summer patriot, winter soldier

a little kink in reloading the 6.8mm rem. spc. ... hornady factory ammo ...

friends:

early on when i acquired my ar-15 upper in 6.8mm remington spc (special purpose cartridge), i also acquired sevearl boxes of remington ammunition for it, and some from hornady.

no surprises from the remington when it came time to reload it.

by contrast, a rather unexpected turn of events happened with the hornady expended brass.

as expected, and as noted in my speer reloading manual, the remington brass came with large rifle primer pockets, into which after depriming and resizing the case, on inserts large rifle primer caps.  in my instance, i replaced the old spent primers, once removed from the case, with cci no. 200 primers.  and, as per usual with remington cases and speer primers, no problems.

such was not the case with the hornady empty brass.  imagine my surprise to find out that the primer pockets in the brass were sized for small rifle primers, and that the brass, made and marketed for the private commercial market, had primer pockets crimped with a military crimp.  this made reseating new primers virtually undoable, and before i will be able to reprime and reuse the cases to make more ammunition, i am going to have to go to the expenditure of considerable labor in swaging the primer pockets and reeming the rims to remove the old military style crimp.

this comes under the heading of "tedium," and "major pain in the butt."  it is not something i enjoy doing, an unless you are really into tedious labor, i would avoid hornady brass or ammunition unless it comes with a large rifle primer as does the remington brand ammunition, and component brass.

i do not know hornady's rationale for so equipping their ammunition.  if any of you do know, i most surely would like to learn why they have done this, and would appreciate you so informing me.

john jay

6.8 mm rem. spc. -- handloading issues ... problems with the 130 grain nosler ballistic tip ... the sierra 115 grain bthp works just fine ...

cruel discovery  …  hand loading problems with the 6.8 mm rem. spc  …  cannot used the nosler 130 grain ballistic tip bullet  …  the sierra 115 grain bthp works just fine  …

friends, you just do not know how much i love nosler ballistic tip bullets, for their wonderful accuracy, and for the utter reliability that pointy tip adds to functioning in the ar-15 type rifle.  ballistic tips just feed so nicely through the complicated geometry of the ar-15 barrel extension/feed ramps, exhibiting no tendency that i have ever discerned to catch or hang up on the many edges found there.

with this in mind, i wanted to try to utilize the 130 grain .277 inch ballistic tip in the 6.8 mm rem. spc cartridge that i am loading for an ar-15 upper.  though the bullet is just a bit heavy for the cartridge, i figured the wonderful flight/ballistic characteristics of the bullet might overcome any issue presented by a slightly lower muzzle velocity than a lighter bullet.

so, imagine my consternation these past couple of days to find that you just cannot seat the nosler 130 grain ballistic tip .277 caliber bullet, part no. 27130, deep enough to obtain the 2.260 overall length requirement of the cartridge, necessary to obtain functioning through a magazine.  why is that, you ask, gentle reader.  seat the bullet deep enough, to make the cartridge short enough, and the bullet simply falls into the cartridge case.

a good steel dial micrometer reveals why.  the nosler ballistic tip starts out as its base near the boat tail at an honest .277 inch in diameter.  no problem there.  but as you proceed up the shank of the bullet, although this true .277 diameter is maintained for a while, the bullet begins to narrow in circumference, so  much so that as you approach the point of the bullet which would be seated at the case mouth of the cartridge, the bullet diameter has shrunk to about .273 or .272 inch: at this point, it is just too narrow for the case mouth to be gripping it with the necessary friction grip to hold the bullet in place.

one can “feel” this as the press ram moves the case up into the seating die: there is normal resistance to the seating of the bullet at first, but as you near the end of the stroke with the press ram, almost all resistance ceases.  one’s fears are immediately confirmed, because when the cartridge is removed from the shell holder, and the bullet placed against a firm object, only minimal force is required, and i mean minimal, to dislodge the bullet and force it all the way into the case.  by this point, the bullet is so deep in the case neck, that even near the juncture of the shoulder and the neck, the bullet has insufficient diameter to be held tightly in a friction fit in the neck.  in my estimation, no amount of crimping can overcome this physical fact, this dimensional fact.

