Hornady 178gr ELD-X

[JeffreyDeGraff]

Some of you may have read my thread on the Hornady .257 120gr HP. Now here is my story about the Hornady 178gr ELD-X.

Awhile back I bought some 178gr ELD’s from a guy online. He shipped them in a ziploc so they would fit in a small flat rate box. He told me they were ELD-X, but who knows for sure. I found a great load with them in my K31 7.5x55 with AA4350. This load is with the bullet .015” off the lands and consistently shoots 3/4” groups.

Skip forward to yesterday and I decided I needed to load more of these up because after I sight in for hunting season I won’t have many left. I busted open a new box of ELD-X that I had gotten from Wes a little while ago. I charged 3 brass and seated the bullet. The over all length, base to tip was .013” longer than my original load, so I hooked my comparator up and the loaded round, base to ogive, was .005” shorter than the originals. I left those three rounds the way they were and loaded up three more with the micrometer moved out .005. These rounds matched the base to ogive measurement of the original rounds. I’m going to sight in with the last of my previous batch then test these two new loads. I hope this will be easy.

Now I wonder if that guy had sold me ELD-M’s and confused them for the X’s. Hopefully that is the case. If not, it will be very disappointing that Hornady would have that much variance between lots of bullets.


JTD

[Flyeralan]

You responded exactly as I would have, I hope it works out good for you.

[JeffreyDeGraff]

Not working out so hot. The load with the new bullet is not shooting to expectation. I am now reworking the load. I’m keeping the powder charge the same, but have refigured my max overall length with the new bullet and have a few test loads made up with different seating depths. I’m hoping that this will be the extent of it.

I also found out that my new Hornady seating die with their ELD seating stem is not working well. The edges of the seating stem have swelled out, making it not move freely/smoothly inside the die and is giving me inconsistent seating depths. It also gets stuck in the die if I try to load bullets longer than what it likes. I had to use my Frankford Arsenal universal seating die to load my new test rounds. Fingers crossed.


JTD

[Flyeralan]

Good work in diagnosing this, keep me informed. This stuff is interesting.

[Harter]

Makes me sad to read about Hornady having these kind of tool QC issues.

I only have a couple of specialty dies from them and don't really use them as intended...... I have an 8×57 neck die I use for cast in a fat bore 7.7×58 . Short version, w/o the expander it's sizes the neck just right for the .317 cast .

Seems strange to read about dies that aren't Lee needing final QC and repair to work or continue working that are so new . Maybe I've been spoiled having so many old tools .

[JeffreyDeGraff]

Makes me sad to read about Hornady having these kind of tool QC issues.

I only have a couple of specialty dies from them and don't really use them as intended...... I have an 8×57 neck die I use for cast in a fat bore 7.7×58 . Short version, w/o the expander it's sizes the neck just right for the .317 cast .

Seems strange to read about dies that aren't Lee needing final QC and repair to work or continue working that are so new . Maybe I've been spoiled having so many old tools .

The seating die itself is fine. The original seating stem that came with the die is fine (I haven’t used it). I had ordered a VLD style seating stem for the die, and it’s the part that is buggered. My thought is that the walls of the vld seating stem are thinner to accommodate this style of bullet, and that my mildly compressed load was just a little too much for it.


JTD

[JeffreyDeGraff]

I ended up taking one of the new bullets and re-finding my OAL. My original load shot best at .015” off the lands, so I loaded these new bullets to .010” and .015” off the lands. This gives me a new COAL, New comparator measurement, and new micrometer setting for the seating die. The .010” shot well and the .015” shot excellent, just like before. I’m glad I got this all figured out, since I love shooting this rifle, and am hoping to take a deer with it this year.

I have scrapped the VLD seating stem and put the original back in the Hornady seating die. I will only use it for standard shaped bullets from now on. I will use the Frankford Arsenal universal seating die for any super pointy bullets. I’m still very pleased with that Frankford die, it still is seating consistently and is still repeatable.


JTD