Armory Sponsor
Posted: 4/6/2012 6:48:22 AM EDT
|
Took my first stab at sizing some rifle cases last night and ran into an issue that I'm thinking is probably fairly common for a newbie reloaded, the first few had bad dents in the shoulder of the case. I quickly found out this was due to too much lube, so my questions are......
1. Even after wiping some of the lube off I was getting the dent, to finally get what looked like a good case I had to feed a complete dry case though, I'm thinking that with the excess lube from the first few rounds there was enough built up on the resizing die that no lube was needed. I then started running a dry case (not completely dry there would still be a small amount of lube on my gloves that I'd rub on it) through every few rounds, everything seemed fine but am in danger of breaking my die and or causing something odd with the case that I'm not seeing? 2. I was using RCBS lube and the pad. I'm not sure if it was just due to it being the first time or what but the way I read the instructions was that the lube would soak into the pad, this never seemed to happen and there was a lot of lube on the surface. Instead of rolling the cases on the pad and getting too much lube, I just started to put my finger on the and use my glove to coat each round, is this an acceptable way to lube a case if I choose to do it this way (On a side note I definitely think I'll be trying the poor mans spray lube soon) 3. I had primed a few rounds a few weeks back before resizing (had clean brass at the time and primers but didn't want to tackle the sizing part just yet), I moved the decapping pin so it would push out the live primers but some of this cases are the ones with the dented shoulders. Can I use my Lee universal decapping die to get the live primers out so I can recycle the cases, or will the primers go off when I try to do so? 4. Is it normal to see some very small imperfections in the brass after resizing (I know I know pics but I wont be able to get any up today)? I guess I was expecting to see totally smooth brass after resizing but some of the cases still have very small dents and one I had to do a double take to see if it was a crack (after reinspecting it doesn't look like a crack but rather a narrow dent) Thanks for the help, once I was getting good cases it was addicting, before going to bed I went back done to give it another go and then I didn't want to stop. |
|
Sounds like a lot of lube inside your die. Take some brake cleaner or electrical wash and clean out the die. I have deprimed with live primers before but I think many will say not to...Be sure to have your glasses on and go slowly if you do. I even reused the primers I decapped and they worked fine. You can just place the round in your gun and go bang as long as there is not powder or bullet... I found using a pad was too slow and put way too much lube on so I went to spray lubes or put lube on myself with fingers. I use Hornady unique for outside and Hornady one shot for case mouths (just a quick shot across ten cases or so). I purchased some cabelas lube that looked similar to the dillon lube, but am not happy with how sticky it was so will not recommend it just yet. There should be no dents or stretch marks left on case after resizing...
Hope this helps some. |
|
Go to this thread: Case lube for cheap bastards
Mix up some of the stuff and use it. It is quick, easy and gets the job done way faster than lubing one case at a time. Mix it 1:12. I went from resizing 150 cases in 2 hours (lubing one case at a time) to over 300 cases in the same time using this stuff. The inside of the sizing die stays cleaner longer too. |
| Thanks for the input, yeah I think I'll be trying spray lube in the near future. I probably will attempt the remove the primer, I'll just go slow with glasses and hearing protection in. As for the dents I'll need to try and get a picture up, as said they are very small, most of them seems to be the dent that was put there by my deflector (once fired brass). The dents are located below the shoulder, I guess I don't know how resizing dies work but I wouldn't think they'd be able to push out a dent on the main body of the case? |
|
FWIW-Reloading newbie here. I found the info below on another site. The author has reloaded thousands of rounds and speaks from experience.
Case Prep #3 Sizing – Stuck cases in dies are common with .308 Military Brass if you do not take the time to lube every case. Here I dab front, back, and top with Mobil 1. RCBS X-die and Hornandy New Dimension dies both dented the brass because of excess lube. The regular RCBS full sizer die claims it does not dent brass, but even it dents brass if you use excessive lube. Only die I found that did not dent the brass was the $10 Lee Full Sizer Die, it has a very generous hole on top to release the excess lube. |
|
Going only from your description, those dents do not sound bad. They will fireform to your chamber when you shoot them. Sizing die will not take out all dents. Go up to the top of the page and read the FAQ's and Tutorials. Be sure to click on the 4 part "reloading 223" posts up in Tutorials. Same process with other calibers, not just a 223 tutorial. |
| I had skimmed through them and watched some youtube videos, I know it's a stupid thing to do with reloading but I was itching to take the next step and it didn't seem too complicated so I went for it. For the sake of not piling on a lot of debt at once I've been trying to collect a few things each month, was going to get a trimmer and some more measure devices such as a case gauge etc but I'm now part of the component shortage and shifted gears to get bullets/powder/primers for the fear they'd be hard to find here in a few months......... so yes I appreciate all the input but I need to read some more. |
Armory Sponsor