Armory Sponsor
Posted: 3/21/2010 10:03:40 AM EDT
|
I have been reloading for almost a year now, and have you a single stage
press. Now I'm looking at getting a auto press. I was watching the Hornady videos on youtube and watching the stages of how it works. My question though, is whenever I see someone using an auto press I never see anyone resize/trim, or chamfer the brass, or clean/de-burr the primer pocket. Every piece of instructions I've read in reloading, says you must do this brass prep, but with the auto press, it seems no one does, or at least not in the videos. So, are these steps really unnecessary, is that what the videos are saying? If any of you out there with auto presses do brass prep, how do you do it with as little interruption as possible with your auto press? I appreciate any input |
|
Most people work bottle neck brass in two stages - size, trim, and deburr the brass in one pass, then load in the next pass. Two die plates are one way to do the operation, and some do the sizing on a single stage press.
Straight wall handgun brass can go directly from the tumbler to the press - size and decap, then prime, then charge, then seat, and finally crimp (or seat and crimp on the last step, if you have the patience to adjust the die; I don't). Sizing and trimming are not optional steps if you want your ammunition to work. |
|
My thought, is that Lee makes a Die, I don't remember the name, that all
it does is pop out the primer of uncleaned brass, no sizing is done. So I could use my single stage press to pop out the primer, then I could clean my brass, then do brass prep –– sizing/trimming, chamfering, etc –– then maybe load the brass into the LnL AP and go from there? Is that a good method? My only thought is then maybe when I send it through the resizing die to reform the neck and stuff it might through off the length, but that should be pretty minor, right? |
|
Quoted:
This is called a "universal decapping die," and it's very handy. I have one and use it all the time.
My thought, is that Lee makes a Die, I don't remember the name, that all it does is pop out the primer of uncleaned brass, no sizing is done. As Borg says, ALWAYS size before trimming, as some part of the lengthening process happens during sizing. Bottleneck cases MUST be measured and trimmed as needed or Very Bad Things (extreme over pressure being one of them) could result. |
|
I want a progressive because most of my shooting is plinking and volume shooting, not precision shooting. It takes me about 2 hours to load 50 rounds which I shoot in about 3-4 minutes. Too much work for a little shooting. So if I can speed up the process a little, that would be awesome.
My two biggest time consumers are lubing the cases (I had been using the Lee paste stuff that I put on with fingers and q-tips) and measuring the powder. I switched to the Hornady spray lube, and that made that process MUCH faster. For powder I'm using a Lee powder dispenser and weighing it on a Cabelas scale. The powder dispenser isn't that accurate, and each charge varies by 2-4 tenths of a grain. So I spend a lot of time adding/subtracting grains on the scale to get the right amount of powder. Then every couple of rounds I have to re-tare the scale. So I'm thinking the dispenser must be more accurate on the LnL Auto Press, because it isn't measured on a scale, it goes strait into the case. (Am I correct on this?). So this should really speed it up. I thought about getting a nice RCBS Elect. dispenser, but those are $2-300, so for that I might as well get a auto press. |
| Seems to me, that your statement about the charge variance points to one of the extruded powders. Odds are that won't change using a progressive. Maybe a change of powders will help. On my precision loads, I use the RCBS chargemaster to weigh out Varget and such. Since I don't have the LnL setup, for short runs of plinking ammo, I just use the Rock Chucker and a powder depenser with TAC. Whenever the weight is off, it's only by .1gr and that's usually to the high side. TAC is like butta. |
The presses are called progressives not autos (those are cars).
Case prep; cleaning, sizing, delubing, trimming, deburring, remove primer pocket crimp, uniform primer pocket, is all done before progressive loading. So the videos will start with the case prep done and proceed to the loading you see. Go back up to the top of the page and read the FAQ's and other info. In the Tutorials there is a 4 part "reloading 223" tutorial, here is a link to part 1. |
|
Quoted:
Seems to me, that your statement about the charge variance points to one of the extruded powders. Odds are that won't change using a progressive. Maybe a change of powders will help. On my precision loads, I use the RCBS chargemaster to weigh out Varget and such. Since I don't have the LnL setup, for short runs of plinking ammo, I just use the Rock Chucker and a powder depenser with TAC. Whenever the weight is off, it's only by .1gr and that's usually to the high side. TAC is like butta. What is TAC? |
|
Quoted:
The presses are called progressives not autos (those are cars).
