case stretched

[Woody]

That gas cutting is why I switched to plastic.

I have noticed that case stretching sometimes happens when a case is not annealed and or very little compression. It seems to happen most often for me in cases longer than 2.1 inch and the case, (Starline) was not annealed.

The other times I've had stretching, was when I played with full breech seating and full uncompressed cases of powder. This happened in 32-40, 40-65, 45-70, and 45-90. Annealing slowed the process, but did not stop it. Compressing the powder column did. Had to make a funnel that could overfill the case and compress through the funnel.

The best accuracy I've ever experienced has been via full breech seating. I have shot both long range and silhouette utilizing this method, but found it takes too much time and limits the number of sighters and the ability to take advantage of conditions.

Your results many vary.

Woody

[labop]

What is a 40-65 RL ?

[Woody]

RL means Ron Long. Ron was a Denver, CO and later, Cody, WY gunsmith. An early BPCR proponent and top competitor. His 40-65 chamber is slightly longer than the original Winchester. It's been a while since he was active, but his guns are still competing and winning. He was instrumental in bringing the Winchester Model 1885 out of the dust bins.

Woody

[desert deuce]

Kenny, Long Shot 10X, Red Neck and Woody have offered good advice.
However, I am going to offer you a solution. One that is sure to solve your problems and you will never have this problem with that rifle again.
This is really simple, take the rifle and clean it really good. Remove the butt stock, wrap both pieces triple thick with bubble wrap and tape then secure those parts in a strong hard case within a cardboard box and ship the box and contents to me and your problem will be over. Guaranteed, you will not have any more problems with that rifle.

[kenny s]

HA..... I stop drinking LONG before That becomes a good idea!

Rifle is fine. this is a problem in search of a solution. I shoot about three dozen rounds a week, and have for the two years I've had the gun. The case separation has happened ONCE...and a serro safe cast popped it out.... so this is just a 'what if' question.....

The case stretching has happened twice......I'm just wondering what causes it.
Ken

[bruce m]

woody,
your comment re stretching with uncompressed powder is interesting.
I have seen case parts go down the barrels of scheutzen rifles, mostly 38/55.
this breech seating with uncompressed powder like you.
I do this too, but have never had an issue in 40/72 and 45/2.4".
the 45 runs right on 100 gns powder loaded this way, and is a little unsuitable for scheutzen.
I do however partially anneal my cases a little more than is ideal for smokeless pressure, and make sure the chambers are dry.
it would appear that softer case necks expand more readily than harder ones, and grip the chamber walls sooner and harder.
bruce.

[gunlaker]

In .32-40's and .38-55's I've stretched cases a number of times. A few times I've separated them. These are all breech seated, and the ones that are most likely to stretch a case are the ones that do not have a 45 degree angle at the end of the chamber. It doesn't happen with smokeless, just uncompressed BP when breech seated. The finer the powder the more likely it'll happen, i.e. Swiss Fg won't do it, FFFg will nearly every time, and 1.5 Fg will occasionally do it.

I've had minor stretching with uncompressed loads with PP bullets, but not much, generally a couple of thousandths. Until last week when I was playing with one of my .45-2.1" rifles. I'd forgotten my dry patches at home so tried to make do by running some paper towel through the bore, on a nylon brush, after each shot, the same way I do with cotton patches. I guess the paper towel wasn't nearly as absorbent as I thought. I stretched two cases, one of which separated and stuck in the rifling. Clearly excess moisture in the chamber was the problem as I've shot a lot of these same loads before and had no problems.

Chris.

[desert deuce]

Chris, I offered Kenny a viable and certain remedy and he failed to take me up my generous offer so I guess he will just have to suffer for bringing up a single stretched case. Oh the agony of it.

Seem to recall all of the stretched or separated cases I have experienced were in 2.4 length cases and opening up the mouth of a tight match chamber cured the problem immediately in both rifles. But I do think there is a danger of over annealing a case to increase the possibility of a stretched case.

[mdeland]

I have exactly the opposite problem Woody ,of case length shortening. Never have figured what is causing that for sure. They go from 2.1 to roughly 1.085 and seem to stop about there.
Even the ones I have nibbed out to 2.130 and trimmed back for a clean mouth.

[bruce m]

chris,
interesting about finer granulations seeming to have greater stretching effect.
I have only used swiss 1.0 and 1.5 which might have been a point in my favour.
there seem to be 3 potential causes to this problem, other than powder granulation.
bullets pulling cases, cases slipping in slippery chambers, and powder somehow gripping the case on its own.
possibly wads can have a connection as well.
possibly most of these things are not so bad on their own, but put 2 or more together and probability increases.?
zack,
experimenting with partial annealing needs to be done.
just right is good, but too soft and too hard are possibly as bad as each other.
of course a full anneal will make the brass as soft as bread dough and is dangerous.
I use tempilaq to set up my annealer before doing a run just to be sure.
bruce.
p.s.
my pp fixed ammo is seated 0.1" in the case, and by breech seated ammo has about a 1/8" airgap.
the rare time I lower nyself to using greasers they are well in the case.

[charlie young]

Not an expert by any means, but follow this with interest. Bought my LRE in 2006. 45-2.4. Started using Remington Stretched 45-70 brass from BACO. When Starline brass became available in 2007 I switched to that. I am still shooting the same Starline brass that I started with. Have also purchased a 16 lb. Bull Barrel #1. I shoot the same brass in that rifle, same load for both guns. Every year I add about 50 rds. of new brass, but it eventually gets mingled in with the rest. I do not tumble my brass, give up on that. My cases look like crap. BUT....I have a 3 step process where I polish the Inside of the brass til they shine. I anneal after every firing. Do not full length resize, just the top 3rd slightly. I now shoot GG bullets. Wipe with one wet patch and mop the chamber so it's absolutely dry. Never had a separated case, give up measuring years ago, except to check out of curiosity once in awhile. If anything my cases will shrink slightly. Until this Lot of Swiss, I never compressed, just seated the bullet on top of the fiber wad.

[gunlaker]

Bruce I don't anneal cases when breech seating. When I tried it the stretching was much greater. Thinner cases also increase the effect. Starline .38-55 is particularly bad, with Goex FFFg Express the cases ripped in half something like 50% of the time in my small sample. Obviously I quit pretty quickly . I do know that the Everlasting style of case eliminates the stretching. All of my breech seating is done with a 0.030" veg wad to hold the powder in place, no plastic.

I'm pretty confident that it's the powder pulling the case. Compressing the powder does seem to help for whatever reason.

Chris.

[mike herth]

Charlie,
You gave up on tumbling? What is your 3-step case prep process?
Mike

[bruce m]

chris,
most interesting about everlasting type cases.
bruce.

[bobw]

"the rare time I lower nyself to using greasers they are well in the case."

Bruce, this would be a simply outstanding sig line