this is, of course, an entirely unacceptable situation in a cartridge whose anticipated use is cycling through a semi-automatic weapon as the ar-15: it just presents too many functioning issues to mess around with, and, more importantly, presents a very real danger in the form of pressure levels being spiked past acceptable limits because of an unpredictable amount of reduced case capacity upon firing.

i am not going to have recourse to a tight crimp to remedy the problem, as the ballistic tip has no crimping grove, and i don’t relish the prospect of having to make up for .005 inch discrepancy by trying to crimp my way to a solid fit.  not this kid.

by contrast, I have found that the 115 gr. hpbt as made by sierra, part no. match 1815, has a true .277 inch shank all the way past the point of the case mouth of the cartridge, when the bullet is seated so as to render a 2.260 inch overall length.  so seated, a 115 grain sierra bthp bullet in a 6.8 mm remington spc cartridge, will withstand all the pressure i can put against it on a wood surface, and will penetrate into the grain without moving in the case mouth.

now, it is not exactly the stuff of tragedy that a person is forced to have recourse to a sierra matchking bullet in order to make a good cartridge for reloading purposes.  the sierra matchking bullet, in all calibers and weights, is renowned for its flight characteristics and its accuracy, and most people would not view “having” to use a sierra bullet, in order to make a good hand load, as much of a handicap.  a lot of matches are won using them, and to my knowledge, most of the u.s. sniper team types, seals to marine recon, use sierra bullets in one shape of another in their sniper rifles.

so why am i so sniffy about this state of affairs.

well, it is because my ar-15 upper in 6.8 mm rem. spc, has exhibited a bit of a tendency to jam with hollowpoint bullets hanging up on the feed ramps, from both sides of the magazines that i have been using.  is it the fault of the feed ramp geometry in the barrel extension?  in the magazines?  who knows? have any of the factory loads i have been using used the sierra bullet: not that i could discern, this problem having occurred with both remington and hornady factory ammunition, predominately with the remington.  but, who would have cared, had the sharply pointed plastic tip of the ballistic tip solved the problem?  and, you know what?  the ballistic tip shoots well enough, at all distances, to come pretty doggoned close to the performance level of a sierra bullet.  the ballistic tip is just that good a bullet.

i am writing this little post, as i feel that this dimensional aspect of the nosler ballistic tip will probably present the same problem to whoever attempts to use or load it in a 6.8 mm rem. spc, anticipating using it in an ar-15 type weapon.  my die only has a crimping shoulder in it, and is not designed to do a shallow taper crimp, but i would not recommend this either.  the decreased circumference as represented by the .005 “gap” at the case mouth, and insufficient bullet diameter at the junction of the shoulder and the neck, is just too much “distance” to make up.

the solution?

for right now, i will used the sierra and hope that its sharply pointed hollow point tip will not jam on the ar-15 feed ramp.

and, at some point, i would hope that nosler makes a 110-115 grain ballistic tip bullet in .277 caliber, the shank of the bullet maintaining that .277 inch circumference past the case mouth of the 6.8mm rem. spc cartridge, with a crimping grove.  now, that would be a good bullet for hand loading, and i suspect it would fly truly and accurately, to all reasonable distances a good marksman could hold.

it would really be a pleasant quandary to face, having both the sierra matchking and the nosler ballistic tip bullet to use in a cartridge of this kind.  kind of like being a college football coach with two heisman trophy quarterbacks: a very pleasant problem.

i will let you know how the sierra matchking 115 grain bthp's work out.  if they function through the feed cycle without hanging up, i have no doubt that if they are not accurate, it is either my fault or the inadequacy of the rifle.  we shall see.

john jay @ 11.06.2008

more current events ...

preface.--  this was written in several darks moments, late in the morning, while feeling a bit down and lonely.  as i type this preface, it is Sunday afternoon, i am going for a walk, and the world seems full of cheer.  i think mccain will prevail, narrowly, unless the election is purloined by all of the voter registration capers being carried on in key precincts all over the country by the democrats: they really have connived to steal the election, haven't they.  have your foul weather gear handy, tuesday evening could bring in a bit of a blow.  let us hope and pray that good sense and america's providence and standing with g_d are in good order, and that obama is defeated.--  but, if he is not, ... .  well, read the below.   john jay, 11.02.2008, 2.32 p.m., pacific standard