Case prep; cleaning, sizing, delubing, trimming, deburring, remove primer pocket crimp, uniform primer pocket, is all done before progressive loading. So the videos will start with the case prep done and proceed to the loading you see. Go back up to the top of the page and read the FAQ's and other info. In the Tutorials there is a 4 part "reloading 223" tutorial, here is a link to part 1. Thanks for the info. As for the auto thing, I was just going by Hornady calls their LnL the "AUTO" Press. But I'll remember to call it progressive to not confuse anyone. |
|
Quoted:
Seems to me, that your statement about the charge variance points to one of the extruded powders. Odds are that won't change using a progressive. Maybe a change of powders will help. On my precision loads, I use the RCBS chargemaster to weigh out Varget and such. Since I don't have the LnL setup, for short runs of plinking ammo, I just use the Rock Chucker and a powder depenser with TAC. Whenever the weight is off, it's only by .1gr and that's usually to the high side. TAC is like butta. You're right, and I should have thought of that. I have been mostly buying powder based in part on how flexible it is (i.e. how many different cartridges can I load with it). Since I'm still building up my loading gear, I wanted to buy 1 or 2 powders that I could load pretty much everything with, so I got IMR 3031 and H4895. I found that 21.6gr of IMR 3031 coupled with a 60gr Hornady V-max shoots really good in my BCM4. The same load, but with 22gr of powder shoots really well out of my Colt HBAR. The H 4895 makes a good load that I shoot out of my Garand. I have been wanting to branch out and try some other powders, so I'll try the TAC. |
| Ramshot TAC, Accurate 2230 and Hodgdon's BL-(C)2 are all very flexible powders in the .223 as far as bullet weights. The other thing that they all have in common is that they are spherical in shape and meter about like water. Once the powder measure is set, charge variances are usually less than the min unit of the scale. The nice thing about TAC is that it is usually pretty cheap. |
|
Quoted:
I want a progressive because most of my shooting is plinking and volume shooting, not precision shooting. It takes me about 2 hours to load 50 rounds which I shoot in about 3-4 minutes. Too much work for a little shooting. So if I can speed up the process a little, that would be awesome. My two biggest time consumers are lubing the cases (I had been using the Lee paste stuff that I put on with fingers and q-tips) and measuring the powder. I switched to the Hornady spray lube, and that made that process MUCH faster. For powder I'm using a Lee powder dispenser and weighing it on a Cabelas scale. The powder dispenser isn't that accurate, and each charge varies by 2-4 tenths of a grain. So I spend a lot of time adding/subtracting grains on the scale to get the right amount of powder. Then every couple of rounds I have to re-tare the scale. So I'm thinking the dispenser must be more accurate on the LnL Auto Press, because it isn't measured on a scale, it goes strait into the case. (Am I correct on this?). So this should really speed it up. I thought about getting a nice RCBS Elect. dispenser, but those are $2-300, so for that I might as well get a auto press. If you are loading straight wall pistol cartridges and use carbide dies, lubing isn't generally necessary. Also, straight wall pistol cases generally don't need to be trimmed. I've never had to trim a straight wall pistol case. Bottlenecked cases are a bit more difficult. I use an RCBS x-die for this chore. When I initially acquire 223 brass, I size it with a regular full length sizer die on a single stage press like normal. Then I trim to .020" under the max case length. I then use an RCBS X sizer die in a progressive press. The x die prevents cases from stretching beyond the max allowable length. For lubrication when loading 223 on a progressive, I use the RCBS case lube pad. It allows me lubricate the parts of the case I need to without getting any lube anywhere on the case where it might contaminate powder. I load these on a progressive press, then tumble the loaded cartridges to remove lube. |
|
0.020" under max case length is 0.010" under trim/min length.
I trim new straight wall handgun brass if I'm using it in a revolver and need to crimp. Otherwise trimming pistol brass is a waste of time. Depending on the load and the rifle it's fired in, you don't have to trim every loading and you only have to de-burr the flash hole once (or never for some brass or plinking ammo). |
|
Quoted:
So I could use my single stage press to pop out the primer... I run my decapper on my progressive as a separate step prior to brass prep. Progressives are even nice for single operations like this since all you're doing is inserting each case and pulling the handle. Removing the case is handled by the press. |
Armory Sponsor