NoFail

Thanks, Robo

Thank you for your email, feel free to send it back. We will make this right. Chris Baldwin SI Defense Manager 2902 Hwy 93 North Kalispell, MT 59901 Phone 406-752-4253 Fax 406-755-1302

It was late morning west, er, left coast when I emailed Chris and explained everything. No response yet. Not really my business as far as he's concerned, I think. If I don't hear from him tomorrow ill advise friend Jason to email Chris.

I don't know, 98, & I could have used my BCG to check it too, didn't Know to think of it. He doesn't have the BCG yet. Ill see if I can get his receivers back here so I can try that, good idea. Thanks, phunk!! There is a lot more light showing through his than on yours. If you look at pic I posted, you see in front that there is no light and as you look front to back the gap increases as it progresses to the back. That makes me think the rear pin is holding rear of upper up, because either the upper hole is offset too low or the lower hole is offset too high.

Thank you robocop & phunk. With no pins they mesh perfectly. The set is back in Jason hands now. I had not tried to see what happens with just one other other pins by itself. Except with front pin inserted & swinging the upper down to position I think they did mesh well, if I remember, and then upon inserting rear pin the gap would present itself. The curve at rear does not seem to be touching with lower when the pins are inserted because I think upper is lifted up, by the rear pin, from lower when pins inserted. So I sent Chris an email with pic asking for assistance. Waiting for reply.

Well okay then ... Can I say "fornicate"!!!!! So I'll tell him what you guys think. This sucks large donkey size for sure, and I'm the one who told him to go for the SI because they do quality poop. I didn't mean real poop, fornicate!! Thanks guys.

$40, I didn't know that. Mine, my old, outdated & obsoleted version LoL, was certainly more than that less than a yeare ago. Friend paid more than $40 for new version that's for sure. The new one looks very nice on the gun.

Yeah Yeah Yeah.. I didnt forget, just had to wait for wife to get off of this thing... :mellow: But here they are now. I'm sorry, Robo, I knew you would be waiting!! Well, I don't like that there is such a gap between them. I compared with mine, a JD Machine and there is a tighter looking fit with it, but the side to side wobble is about the same. Upper moving along the front to back axis on lower is the same, which is nill with the foam rubber wedges I have in the both of them.

Ain't no nuttin wrong whit it!!! Pretty normal how it is me thinks. He did have one of those shim thingy's in the rear of the lower behind rear pin placement. I didn't like the job it was doing so I did what I did for mine. Some dense foam rubber with adhesive bottom. I trimmed it up until it made a snug fit between the halves. No real movement now of upper sliding backward on lower. There is wobble laterally. I think it's called lateral? But it's not too bad anymore. I think maybe my JD Machine .308 set is just a little little bit better but this SI is good too. He has the VLTOR BCM Gunfighter charge handle with mod 3 latch just like mine but its different. Seems they have improved the design at least in the looks department. Damn it looks way better now, I'm jealous and want it...

Yeah, I know, he said he got pins from some whatever source. I'll do the pics tonight so stay tuned. He said the pins feel sloppy in the upper's holes. The 1/8" gap he said is estimate, it could be less than that, idk. I still can't see SI screwing up though. That would be a huge screw up, I think. If it was SID issue then would they have not run off a poop load of them at the same time with this problem? I don't know the processes, but I'd think the whole lot would be controlled and come out the same for each unit, and the problem would be caught at some point in the process. Idk...

60 lbs!!! Robo? Holy cow!!! No pun intended, lol!! I'd like to loose 30 lbs. That is a healthy & smart way you did it. Good for you... Sorry I don't have anything like that to share now. Unless this ice cream called "Death By Chocolate" with some Mrs. Richardson's hot fudge poured all over it counts...

Thanks for all of your responses guys!! It is SI Defense, not CMMG. In any case I'll be able to have a good look at it tonight. I'll take measurements and pictures to post here at that time, but with iPhone 4. Hard to believe SI made a mistake. This particular set was made a few during si's most recent run of their .308/multi-cal receivers within last few months. Jason has also ordered the SI Nickel Boron BCG which i guess will be ready in a month or two. But I hope it is just somehow the wrong pins, still I think Jason would have gotten the correct ones. I had inspected this set maybe 3 or so weeks ago when it was dropped off here and I did not notice anything wierd about them, didn't notice any alignment issue with the coupling holes, or whatever we call them. Oh well we will see tonight...... Thanks again you guys!!!!

