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What is this trying to tell me?


Nimitz

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After collecting a Baggie full of rds which did not make it through my case gauge I pulled al the bullets then ran the cases through station one on my 650 with Lee U-die and decamping pin removed. I checked the cases at this point and they all make it through the gauge but when I made a few rds the completed rd no longer fit through the gauge. Any idea what could be going on? I'm using MG 124 JHPs

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Make sure your U die is all the way down.

The stuff that doesn't gage for me I run the seating and crimp station again.

If that doesn't clear it up I look for uneven bulging on the case is bulged. If you're using a undersized die this should be noticeable. Those I pull the bullet and throw away the case. Squirt WD40 in the case to kill the primer, I do it in batches.

Some WWC gets a ridge near the base of the bullet were the resizing die doesn't reach. I pull those also. Also ejector marks on the lip of the case cause some stickness in the gage. You pre-gaged your brass so this shouldn't be happening.

DNH

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I'm not sure but guess your loading 9mm? Might try a little larger bell. Are you lubing cases? A little lube will help seating the bullet also. Does the seating die match the shape on the nose of the bullet and does AOL vary? If so you may have a problem at the seating die. Using Lee dies? For a few bucks you can send a bullet to Lee and they will cut an insert to fit the bullet shape. This helped me when loading heavier bullets 147 Frontier and 160 lead. I load 9mm on a 650 also and backed away from the U die and went with a standard Lee first stage sizer because I was shooting bullets .356 and .357 in 9mm minor.

I like Lee's dies as the first stage sizer will size close to the extractor groove and use the U die in 40 S@W. I do not use the crimp die as a full length die but just crimp with it.

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Thx all, sorry I didn't respond sooner but I was prepping for and shooting the Fl State match this past weekend. I will look at what you al said. My OAL is 1.10 +\- a thousand., the rds would not chamber either and I haven't touched the crimp die in close to 5,000+ rds. I will try to post some pics tonight. Also, a few rds did chamber fine ...

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Here's a couple of pics, the first one shows both those that cased ok and those that didn't ... remember, all those cases checked ok before I made completed rounds. Pic two shows the actual bullets, the 3 on the left checked ok and the 3 on the right did not ...

post-32005-0-55420700-1358909706_thumb.j

post-32005-0-64635600-1358909721_thumb.j

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The 3 on the right have a visible bulge. Is the bulge all the way around? If it isn't the bullet is off-axis with the case and will make it hang up in the gauge.

I do a chamber check with my barrel out of the gun. If it drops free then I use it for practice.

Are you using the round nose or flat nose part of the seating die? I suspect you're using the round nose which might be skewing the bullet when it gets seated.

I also find too much bell can also cause this.

DNH

Edited by daves_not_here
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This looks to me like what I would call "overcrimp." Basically if you set your crimp using a short case when you get a long one in there it's too much pressure since the FMJ won't give to allow the overcrimp that would occur on a lead round. Check about 10 of your cases and you might find that some are a bit longer and maybe these are the ones. I use very little crimp and check a bunch before setting and make sure to use a short one to set it.

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Are the rounds on the right larger at the crimp or at the bulge? Using calipers and comparing to a good round would tell you a lot.

Also, what is the recommended OAL for these bullets? There's a lot of the straight sides of the bullet showing. One quick test would be to seat them a little shorter, re-crimp and then try. That would tell you that you need to seat them deeper.

DNH

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Looks to me like the OAL is different from the two sides, and there's a distinct bulge on the right-side rounds. It's certainly not right!

I would check your crimp and OAL, those look very long to me. Crimp should be .376-.378"

Edited by polizei1
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I have a slight clarification to my issue, i didn't mean to imply that none of the rds worked ... in fact, most case gauge fine but a small but significany amount don't. for instance, tonight out of 500 rds there were 15 that had the problem described above and so I rechecked everything and here's what I got: out of station 1 the brass is resized correctly.

This pic is of the case after it comes out of station 2.

post-32005-0-93801400-1359509503_thumb.j

I then rechecked and again it fits in the case gauge.

post-32005-0-87376900-1359509662_thumb.j

The next photo is of the completed rd

post-32005-0-28577000-1359509692_thumb.j

and then as yiou can see it no longer fits in the case gauge

post-32005-0-43638000-1359509719_thumb.j

so it appears to be happening when I seat the bullet. Does this just mean that these particular cases are no longer any good or is it something else?

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I would swap the bullet seating die from round nose to flat. https://www.dillonpr...on_Seating_Dies

Also I would ease off the crimp a bit. That might be mashing things. Make it so most will just barely gauge and then you can crank it down a bit then re-crimp the ones that don't end up with enough. From that setting you can eliminate crimp settings as a source of the problem

DNH

Edited by daves_not_here
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I already swapped the seating die head to the flat nose. I'll try backing off the crimp a bit to see but given that 485/500 gauge just fine doesn't that point to some difference with the brass & not my die settings? If the die setting were off wouldn't the majority of rds not be correct?

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Are they all the same brand of brass ??? Some are thicker than others which can sometimes cause problems.

Or just crappy brass. I had a bunch of off center bullets like the ones on the right using RP brass until I got a Redding competition seating die.

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the 'bulge' is not a good indicator of the issue, there are many rounds which show that bulge but gauge just fine. What's the difference with the Redding competition seating die vice the Dillion seating die I have in there now?

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The Redding Competition seating die has a spring loaded sleeve that will straighten the bullet before pushing it into the case.

Can you paint the cartridge with a Sharpie, stuff it into the gauge and see where the scrape marks are?

I assume there are holes you can use to push the round back out if it gets really stuck.

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Some cases just don't do what you want. Some just die. Throw them in the trash and move on. They will likely just give you trouble down the road anyway. It is always good to try and learn from an experence. I'm afraid the lesson here is when to trash them.

Edited by Doc Hunter
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Fair enough ... One of the pitfalls of range brass ... I maintain a bucket of all the brass I fire through my Glock so once it's full at least I'll have a starting point for how often each case has been fired ...obviously not perfect since I don't know how many times it was fired before I got it but i know a lot of it comes from factory ammo that the non reloaders use at our matches ...

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