 

the article.  seems that my social life isn’t what it used to be, so while the rest of you were gallivanting around saturday night,  i was down in my basement, suitably dreary to be outfitted w/ anthony perkins cutouts, polishing, resizing and de-priming brass rifle and pistol cases, in preparation of charging them with fresh bullets, primers and powders come the ascension to the marxist thrown of the united states by osama obama.

and, for some reason i thought of the stinking russians and the georgians.

and how, amongst marxist leninists, a little bourgeois notion of nation state boundaries was precious little inhibition in the face of geo political necessity, and how the russians might naturally want to retain/regain suzerainty over georgia, for access to the blue waters of the world, and control of oil resources, delivery, market and production.

and being old and malevolent and not yet totally potty, a deliciously nasty and evil irony struck me, which i don’t think the rest of this hemisphere and the rest of the world has quite yet tumbled to.  let me give you a hint.—

leaving aside the minor issue of whether the west has always adhered to them, the west has always had, and always enunciated, and has more or less tried to adhere to a set of moral and ethical standards in the conduct of its constituent nation states, and in the conduct of its diplomacy and trade.  it is that very thing that leftists the world over, including leftists in mexico and leftist in canada, have always derided and made fun of us, our old potty, outmoded, unhip, tired, moldy, silly old bourgeois beliefs.  you know, fair play, civility, manners, deportment, staying away from another fellow’s wife, morality, and not stealing a nation blind of its precious natural resources.

let me give you another hint.—

russia, for example, is not bound by such silliness as bourgeois belief.  marxists just aren’t, and neither are most radical leftist socialists.  i personally don’t think being bourgeois is silly, i regard it as sort of noble, but they view themselves much more pragmatic, driven by the exigencies of power and the moment, and not limited by mere sentiment or outmoded morals.  if any of you think that we are not on the verge of the world wide triumph of the naked nihilism of the power philosophy as announced by friedrich wilhelm nietzsche in “the origins of good and evil,” well then, think again.

so, it is with some inner glee and genuine malice that i anticipate ironies and coming evils of history, and the fact that people brought it on themselves.

for years everybody on this idiot planet has accused us of empire and conquest, when we have sought neither, and the various other perfidies of veiled world dominance, when actually we have been pretty decent about things.  we have left after we have conquered, and we have rebuilt and rehabilitated our attackers and enemies, and though we make large mistakes, it is because we have attempted large goods.  quick, name me one other nation in the last ten centuries that you can think of that had a marshall plan, and rebuilt a continent, twice, in the same century, after the rulers of that continent managed to destroy themselves.  and, paid for their defense, and helped them rebuild their economies, and helped them compete directly against us in domestic and international markets after we defeated them in war.  go ahead, name one other nation in history.

all the while this has occurred while we have good naturedly accepted the opprobrium and hatred of the world upon which we conferred our knowhow, our production techniques, our scientific and trade secrets, and our educational institutions and learning.  and, as mentioned, were criticized and ostracized for our bourgeois tastes and sentimentality's, our “posturing” about being good and acting and doing good, while the world new for certain we schemed to acquire and control.  did i happen to mention that for a significant span of the history described above, we were in sole possession of the world’s only deployable and workable nuclear weapons system: a quaint notion now, isn’t it.

this notion of conquest, it just never occurred to us.

but now.—

now we stand on the verge of being ruled by a cabal of marxist leninists, just like so many other cabals of marxist leninist radical leftists the world over.   (they do think in terms of conquest, oh, yeah.)just like russia.  just like the russia, and the russian marxists and revolutionaries lionized by the rest of an adoring world, … , intellectually halt, lame, self deluding and mendacious as they were.

well, the world has got its wish.  the u.s. enters the world of marxist progressivism.  and, our leaders will not think like mid-western insurance salesman, thorough going bourgeois dullards.

no, we have bright fellows driven by notions of power and dominance and material realities, unfettered by sentiment, or loyalty, or morality, who will be regarding the world, and our neighbors, and their resources, to include their minerals and their shorelines and their undisciplined peoples.

