Martini cadet 32s&w long .308

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Philip

New Member
Hi

I hope this is the right place to start this tread, I have bought one of a few martini cadets here in Norway chamberet for 32 s&w long by reaming it "short" with a 32 h&r reamer. The barrel is .308bore an 1-10" twist.
The former owner only shot j-words in it so I have to start from scratch.

I have 500ct og h&n 86gr rn .309 and 500ct of missouri bullet co 100gr fn .313. Planing to size these down to both .311 and .309 to test accuracy.

Here in norway we only have easy access to vithavouri powders so i have n310,n320 and n330.

Have only tested the 86gr h&n bullets so far with little success, lots of carbon on the cases. Accuracy was about 2" at 50 yards.

Have just accuired a lyman 115gr mould And a lee 120gr round nose, and hopefully these will better the accuracy.

I will oppdate the tread when i have tested more.
 

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Petrol & Powder

Well-Known Member
Welcome !

Of the powders you have available, The N310 is the fastest. The 32 S&W Long is a small case and therefore I would go with a fast burn rate from the N310 or maybe the N320 becuase you have a rifle length barrel. The 86 grain bullet is a bit on the light side for 32 S&W Long, so I would opt for the 100 grain bullet. Your barrel will tell you what to size at but .311" will likely be fine.

I agree with Rick, your load may be a little under pressure.
 
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Outpost75

Outpost75

Active Member
Depending upon the length and shape of the transition from the case mouth into the origin of rifling, the 10-inch twist will accurately stabilize bullets up to 10 grams in weight at subsonic velocity, from 300-330 m/s. Try assembling some "dummy" rounds with the bullet seated out long until they contact the rifling origin, but do not impede the action closing easily, so that loaded rounds can be safely removed without firing and not de-bulleting and leaving the bullet lodged in the barrel.

Using a nominal case full in the .32 S&W Long case, of military rifle powder suitable for loading full charge loads in the 7.63x39 with the 8 gram service bullet is a safe place to start. I load 8 grains of IMR4227 with a 155 grain .30-30 cast bullet sized .310 and get inch groups at 50 yards.
 
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Petrol & Powder

Well-Known Member
Outpost75 kindly converted some of that data to metric measurements for our Norwegian friend. To help those of us on this side of the pond, here are the English equivalents:

300 Meters Per Second = 984 feet per second

330 Meters Per Second = roughly 1083 fps

10 grams = 154 grains

And for our Norwegian friend, a 1 in 10-inch twist rate is 1 turn in 254 mm.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled thread. :)

(And that is a COOL rifle)
 
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P

Philip

New Member
Thank you for all the helpfull and welcoming replys, been a longtime reader of this forum, looking for tips and tricks.

For the photos of the cases with sot your probably right regarding low pressure. The 86gr bullets and n310 is not a good combo for this gun. To reach "enough" pressure the bullets will go supersonic.

As Ben said the 311008 bullet is what I have been looking for. Bought a couple of moulds unseen secondhand from a old reloader and when i opened the parcel today I found: a 2-cavity 311227 mould, 2-cavity 311008, nib lee 314 90gr swc mould, a 355 rcbs and lyman 358 that need cleaning.

Outpost75 i "knocked" in two .313 bullets carefully in backwards in the chamber today to get a better feel for the throat and transition. I am no expert in these kind of chamberings but it looks kinda sharp. Will try to seat some .311 sized 100gr bullets tomorrow with about 2.4-2.8gr of n320 and shot it over the magnetospeed.

The previous owner shot lapua 100gr and sierra 110gr hp over 5.4gr of vithavouri n110, but that load did not have a good presentage of burnt powder. Probably why he had good groups of 4 shots and nr 5 two moa of.
 

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Philip

New Member
Ps sorry for mixing imperial and metric measurements. Most Norwegian reloaders use imperial for charge weights, bullets weights and barrel twist. Metric for cartridge Oal and muzzle velocity. This rifle will be dedicated to subsonic loads cause we are so lucky that suppressor are over the counter items.
 
Outpost75

Outpost75

Active Member
Metric system is widely used in military, aerospace and scientific areas both for NATO standardization and to make calculations easier.

For those who cling to British Imperial measurements, I ask them to compute for me the orbital velocity of a keyhole satellite in furlongs per fortnight and to tell me when it will be overhead to download encrypted imagery.
 
Ian

Ian

Notorious member
Philip said:
Ps sorry for mixing imperial and metric measurements. Most Norwegian reloaders use imperial for charge weights, bullets weights and barrel twist. Metric for cartridge Oal and muzzle velocity. This rifle will be dedicated to subsonic loads cause we are so lucky that suppressor are over the counter items.
Click to expand...

You must know Henrik then, or should. I am constantly amazed by the competence in both the English language and U.S. Customary units demonstrated by many Europeans. As an American, I am both jealous of your lack of national anti-suppressor regulations and grateful for the remaining firearm freedoms what we have here.
 
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RBHarter

RBHarter

West Central AR
The whole planet bases oil production on the barrel . 33.5 gallons .......same unit as wine and beer ........ I'm still trying to figure why Newton metres and kilos per sq metre arnt interchangeable and why BAR isn't an international standard.
 
RicinYakima

RicinYakima

High Steppes of Eastern Washington
A barrel of oil is 42 US Gallons.
In the US most fluid barrels (apart from oil) are 31.5 US gallons (26 imp gal; 119 L) (half a hogshead), but a beer barrel is 31 US gallons (26 imp gal; 117 L). The size of beer kegs in the US is based loosely on fractions of the US beer barrel.
 
JWinAZ

JWinAZ

Active Member
What a nice rifle and a pleasant prospect to develop handloads for.

Whether Système International (SI) or customary units are used, the important thing is to state the units as you have done. We all have units that we "think in", but conversions are not a problem if you know what the units are.
 
Ben

Ben

Moderator
Staff member
Sorry, but this is the closest thing I've got to a nice custom
Martini.

My " Max " would handle those wolves and cougars :

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357 Maximum
18.5 grs. of IMR - 4227
Fed 205 Match rifle primer.
RCBS , 200 gr. , G/C, HP

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Three rounds of 357 Mag. @ 50 yards

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