What is "the lands"?

S

spy231

New member
One other thing I wanted to ask was what does this statement mean:
One thing we know will help us is seating the bullets out further. I've found a good starting place is with the bullet just slightly off the lands -- say .005 inch or so.

What is "the lands". I have an Encore. How do I figure this out?
 
Look down thru your barrel from the breech end (the end you put ammo in). You will notice the rifling twist in the barrel. Rifling is made up of lands and grooves.....often six lands and six grooves. The lands would be the high spot in the cross section of rifling and grooves the low.

Chamber in a rifle is cut to a configuration similar to a loaded round.
In that chamber the neck of the loaded round has an area for it to fit and immediately forward of that is the throat area.
A small area where the full diameter of the bullet sits prior to firing with no rifling.
If you cheat a bullet out far enough in the process of loading you can often get the bullet to contact the lands and still be in the neck of the case.
This can be the most accurate loading method depending on gun and ammo.
It can also be dangerous depending on gun and ammo.
To load "off .005" " would be just short of this condition.
In some cases the bullet is too short to be in the neck of the case and still touch the lands.
In other cases loading this way would not be a good idea because the magazine of the gun wouldn't let those rounds feed or they wouldn't fit in it anyway.

In the back of a Speer reloading manual there is a glossary that has a picture of lands and grooves. And many manuals havea cross section view of a chamber for reference.
 
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Look down thru your barrel from the breech end (the end you put ammo in). You will notice the rifling twist in the barrel. Rifling is made up of lands and grooves.....often six lands and six grooves. The lands would be the high spot in the cross section of rifling and grooves the low.

Chamber in a rifle is cut to a configuration similar to a loaded round.
In that chamber the neck of the loaded round has an area for it to fit and immediately forward of that is the throat area.
A small area where the full diameter of the bullet sits prior to firing with no rifling.
If you cheat a bullet out far enough in the process of loading you can often get the bullet to contact the lands and still be in the neck of the case.
This can be the most accurate loading method depending on gun and ammo.
It can also be dangerous depending on gun and ammo.
To load "off .005" " would be just short of this condition.
In some cases the bullet is too short to be in the neck of the case and still touch the lands.
In other cases loading this way would not be a good idea because the magazine of the gun wouldn't let those rounds feed or they wouldn't fit in it anyway.

In the back of a Speer reloading manual there is a glossary that has a picture of lands and grooves. And many manuals havea cross section view of a chamber for reference.



That was very good Steve. You should write a gun manual.

How is the weather? It is hot here today. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grinning-smiley-003.gif

Jimmy
 
Ok, I will look at my reloading book about that tonight, but since the Encore does not have a magazine how far can I safely seat the bullet out?
What I did was seat the bullet to match the max overall length found in my reloading manuel.
Are you guys saying that the overall round can be longer than what it says in the manuel or am I reading that wrong?
 
I would suggest to 'newbie' handloader to stick with a given overall length for bullet and chambering to start with. Concentrate on getting the other things accomplished correctly first.

jog - I have my moments. 30 years ago I think I failed miserably at any kind of writing. Now all I use it for is a thread killing.

We got up to a balmy 9 degrees today....its hovering around 5-6 right now. (colder than a welldiggers axx)at night.

Going out to the farm on Feb. 2 for cold, deep snow coyotes.
 
spy231, I would also look up the bullet manufacturer's recommended cartridge overall length to compare it with the loading manual...Most of them have specific safety factors that they have already proven with expensive high tech equipment.

For safeties sake, always check your dimensions with two sources and never take the load information off the various forums (this one included) as each chamber can be a little different and what works well for my rifle, may blow up in yours...You have to be responsible for doing good research.
 
I cannot add to any thing these others have said so I will not try. After you have been handloading a while you can try experimenting with freebore, ( that is the space before the bullet contacts the leade, The begining of the lands) But for the sake of good safe handloads stay with the manuals specs as far as COAL goes. overlength rounds are somthing you do only after you have learned the BASICs and gotten familiar with the mechanical aspects of the loading process.
 
Break action guns will often allow for you to load longer. This reduces the jump the bullet has to make, unsupported to the lands. Less jump, less chance for misalignment.
You can do this by trial and error. Seat the bullet so it is 'way long' to start with and safely load the round in your chamber. The gun will not close if it is too long or you will feel the resistance of the bullet contacting the lands. Keep incrementally seating it deeper until you can just feel that contact and be able to close the gun....add .010" to your seating depth. Measure the overall length of the round and record that info. for the future. In some cases the bullet will be to short to reach the lands regardless. In that case load so that you have enough bullet in the neck to hold the bullet for handling and keep it straight. This will vary based on chambering, bullet and gun. I like at least .125" of full bullet diameter in the neck for my break action guns.

If this is more than you wish to deal with load to the recommended overall length and be done with it.
 
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there are some bullets that actually like a little jump and shoot better with it.. As for seating to the lands, for most people it is not needed, you might see some change in accuaracy, you might not. the only time it really comes into play is when a barrel is getting worn.. My advice to any new loader, is not to worry about such things, the possible dangerous rise in pressure and feeding problems that might arise from it out weigh the gain.. Seat them where the manual recommends, after trying everything else, you might try moving the bullet out. A good worked up load, with a good recommended powder for the caliber and bullet weight, top notch bullets, cases weighed and seperated by case capacity, some BR primers (although not needed sometimes helps alot) and an accurately weighed powder charge, In my opinion will get you much farther than seating the bullets out deeper.. There are no shortcuts to good work.. Time, effort and paying attention to little details will make life easier and your ammo more accurate.

Dave
 
I just loaded some for my .223 Encore, all I did was barely size a piece of brass so that it would just hold a bullet. I seated it real long, put it in the chamber, closed it up, opened it, and measured the round. I did this 10 times to get an average. I then set my dies and went to .010" off and started load work. Be sure to start low. I had a load in my /06 that worked well about .030 off, I decided I would take it to .010 without reducing anything, HOLY PRESSURE SIGNS BATMAN. Good lesson learned, anytime something is changed start low and work back up.


http://noslerreloading.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=7569
 


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