our geo politic shall not be the spread of democracy and self determination, not those bourgeois sentimentalities, but the wonders of materialistic progressivism, and power..

the same u.s. that for nearly two hundred years has stayed the hell out of canadian and mexican affairs, because of that bourgeois ethic, now, unhindered by such sentiments as progress and self determination.  no, no, no, … , we will no longer be exporting democracy and self determination.  we will soon be proletarians.

mexico, to our south, and canada, to our north, both countries blessed with an absolute abundance of mineral wealth, both of them blessed by large expanse of rich farmland, … , and neither of them with the populace and the military might to protect them, … , both of them with indefensible borders for 1,000’s of miles, with nary a single geographic impediment to conquest, both of them absolutely defenseless against the kind of preemptory invasion such as mounted by the russians, with their rag tag little chicken shit military against a defenseless georgia.

and, you know, so gleeful are the dumbshits that live in those tin pot little piss ant countries, and both of them so eager to be rid of the demon bush, who did nothing more, as all americans and americans heretofore have ever done, than protect them from external threat at absolutely no cost, than pay fair market value for their products, and then some, and allowed the citizens and businesses of both their countries to participate in our markets and penetrate them duty free to their profit and benefit.

for which bush “the dictator” and the u.s. were roundly excoriated and humiliated: one canadian minister going so far as to call president bush an idiot, without fear of reprisal to himself or to his country.  bourgeois, democratic values, and all that.

it will be so much fun when the mexicans and the canadians tumble to something.  something that they have wanted for years.

the united states, in some few months, is going to be a country run by people just like the people who run every other country in the world.  and, soon, it will be transformed into something just like something the canadians and the mexicans have never lived next to, though, ironically enough, they have aspired to it themselves.

they are going to be living next to a country just like russia and china.  a socialist marxist progressive society, run and administered by people totally devoid of capitalistic and western morality and ethical values, but, instead, guided by the principles of power, pragmatism, by a totally materialistic progressivism, which is to say, people totally uninhibited by notions of decency, religion, tradition or personal restraint.

the same progressive relativism that prompted russia into georgia (always pick on who you can beat), and china into tibet, and have they got to nepal yet, and pushed its way into hong kong and have they got to singapore yet, and which eyes taiwan (always pick on who you can beat), and which has tried innumerable times to bully its way into hegemony with viet nam (and found out you cannot beat everybody, even the little guys can be pretty nasty.

hey, we can take mexico.  40 million mexicans cannot be much of an obstacle: we have 10 million of ‘em here already.  and, what, 8 million hockey stick wielding cannucks, cannot amount to much.  how many people they got up there, anyway, … , anybody ever bother counting. i do “know” that about 80% of them live with 50 miles of the american border, about the normal daily combat radius for an abrahams tank.

so, the mexicans and the canadians have rid themselves of their marauding capitalistic imperialistic asshole neighbor.  and, now, they have a marxist radical government living right next to them, with the world’s largest military.

i can barely wait to begin hearing the shrieks of terror as the reality of it sinks in.  so, i am going to enjoy the spectacle, secure, in my own little dark heart, that they real fun has yet to begin, … , if, osama obama gains the presidency, with comrades pelosi and reid running congress.

i know it, and you know it, if we lose this election.

so will the rest of the world, in time:  they will find out what conquest and empire is, as soon as our little marxist farm gets up and running.  they will find out how much fun it is to provide for their own defense, when it is from us that they find themselves defending.

and, they have not a clue, not a tumble, at this juncture to the horror of it: they have not thought the matter through.  for they are putting the entire american arsenal and economic system into the hands of a man, who is not restrained by the notions of morality and fair play and decency which have restrained countless generations of americans and american leaders: we don’t believe it that old fashioned bourgeois morality crap, no sir, not any more.  the devil can take the hindmost: and the canadians and the mexicans can find out about it first.  kind of funny, to the dark old soul that i am turning into.

i cannot wait to see what happens the first idiot canadian governmental idiot calls osama obama an idiot.

john jay @ 11.01.2008

p.s.  i think that the sweet young thing who thinks that america will turn her swords into plowshears, and will dismantle the hated by leftists & dread "military industrial complex" if obama wins the presidency, has got another think coming.  maybe at first some rhetoric.  but, they will take to their toys.
 
