Neck sizing .56-50

[ndnchf]

I'd like to neck size only the .56-50 cases made from .50-70 Starline brass.  The chamber of my M1871 infantry rifle is pretty loose and the shells expand quite a bit.  They resize fine in my CH4D .56-50 die, but it is working the brass more than I'd like.  I've tried backing out the sizing die a bit, but when I do, it doesn't size the neck down enough.  After sizing, the ID of the neck is .512" which works great with my .515" bullet.  After firing the case mouth ID is .530".  So you can see there is a lot of brass working going in here.  Does anyone make a suitable neck sizing die?  The only other thing I can think of is to buy another .56-50 or .50-70 sizing die and cut it off at he bottom, leaving only enough to size the neck.  Kind of drastic, but what else can I do? 

[Snakeeater]

From the manner which you describe the problem, it would appear the chamber has eroded, hence accounting for the increase in the case mouth size after fire-forming your brass. I don't have that problem with my M1860 Rifle but it has been re-barreled by Romano. I am shooting Romano's .519, 395-gr bullet, sized to .510. Of course, I haven't measured any of my fired cases to check what they may be opening out to, but I have noticed that depending on how much I crimp them adds to the case stretching. I have resolved to crimping only very lightly, just enough to snug the bullet, since I am merely target shooting and not hunting for big game. Maybe its time to consider re-barreling the rifle and putting the old barrel up until you decide to sell it, then you can sell the rifle with both? I still have the original barrel to my rifle even though it was cut down to carbine length.

[ndnchf]

No, there is no erosion in the chamber, it is smooth and shiny and the bore is near excellent.  Its just how Springfield chambered these in 1871.  If you review my "shooting the M1871 Infantry Rifle" thread, you'll see that it shoots very well, 1.25" at 50 yards when I do my part.  There is nothing wrong with the barrel other than being chambered a little loose.  This is consistent with how Springfield chambered the M1868 trapdoor also - loose.  This rifle uses the M1868 trapdoor barrel also, they are cousins so to speak. I have both of these rifles and they both seem to have oversize chambers by modern standards.  This rifle also uses cases that are a bit longer than typical .56-50; 1.356" and an overall cartridge length of 1.682".  They are a bit different than other Spencers.  I suspect they did this intentionally, to allow a soldier to keep shooting even when the chamber got extrmely fouled.  If I have to make new brass more often due to work hardening, I will.  But if that can be avoided by just neck sizing, so much the better. 

[Herbert]

Every Spencer I have reloaded for has had a genrous sized chamber,as with any military rifle feeding reliability would be the reason for this as you mentioned,even with a custom neck sizer your brass is going to be over worked if you youse the smaller bullet,you could go to a larger bullet .520+ and back your FL die of but with the results you are getting with the load you are now useing I would wear the working of the brass and just aneal more oftern

[Snakeeater]

Back in the late 1980s when  I served briefly on the All Army Reserve Service Rifle Team, the team were issued M-14s with oversize chambers so much larger, in fact, even using brand-new Federal brass, the brass was so distorted after firing once it was useless to any reloader except for scrap value. Of course, we primarily trained for the 1000-yard Palma Matches, and shot 190-gr Sierra bullets which in a gas-gun packed one heck of a whallop to your shoulder in prone position. Although we frequently asked the AMU armorers why these match rifles had oversized chambers, no one ever gave us a rationale answer except to suggest we could shoot most any ammo issued and not worry about dirt or fouling. Fortunately, I never had to use the team rifles but three years earlier had my own rifle built (by Glenn Nelson) that when I received it, it came with a 200-yard tunnel-test target (machine-rested), with a 14-shot group (of 168-gr Sierras) the size of a nickel! I never was able to hold it that tight, but had no problem shooting 98s and 99s back to 600, and shot one clean at 600. The first time that I shot that rifle at 1000-yards, our team coach CW4 Billy Atkins zeroed me into the X-ring in just three shots! But it was like the folks that made the decision anent having rifles with oversized chambers were not the grunts in the field using them. Like the ammo we shot, we was expendable.