading lead bullets, I generally cast with wheelweight lead, a softer alloy. I would bell a tight neck case, seat the lead bullet, without any apparent shaving, and then experience horrible accuracy at the range. Bewildered, I pulled some of the lead bullets and found that the bullet shank diameters had been significantly reduced, during the seating action, by the tight necks of the cases. I'll admit that I abandoned lead bullets for Luger handloading for some years, as "they" said that lead bullets were not accurate in a 9mm in the first place. "They" were later proven grossly wrong, by the way.

Later, while experiencing a similar phenomenon with tight necked 11mm Mauser Rifle casings, I found that the true art of shooting lead bullets, accurately, is not to deform the bullets while seating them. Well, with this learned, my accuracy, at 100 yards, with lead bullets, increased dramatically; as former six inch groups were reduced to 1 1/2 inches, or so. For me, this process worked: not shaving and not deforming your bullets while seating them.

Just some additional thoughts.


Sieger