Yup..... I'd post the titties too but that would be pushing it on this forum. But so anyway I've been texting with my bud and he said the upper and lower don't fit well with the take down pins inserted. I told him must be wrong kind of pins. He said there is 1/8" gap between halves with pins inserted. He said the pins feel sloppy in the upper holes. ???? Robo? Edit: please don't misconstrue that last paragraph as having anything to do with said avatar..... I realize it could be misinterpreted, maybe. :)

Why I took a picture of it in the mirror, silly boy.....

SI Defense .308 matched set. SI Defense BCG Nickel Boron (will ship in 4-6 weeks) Criterion SS 18" from Fulton JP EZ trigger JP adj. gas block JP comp Magul MIAD, PRS (going to have to loan him one of my LR-20's) I don't remember the FF hand guard name now.....

Lmao!! Me thinks I'll have to use that one

Oh, it's all old stuff I picked up from my bro in law, his equipment is at my house, I have bought some of my own stuff but I am lucky to have his stuff here. And I have done tons of reading on the subject. Experience is where you get better and better, and keep reading and asking questions is key. Safety is key!!! It is fun for me, relaxing and it is my hobby. This thread is about SS media tumbling. When I went that direction everything, EVERYTHING, got so much better I can't tell you enough. I believe it has become so important in my processes that it would be a crime to not tell any and all reloaders about it, that's all.

I look forward to that, my brother unforgiven. To me reloading is the only answer. It is cheaper, but you have to spend for the equipment first. I can't afford factory ammo, but I can make some pretty damn good ammo that rivals most of what you can buy factory. The only thing that seems to do as good is Federal Gold Medal Match, that is great match ammo you can just buy. I have matched it using 168 SMK's, IMR 4064 powder, Winchester .308 brass & Winchester large rifle primers. Pretty much all I have to do is good brass prep and, using those components, make the bullet go 2450 fps from out of my 16" JP barrel. The best dies is a good thing to have too, though. I went Forster!!! Edit: I want to add that consistency is very key to all of this. All the prep work of brass is where it is mostly at, I think. Make it all the same as best as you can with the equipment you have. I put a lot of time in the brass, most of it is there by far. The one thing I couldn't solve was consistent neck tension. When I switched to SS media tumbling I solved that problem without realizing it until all of a sudden I took those first tumbled cases and loaded them. I cannot stress enough how shitty my neck tension felt before when seating any bullet in any brass, and the total turn from that now. My brass is so good to go now!!! It is hard to say that that is not the most impressive thing I discovered using this new method. By the way it was probably about 3 years ago when only about 3 guys on the planet were doing this SS media thing. Make that at least 4 now ;)

