jonb.

WHAT THE HELL AM I DOING WRONG THAT 10% of my Brass will not pass case gauge I HAVE TRIED EVERYTHING SHORT OF CHANGING MY PRESS The U DIE is allowing the brass to pass gauge after the sizing station but by the time I have seated and crimped the magical bulge reappears at the base of my loaded ammo.

Gonna invest in either a bulge buster or a GRX redding die for my glocked brass. Is it possible to run either of these dies on a dillon 550 using a separate tool head or am I going to have to invest in a single stage press no matter what. By the way I am doing this because my Lee U die is not cutting it.

It's definitely a bullet seating issue I'm gonna try fight fire jays fix first since it costs me nothing, then if Im still pullin bullets after that I'll try carlosa's combo thanks for the help!

It's me... My bullets were not seating straight I've gotten the hang of it and I'm down to about 10% failure to guage I think with more practice this will get better. (it helps to NOT use the round nose seating side in the seat die) Any tricks to seating the bullet straight faster without practice?

I know this was a year ago but I am having this exact same issue! What was the final fix so I don't waste anymore time or money. My setup right now is 40 loading with a dillon 550 using a u die about 30% of my reloads are no go.

Spoke to RCBS they said that it's the expander die and that yes it works with 380acp but the guy on the phone with me sounded impressed that I had such an old set that was serviceable he went ahead and sent me a 380 expander die for the set LOL gotta love American manufacturers.

S stands for steel... this I know. My question is why did this set have a 9mm taper? Do all 380 acp rcbs die sets come with a 9mm taper?

I have an old set of RCBS dies that I found with the Dillon my uncle gave me. One die set in 380 and one set in 9mm. The 9mm set comes in a green box with a bluish green label marked Carbide Die Set 9MM luger. No questions there. The second die set the box is also green but the label is yellow and it is marked S Die Set 380 auto pistol. Inside the box with the 380 die set there is one die marked 9mm Luger. I am wondering if this was normal or if this was an incomplete set I have heard of people interchanging the 9mm taper dies to load 380 but I am a NOOB. Here it is pictured on the far right of this picture. Take note this is an older die set from the mid 80's.

My good rounds. My "missed it by that much" rounds. Last my no way in hell rounds. Now I did try the backwards method Jae was talking about and the roll check and like I said I did see some wobble from quite a few rounds. Here's a question can I size and deprime at station one then case gauge just my brass? Then I could save the ones with too much bulge for later when I get the extra kit. Should I try making my crimp tighter?

GRRRR... This is getting ridiculous. So I did have wobble SOOooooo I opened my bell a hair and started taking care to seat my bullets more carefully. So here is what happened. Out of 100 this time I dumped about 30 15 had bulge so bad they didn't even go half way down into the case guage. Here's a picture. The other half are coming close but still not a winner. Here are the winners. ] So now do I take the belling back down since my yield was better before, or do I assume I randomly am seating these suckers crooked or brass bulge... or what? I'm not gonna lie I'm getting pretty frustrated. Any way to salvage the duds?

I'm using moly 180 grain bullets. 15 of the 32 will not go into the case 1/3 of the way OAL does not seem to change. Between those that go 1/3 of the way in the gauge those that do, and those that pass they are between 1.123, and 1.125 I blame the variances on trying to push them out of my case gauge trying to cycle them, and just the general mistreatment of my crap rounds. My machine is set to give me a 1.125 OAL .416 crimp using 180 grain moly sitting on top of mixed range brass .40 s&w. Yes they were clean and tumbled.

So I fixed my primer issues thanks to those that responded to that post. I now have a question about my case gauging. So far I have made 200 rounds out of those two hundred rounds 32 rounds fail to fit in my Lyman .40 case gauge, or down the barrel of my glock 24 kkm. My buddy is telling me its the brass I'm using (range brass I picked myself). I did a test to see if my sizing die was doing a good job it's a Lee/egw undersize die. I did 20 cases in just the resizing/deprime die and they all case gauged. After I finished them through the other dies 2 did not pass the gauge so that tells me that somewhere between the sizing die and crimp die something is deforming my cases. My press is fairly smooth but the cases do get stuck in the powder die specifically around the powder funnel. I really do have to put some weight behind my upward stroke to dislodge it. I did take some sand paper to it but its still seems to stick. Could this be causing deformity or is this really a cause of bad brass? While picking brass seems economical it might not be if I'm tossing 150 rounds for every thousand. My gut is telling me that the likely culprit is something I set up on the press wrong and not my brass. Any suggestions?

I actually spoke to dillon about this today because my sizing die was sticking a bit and they said to do the powder funnel with 7000 grit. As far as use with "CAUTION" please spell that out for me since I am likely to do something opposite of that if you don't.

1. YES A. Will DO B. Bought theme used threw them on and started knocking out rounds... Apparently this is wrong.

Since I'm using moly bullets they seem to be really tacky and that stickiness gets on the case I end up with pretty smeared up cases it makes it hard to see deformity's. I also figured the cleaner the cases are the less fouled up my barrel will get or am I over thinking this?