how can barney frank cut back on all those parades with all those sweet young men and their tight little hunchies, marching down the street in front of them.  hunchies and pecks, what is a fellow to do?
 
i am unaware of any marxist leadership that has not loved a military, and sought to bring it instantly under its sway.  you want to know how the obama marxist occupation is going?  watch west point and the naval academy.  watch the air force academy.
 
the rest of the world may very well be shed of a moralistic, ideals driven america, and american foreign policy.  i think they have not thought through the alternatives.  just as with the russians, because this country may be headed for a marxist coup, does not mean that the world of real politic driven by parochial interests is over.  the fact that europe under the holy roman empire was catholic and unified by world view, did not stop warfare or foreign rivalry.
 
the u.s driven my morality and restraint is gone, if obama is elected.  the world has not thought this through.  as much as they decried that united states, they recognized it worked to the world's benefit.  we shall see.  canada and mexico will be the first.

current events

friends:
 
what mr. obama is attempting to do is to "stampede" this electorate to join in a herd response to his campaign, e.g., a lemmings' rush to the sea.
 
i have earlier posted an excerpt to that which is set forth fully below, from win blevins' dictionary of the american west.  i am going to set it forth entirely this time, because it so amply defines, while serving as a vivid metaphor/image, of whatj the obama campaign is doing to try and suppress the vote, and steal this election.  as noted in the article by the obama campaign worker (a disgruntled hillary supporter), and in mara's link and as reported last evening in atlas shrugs, they are repeating a tactic which attempted to oust hillary from the campaign really before she had clearly lost.
 
so, read this and enjoy.  mr. blevins is a marvelous writer.  and, partner, there ain't nobody with a more vivid speach that the native born texican cowpoke, lessen it is a north west buckaroo, of the great basin, or the great bindle stiffs of the dark and dank oregon and washington forests primeval.  so siddle on up, partner, and drape them arms over the top rail, let 'er buck, ... , and watch the fun!!!
 
the dictionary of the american west, pages 366-67, sasquatch books, seattle, wa., 2001.
 

stampede.  nouns:  (1) what every open-range cowman feared, especially on a trail drive -- a blind, lurching, crashing takeoff of cattle (or, for that matter, horses or buffalo).  it was always serious trouble and sometimes disaster.  the animals would run until they were worn out, which damaged their condition for the trail drive and seriously reduced their weight and thus there value for market.  they also got broken bones, got trampled, got lost, and got drowned. 
     anything could and did start a stampede, 1,000-pound critters being afraid not only of jackrabbits but nearly anything that moved.  the most frequent causes were storms.  it happened suddenly: "the remarkable thing about it, " said the veteran cattleman charles goodnight, "was that the whole herd started instantly, jarring the earth like an earthquake."  the hands tried to keep them from getting clear to hell and gone by getting alongside the leaders and turning them into a circle, using up their furious energy running around and around on safe ground, instead of having them end up in the river or off the top of a mesa.  some cowboys, though, believed that het best strategy was to get in front of them, make yourself the leader, and gradually slow down.  riding hell for leather to catch the leaders or in front of them, often at night, was risky business and killed many a hand.
     the stampedes of buffalo were formidable -- 5,000 and 10,000 beasts half again the size of cows on the rampage, utterly unstoppable, a force of nature.  [some night, get "dances w/ wolves," go to the buffalo hunt scenes, turn out all the lights, and turn your t.v./stereo/home theatre up load enough to shake the plates, and watch the buffalo chase a couple of times, with your sweetheart.  i guarantee you, you will not be disappointed: it stirs the blood, oddly enough.  you easterners think you invented enjoyment.  laughing.]
     now that cattle are tended by people from birth, not allowed to get wild and snorty off by themselves and mostly kept within fences, the stampede is primarily a danger of the past.  [in my neck of the woods, we have the "mountain cow," not a feedlot critter, by ranges year round in the mountains, brought out only for winter feed lots: they are plenty snorty, and separating them from the timber on horseback has led to many broken collar bones, broken arms and dislocated shoulder, and cracked skulls, principally by catching a tree limb in the chest just as one caught a lance during a joust and with the same result: the rider is temporarily suspended as his horse runs off from underneath him, and then he crashes someplace hard, and usually rocky.  if you are around horses long enough, you will be hurt.  guaranteed.--  jjay.]
     (2)  a charge of gold miners to new diggings was called a stampede.  such stampedes were a subject of much hilarity, even among the miners themselves.  this joke comes down to us:
     "a miner came to the pearly gates and asked for permission to enter.  but st. peter said heaven couldn't stand another miner.  why just the week before teh critters were breaking up the pavement of the gold streets with picks and assaying their harps.
     "so the miner proposed a bargain:  if he would get rid of these trouble-makers, would st. peter let him stay in heaven?  agreed.
     "by the end of the day came a stampede of miners, lickety-split, for the lower place.  at its end came the miner who made the bargain with st. peter, his gear packed and headed out.  st. peter asked in amazement how the fellow managed to get all the miners to leave voluntarily.  the fellow said he'd just started a rumor that someone had struck color in hell.  st. peter chuckled, but went on to ask why the miner himself was packed up and headed south.  'well,' drawled the fellow, 'you never know.'" [more on this: jjay.]
     (3)  stampede is one of the early words for rodeo, as in calgary stampede.
     (4)  a stampeder may be an animal prone to start stampedes, a horse inclined to run off blindly, a man who causes a stampede or who simply takes part in one, or a miner who rushes into a new mineral area.
     verbs: ([5])  to set off on a flight, whether you're a critter or a person; to cause a stampede, a common technique of horse thieves both indian and anglo; to rush into anything, as to stampede into marriage.  (6)  to stampede to the wild bunch meant to go on the dodge, to cast your lot with outlaws.
     often pronounced stom-PEDE by old-timers, the word comes from the spanish estampida.  early forms of the word in american english were stampedo, stampido, and stampado.