Hi all, This reloading forum is at a trickle lately. I thought I'd throw in a new topic to share with you all how the Stainless Steel Media Wet Tumbling process has been benefiting me. Before I discovered SS media tumbling for brass I first used walnut in the vibrator. I thought, when I first started loading for pistol cartridges a few years ago, oh how cool is that, an easy way to clean them all at once. I was a rookie and I didn't know anything else. So I'd first thow my dirty used brass into the vibratory and let I go for a few hours. It was noisy but the brass came out clean on the outside and I was like well okay then. But I still had to clean primer pockets and the insides of cases weren't exactly clean, to say the least. And within days the brass had started to loose its polished sheen look. I figured that this is as good as it gets? Then I learned some people are cleaning their brass in ultra sonic tanks. They would typically used Dawn detergent and lemon juice. They claimed it would clean the insides of cases & primer pockets pretty good. I thought that tha sounds pretty awesome if it does primer pockets and cleans insides better. So I went & bought a ultra sonic at harbor freight. I got the cheaper one they had. I could do about 25 cases at a time. Not so many but I don't go and shoot shitloads of rounds at a time. And so I did this for a little while, over last summer, and it was okay, primer pockets were getting cleaner just by this method but not all the way at all. Cases insides were getting much cleaner but not all of it. The sonic tank only ran in 3 minute increments. I had to start it 4 or 5 times to get it clean to my liking. Still, the sheen would fade within days & it was ugly again, but the ammo was good so so what? Th method was a pain in the ass and it was wet so I had had to come up with an efficie t way to dry. It was summer and the sun is free, so........ So one day I stumbled on the SS Media method on another forum, snipershide.com's reloading forum. I saw results they were achieving from the pics they would post. I read all about their methods and recipes. I saw how amazing the brass would turn out as good as new or better. I got a hard on for it!! So I told my brother in law what I was learning and he said, "I've got an old rock tumbler that was my dads". I asked him to bring it by to look at. I had learned that the tumbler of choice was the Thumler's Model B rock tumbler. One day soon after my bro in law showed up with his dads old tumbler. Low and behold it was the Thumler's Model B!! I got all excited, I pluget her in and the motor worked. The whole thing looked I. Grea shape except for paint. The only thing it needed was a new drive belt so I ordered one from Thumler's. I also needed the SS media pins that are used. They need to be a certain size, 5mm long I think they are. They look like needle bearing pins too me. So required are 5 lbs of the pins. I bought the from a guy for $45. I went and got this stuff called Lemishine that is part of the recipe theses guys are using, at Walmart is the Lemishine. All else that is needed is Dawn & water. So finally I had everything I needed to do my 1st batch of SS media tumbled metallic cartridge cases. The thing to do is fix your recipe, which is 5 lbs SS. pins, 1 9mm luger case full of Lemishine, and water filled to 1" below rim of thumler drum. This, with 100 .308 cases, weighs out to 15 lbs which is the max weight capacity of a Thumler's model B. So nothing else to do but tighten the drum top on and let her rip. 3 hours later I figured it was done. Upon removing lid a taking a few brass pieces to inspect I was thrilled to discover how crazy clean it all was. Primer pockets clean, insides fkn absolutely CLEAN!!! As clean as outsides which were highly polished. Those were the expected results I had. Unexpected benifits: I had not realized that not only was this going to give me phenomenally clean and polished brass, it was also going to deburr everything, like my fkd up rims from extractor. Any burrs like that were knocked down and smoothed out, just like that!! So if rims aren't bent, which I have experienced before, it was all very good now. Wow how could this get any better? I'll tell you how. When I started loading with these now SS Media tumbled .308 cases it became very apparent how consistent and smooth it was when seating bullets. I could feel thru the lever of the Dillon 550B how every single bullet felt just the same going down the necks. It is all one consistent pressure to put them down. No rough spots, no deviations in the feel, the insides of necks were all smoothed or honed. Note that I do size/decap the brass before I tumble, so the last thing I wantto do is tumble after all other prep work is done, it works for me. I believe my neck tension is pretty much all equivelent from case to case now. It was a problem that it was not before, I'm sure if that. I didn't know how to fix it before. I think I just did..... Dudes, I am so stoked over this, I don't know what else I can say about that. This method works like no other. If you want to try this let me know, I can hook you up to know about everything. Try at your own risk, you'll get hooked no doubt about it...

Yeah that's so true, edgecrusher, but at least I get to drive the Datsun

It is said that Federal used to use it for their Gold Medal Match ammo, at least in .308. I use it and it has produced my tightest 5 shot groups from my .308 using a 168 gr SMK on top. Single digit ES's in the groups is typical. I like it more than Varget, to be perfectly honest. Varget ES's not nearly as good for me. If I knew where to go and pick up some IMR 4064 I would do it, already would have... I've got less than 2 lbs right now.

It's purdy, ain't it?

^ Yes, it's is. But I get the great low ES's too with the good nodes.

^ I asked for a friend, whom in turn went with a JP Enterprises single stage fire control kit. It's the same one I use, comes with everything including safety mechanism. A few weeks ago I took out the 4.5 lb spring and threw in the 3-3.5 lb spring. So much better now!! My trigger pull scale shows it to be 3 lbs. now :)