Originally posted by orangetom1999
Hello again Dawg,
Thanks again for the photos. Very nice wood on the revolvers. I like a good wheel gun.
Look olde man..I want your opinion on a project for down the road.
You mention a 6mm TCU in your last post. How satisfied are you with the performance of this caliber. I am considering the 7mm TCU as I have two
barrels for my Contender. .223 and .35 Remington. I have been reading for years that the .223 is being wildcated to heavier calibers and I am sitting
on some 3000 once fired cases. I believe the 7mm is a good compromise in hunting and bullet weight for longer ranges in this pistol. Looking to scope
it down the road when I get the barrel.
Would like to know any peculearitys of handling and reloading from what you know of your 6mm TCU. I dont think it will be to far off from the 7mm TCU.
I dont know many other people with this type of set up. I like the pistol very well but .223 is not suitable for everything.
.35 Remington is a bit much in this pistol in the 200 grain bullets. This is what got me to thinking about the .223 in its various wildcat
configurations.
I know that there are 6mm, 6.5mm and 7mm configurations in this pistol and its various barrels.
Nevertheless what can you tell me about your 6mm configuration. Are you satisfied with its performance??
Thanks,
Orangetom
Very satisfied.
Shoots right at an inch with fire-forming loads.
100 yards which is the usual standard.
And a 4x scope which is perhaps limiting.
I thought about a higher power and at the time I got it the variable long eye relief scopes were fairly expensive.
A 2x7x would be the hot ticket.
Fairly sure I loaded 75 grain HP bullets, probably Sierra.
I checked my records and for some reason failed to note bullet type.
Part of the reason for the 75 grain bullets was that I'd planned to get a 223 barrel and figured I'd shoot 52, 55 or 60 grain 223 bullets and
didn't want two almost identical bullet weights.
That happened with my sporter barrel 6mm Remington and varmint barrel 22-250 Ruger bolt action rifles.
The 22-250 shoots a 55 grain bullet the best and the 6mm shoots a 60 grain bullet the best.
Making them almost the same rifle in a manner of speaking.
Regardless, when I was shooting varmints with the 6mm I really liked the Sierra 85 grain HPBT bullet in it.
It was later that I tried the 60 grain 6mm bullets.
No problems with the Contender which has a 14" bull barrel.
Nice trigger from the factory as well.
All I did to this gun was clean the cardboard box dust out and put a little Gunslik grease on the sear.
7mm TCU would be a good choice considering that you have a 223 barrel - which I wish I'd bought for open sight use when they were a hundred bucks or
so - and the 35.
I do like the 6.5mm TCU, but you have a better choice of bullets with the 7mm.
Even so, considering how well the 6.5's shoot you may want to think about it.
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You'll want to do some reading and a little research on "fire-forming" loads.
You can probably find some info on the Hodgon powder site.
They have loads listed for most calibers and nowadays the 6mm TCU is probably common and if no fire-forming loads are listed, the minimum load for
that particular bullet weight should work fine.
Even so, a little research never hurts.
So here's the drill on reloading for the 6mm TCU.
A 7mm would be similar.
It's a little offbeat because in the early days of the public having the 6mm TCU and & 7mm TCU in their hands there were reports of a lot of case
head separations.
The case head separations were caused by reloaders running the cases into and out of a 6MM TCU sizing die. (Same basic problem for the 7mm TCU.
That sounds reasonable and to an extent it is, but the case head separations were caused by excessive head space.
Since you're dealing with an oversize chamber with straighter walls than a 223 what was happening was that the unformed - for 6mm TCU - rattled
around in the chamber a bit.
When the trigger was pulled, the firing pin drove the round forward.
The case obturates (swells) locking it in place.
Since the head was too far forward the case stretched toward the head and either broke away or the case was spoiled for any more reloading.
A properly fire-formed 6mm TCU case should give you quite a few reloading cycles.
For the 6mm TCU you'll need dies for 6mm TCU and 25-06.
The 25 caliber die doesn't have to be 25-06.
Neck size is what's important here.
257 Roberts etc. work fine.
You'll also need the gun or that particular TCU barrel on your gun because you'll use the gun as a gauge of sorts.
Start with new unfired brass.
Non-Military is preferred and after some experience reloading the 6mm TCU you can give the military 223 cases a try.
As you'll see, when and if you go to a military case you'll need to reset the 25 caliber sizing die.
If all you have is military 223 then by all means start from there.
I like commercial brass to start with and if you get some experience there the usually thicker case walls of the military stuff is no big deal.
Run the correct length and properly lubed cases in and out of the 6mm TCU sizing die.
Since you have a lot of 223 cases on hand, I suggest doing about 200 of them for fire-forming and go from there.
Next up is the 25 caliber sizing die.
A full size die works fine and I see no reason a neck sizing 25 caliber die couldn't be used.
The neck size dies are usually available singly so that could help.
I tend to buy the full set in a caliber I think I might have someday so my 25 caliber dies are 25-06.
Set the 25 caliber die so you're only neck-sizing.
By running the case into the 25 caliber die, you’re making a 25 caliber neck.
Set up the 6mm TCU die for neck sizing most of the way down, but not all the way.
Here's where using the gun as a gauge comes in.
Wipe the lube off, load the empty brass into the chamber and see if you can close the action.
If you can, you went too far down and if not, not quite far enough down.
What you want is to have the gun snap closed with a minimum of drag and not much added closing force on the action.
(Continued next post.)
[edit on 24-11-2007 by Desert Dawg]
[edit on 24-11-2007 by Desert Dawg]
[edit on 24-11-2007 by Desert Dawg]