My new .260 Rem Cases

[Elkbane]

For anyone interested in .260 Rem, I think I've finally found a solution to forming decent quality .260 Remington cases.

I've tried just about everything out there for getting quality cases, including:

• - Standard Rem cases - highly irregular weights and neck wall thicknesses - I turned these, but to get them uniform I had really thin necks and the primer pockets expanded faster than I would have liked
  - Necked up .243 Lapua cases - these worked really well for 2-3 firings, then I started getting donuts and accuracy went to he!!. I may try these again if I can get the donuts cut out (I have the tooling)
  - Factory Nosler cases - these worked fairly well, but had thin necks to start with - I turned them to clean them up which made really thin necks (like 12 thou); otherwise, they were decent cases, but I'd get higher runout from them on some of the cases when F/L sizing
  - Necked down 308 Lapua cases - good strong uniform cases, but with really short necks (the parent cases were 2.013" average)
  
  The solution: I just finished up a set of necked down 7mm-08 Norma cases. This was pretty unifrom brass to start with and the necking down from .284 to .264 caused no inordinate runout. Neck wall thikness averaged a little over 14 thou, and I did a light turning, leaving me with a 13.75 thou neck. These cases appear to have Lapua or better quality, with drilled flash holes. Weights for the 40 have 1.2 grain total spread (about 1/2 a percent of average weight), so no weight sorting will be required. I have them trimmed to 2.030". The finished cases have <1 thou TIR on the necks.
  
  I have my 260 back together again after swapping actions, putting a new SSS stock on it and bedding. WIll rework my standard load of H4831sc and 123 gr Lapua Scenar&#39;s and give a report after I shoot it this weekend. Barrel is a 28" LW.
  Elkbane

[savageboy]

Elk great info. I have Norma cases for my 6.5x55 and love them. I went the .308 Lapua necked down route for my .260AI and observed what you did about the necks. Also, they seem to have less case capacity then other cases.
Good tip. Now if I only didn&#39;t have 300 Rem and 300 Lapua done- necked down, fireformed to AI, trimmed, necks cleaned up, pri, pockets cleaned up- I&#39;d go get 100 Norma to try

[Scythe]

Thanks for the tip. I am leaning toward a 260 build or a 7-08, but the 260 fits the plans I have of giving this to my Daughter.
Looking forward to hearing about the end results. Good Luck

[rjtfroggy]

I had 75 243 cases that I annealed the neck & shoulders then resized to 260 and have not had any problems yet, they have been shot 3 times since the resizing. I am not finding any difference between these and the new remington brass I bought.
Almost forgot they are win. brass.

[Elkbane]

I got the 260 put together again and shot it Saturday. I had switched 260 barrel onto another actions, and bedded/installed it into one of SSS&#39;s stocks, Scope is a BE 6500.

[img width=600 height=450]http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h28/elkbane/260Rem001.jpg[/img]

The Norma brass shot really well. I used up 11 shots sighting in and getting my bags set up for this new stock. Had 4 left to shoot a group. I compared this to 5 shots from my old Nosler brass - I tink I have some donuts in the Nosler -- will work on that. Anyway, with these results, I went ahead and finished off a set of 50 turned necked down Norma 7mm-08 cases...

[img width=600 height=450]http://i60.photobucket.com/albums/h28/elkbane/260Rem002.jpg[/img]

Sorry about the crappy pictures - they&#39;re from my iphone..

Elkbane

[pbcaster45]

I&#39;m getting my Remington 700 SPS converted to 260 Remington by Bryant Custom. It seems like brass quality is a big concern with this cartridge. I bought 100 new Remington brand 260 cases and was really dissappointed with the quality. I&#39;m not really sure if off center flash holes can cause problems but nearly 50% of the cases were this way. The Nosler cases I got were much better but it looks like I better start thinking about neck turning equipment. >

[knight_dive]

I think Norma makes factory .260 brass (at least they&#39;re listed in the Sinclair catalog and online at Grafs). Is there any downside to the Norma .260 brass versus resized Norma 7-08 brass besides the cost? Looks like about 15 cents a case more, not sure if I want to worry about resizing the necks for that (never loaded anything for rifles besides .308 and .223 with once fired brass).

[hcpyro13]

Elkbane, can&#39;t argue with groups like that! That&#39;s fantastic, nice work behind that trigger. I&#39;m running straight 260 norma brass, if you are already spending the money for the Norma, why resize?

-Jake

[Elkbane]

I looked around before I did thisn and couldn&#39;t find any 260 Norma brass. News to me. Will probably pick some up, cause it sure is nce brass.

Elkbane