Did I say I was a noob? In case I forgot I'm a reloading noob. Still a little redfaced. I was under the assumption that a case like this had the potential to cause a KABoOm. I stand corrected.

Hey Jae are you the same Jae from calguns? I think I finally met you at the Lopez Canyon Match this Sunday I was the bald headed Filipino shooting with Byron's crew pushing a jog stroller (dont judge, I love my wheels) but I'm not sure either way thanks for chiming in. As far as the primer issue is concerned I did end up figuring it out.

Alright excuse my NOOBINESS I did use the the search but couldn't find what I was looking for so here goes. 1. My buddy used to reload for me I would take those reloads case gauge them and then tumble them a bit to get whatever grit and lube off of them. Now I'm loading moly bullets for myself but I'm wondering if I tumble my reloaded ammo do I risk taking the moly off? 2. I notice my reloaded ammo .40 is shaped a little differently than my buddies reloads only slightly. I am using an undersized lee die while he uses a dillon die is this normal with undersize die's and is there anything to worry about using an undersized die? 3. I DODGED A BULLET! Check it out This was a bad round in my first 100 reloaded rounds. I was extremely careful when sorting, again careful while I picked the cleaned brass before placing it on my press, and then again when I transferred from the bin into my case guards. I found this round as I was loading a magazine at the range this morning THANK GOODNESS(apparently A split case does not cause a kaboom so excuse my drama or the lack of). My question is do any of you guys use a lighted magnifying glass or something similar to inspect brass? Or what are your methods and what do you look for in the reclaimed brass. I was using a case gauge. That's it for now thanks in advance!

First Thanks EVERYBODY! I really appreciate those that chimed in it can be a bit frustrating relying on an instruction manual when you have no clue where to begin. I came home from work and went to work disassembling the primer feed system then I re-assembled slowly, and insuring I did not over tighten or misplace anything and voila it fixed itself. I have since banged out my first hundred minus the 16 that I botched with the missing primers and some other issues that have since been figured out. I will take these out later this morning to see if they will go bang without blowing my hand off or destroying my gun.

My 550 is up and running but now I'm having issues with my primers. 1 in every three or four strokes a primer fails to fall I added some weight to the top of the rod but it didn't seem to fix it. Any suggestions?

I wear a boonie and when shooting I take it off. Generally I buy them oversized so the boonie fits right over my ear pro. I wear gascans or mframes and have never had brass come down the top of my eye pro, but I do have the Typical massive Filipino head so that may be the difference... True story.

+1 for ballistic m frames!

All my components are in and I'm looking forward to getting started but I don't really know where to begin can anyone suggest or link some online databases, manuals, you tube videos, etc... Thanks in advance! Oh I'm going to be loading 180 grain .40 lead with universal clays for a glock 24 w/kkm barrel.

Oops

In a time when most American born company's have gone to parts unknown in search of cheap labor and higher profits leaves many to wonder whatever became of the American manufacturer, the quality, and customer service that was the standard for everything NOT MADE IN THE USA. Well it is not gone, it is not dead, it lives breaths and thrives in Arizona. Less than a month ago my cousin made a jackpot discovery that had been hiding in his family's garage for over 20 years. This proverbial lotto ticket comes in the form of an RL 550. There were various dies, beam scales, and even a Thumblers Tumbler in the box of goodies, but definitely the biggest prize was that powder blue press. The presses original owner was my Uncle Buddy. Long retired and moved away back to the Phillipines. He had originally earned passage into the US by serving the country in the Navy (not everyone can be Army)during Vietnam. The press was one of his first purchases after being introduced to bulls eye matches in the early 80's. Many a bullet was made by him, and his whole family. I remember coming to his house for family parties where he would show his children, and nephews how to make bullets. At 5 or 6 all I can remember from those lessons were case, powder check, and bullet, the pulling of the lever of course was done by one his own older children. In the early 90's he retired and left his equipment in his first cousins garage, and there it sat in disrepair collecting dust, drying up, and getting splashed with rust. There was no keeping this beauty in disrepair once my cousin and I had found it. I quickly called Dillon and asked about the lifetime warranty and if there was anything they could do. They asked if we could take it apart and send in the parts that were old or broken. I said I could but would like the integrity, and every piece of the press to be checked, and that being new to reloading I could not really tell what was serviceable and what was not. They said for that there would be a refurbishing fee of 67 dollars. At first I was a little apprehensive (that's what I call it; my wife calls it CHEAP)but was assured by Dillon customer service that the overhaul would be worth the money so I jumped right in. In exactly 2.5 weeks it was Christmas and inside the package that was left was a machine I did not recognize as the machine I sent. Every piece was spruced up, oiled, or replaced, and there was a lot of parts that were upgraded as well. The running total of upgraded parts, and repairs equaled well over 340 but I was only charged the 67. Dillon stood by their 25 year old product, improved it, repaired it, and will help maintain this family's shooting lifestyle for more generations to come. So to whoever from Dillon may be listening, I THANK YOU, you have made a customer for life. Attached are the before and after pictures of the press both of which brought back great memories of shooting, and reloading with their father when his children saw them posted on my Facebook. I will post some pics once the press is mounted and up and running. Before AFTER Last for the non-believers.