well, there you have it.  i do wish to comment on one further aspect of this word, and its consequences, alluded to above by the miner who was taken up in his own rumor mongering, knowing full well it to be false, but caught up in the very stampede he started, nonetheless.

and, it is the modern art of polling, especially as perfected in their own craft of publishing misleading "polls."  the democrats have excelled at this, aided and abetted by the media, trumpeting false poll after false poll exaggerating or simply fabricating substantial leads for their candidates, in order to try and demoralize republicans by keeping them away from the polls, casting the exercise of one's franchise as futile.  [see the description of "salting a mine" in mr. blevins' dictionary, ... , casting nuggets and grains of gold about a worthless claim, in order to create the impression it is ore bearing, e.g., fraud.]

now, generally speaking, the democrats are so taken in by their own rumor mongering, or, to use another term, lying, that in the event they do in fact loose an election even after having predicted handy victory, knowing full well the claim false, they cry, "we was robbed," amidst copious teeth gnashing and egregious eye-rolling, hair tearing, and beating of the chests, or, fondly others, if handy, in their enthusiasms.  indeed, it is predicted in some quarters that if obama is "robbed" in this election, there could be trouble in the streets.  see above, for stampeders.

it is the "bradley effect" known to all pollsters.  minority candidates, especially blacks, have to run at 50%+ of decided voters for the polls to be able to predict victory, because the undecided's do not vote for the minority candidates in any ratio which might be otherwise extrapolated or predicted from the general results, e.g., if running less than 50% there is always a chance for a white candidate to spring ahead by taking a substantial portion of the undecided votes.  it is a well understood and observed/observable phenomena in politics, understood even by democratic pollsters, ... , who are loathe, however, to acknowledge it, because it usually means a "clear cut" advantage suddenly turns into a very "tenuous" and "problematical" advantage, and if the minority candidate is running 46, 47 or 48% of solid commitments, to 43, 44 or 45% solid committtment for his white opponent, may in fact rather reliably predict failure for such candidate rather than success, as the white undecided's swing in behind the white candidate.

it exists.  it is at play in this election.  it is not talked about very damned much, except in hushed tones, and it is never publically mentioned by the media types or the demo poll takers.  we will find out tuesday, whether it is at play here sufficiently to "unelect" mr. obama.

read this, and understand.

john jay, 10.31.2008