packers Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 I posted the other day about my first batch on my first press (Dillon 650). I had a few rounds where the primer did not seat fully. I pulled those bullets today to fix them. This is what I saw...only one survived without scraping some of the coating off. I thought the location of the scraped off coating is a little strange. I would have expected any scrapage to be on the bottom of the bullet. So the question is whether I have too much or not enough flare? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RickT Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 What dies are you seating and crimping with? If that were due to flare and occurring during the seating operation you would see the coating on the shell plate I would think. Way over crimping could do that. I've pulled a lot of finish Bayou 147 and 124 and sometimes I'll see a very, very narrow band part way around where I can see the lead; probably not unexpected with mixed brass. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AzShooter Posted January 20, 2016 Share Posted January 20, 2016 Looks like your flair is O.K. but I think you are crimping too much to produce that type of scrape. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dave33 Posted January 21, 2016 Share Posted January 21, 2016 I believe that scrapping is coming from the bullet being slightly tilted as it goes into the seating die. Sometimes a little less flair works better as the bullet cant lean as much. The second picture above shows the bullet being a little low on the right side, I bet if that goes into the seating die it will scrape on that side. I dont load on Dillon equipment but I believe the seating die has an insert that is flat on one side and conical on the other, you may want to try flipping that. There is also an insert you can buy for your powder measure that works like a Lyman M die that creates a little pocket for lead bullets to sit in that helps them load straight. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
packers Posted January 21, 2016 Author Share Posted January 21, 2016 What dies are you seating and crimping with? If that were due to flare and occurring during the seating operation you would see the coating on the shell plate I would think. Way over crimping could do that. I've pulled a lot of finish Bayou 147 and 124 and sometimes I'll see a very, very narrow band part way around where I can see the lead; probably not unexpected with mixed brass. I'm using the Dillon dies. Looks like your flair is O.K. but I think you are crimping too much to produce that type of scrape. Hmm...I'm new to this, but to my eye the final crimp looks like it just removed the flare. Here is a finished round. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
packers Posted January 21, 2016 Author Share Posted January 21, 2016 I bet if that goes into the seating die it will scrape on that side. I dont load on Dillon equipment but I believe the seating die has an insert that is flat on one side and conical on the other, you may want to try flipping that. There is also an insert you can buy for your powder measure that works like a Lyman M die that creates a little pocket for lead bullets to sit in that helps them load straight. The leaning seems to me like that is likely to cause the problem. I have the wad-cutter side facing down. It seemed to feel a little more solid than the round-nose side. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beastly Posted January 21, 2016 Share Posted January 21, 2016 (edited) Might try: Mr. Bullet feeder powder funnel and/or Hornady New Dimension seating die with floating sleeve. I went thrrough all this, plus also eventually changed to the BB 135 gr RN. Edited January 21, 2016 by Beastly Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hi-Power Jack Posted January 21, 2016 Share Posted January 21, 2016 Do they feed thru your mag/gun? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TJART Posted January 21, 2016 Share Posted January 21, 2016 I had the exact same problem when I started loading BB147's. I increase my flare and it instantly fixed it. Also, I barley... barley crimp my rounds, now that they feed fine in my CZ. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CZ85Combat Posted January 21, 2016 Share Posted January 21, 2016 Your seating die is crimping as you seat the bullet. do a test, run a case to every stage after the case is belled take a measurement, now run it in the seating die with a bullet, take a measurement. did the measurement change? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BASE772 Posted January 21, 2016 Share Posted January 21, 2016 A Lee bullet seating die worked better than the Dillion with the 147 flatpoints for me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nathanb Posted January 21, 2016 Share Posted January 21, 2016 Mic your case and bullets. You just want to remove the flare. You might see a faint line on them but in my limited experience that is too much crimp. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Erick85 Posted January 21, 2016 Share Posted January 21, 2016 Ran into the same thing on my 550 with Bayou 147s. I've found the bullet needs to be perfectly straight going into the seating die, or that will happen. I messed with the flare, but couldn't find the sweet spot and got tired of messing with it and bought the MBF powder funnel. That seemed to take care of it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
packers Posted January 21, 2016 Author Share Posted January 21, 2016 Thanks for the insight everyone! I'll experiment a little more to see if I can find out what's happening...while waiting for the Mr. Bullet Feeder to come from Midway. The rounds feed just fine in my Glocks, but I would like to identify the problem and remedy it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AzShooter Posted January 21, 2016 Share Posted January 21, 2016 Proper crimp. Just take off the belling. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IDescribe Posted January 21, 2016 Share Posted January 21, 2016 Flare looks fine. Bullet going in crooked. If you used a seating stem that seated off the ogive instead of the nose, it would keep the bullet straight up and down. I don't use Dillon dies, but I think the Dillon seater has a reversible seating stem that's a hollow ogive seater on one side and flat anvil on the other. Try pulling your die apart at slipping that anvil around. If not, get a Hornady New Dimension or a Redding PRO Series seating die. Those both use ogive anvils. Ogive seaters are the way to go. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lcs Posted January 21, 2016 Share Posted January 21, 2016 What dies are you seating and crimping with? If that were due to flare and occurring during the seating operation you would see the coating on the shell plate I would think. Way over crimping could do that. I've pulled a lot of finish Bayou 147 and 124 and sometimes I'll see a very, very narrow band part way around where I can see the lead; probably not unexpected with mixed brass. I'm using the Dillon dies. Looks like your flair is O.K. but I think you are crimping too much to produce that type of scrape. Hmm...I'm new to this, but to my eye the final crimp looks like it just removed the flare. Here is a finished round. In this picture-i see a ring right where the crimp is. You are over-crimping. Iif you see a shiny ring at the end of the case, it is over crimped. Are you using a Lee U sizing die? The Lee U die is good thing and you need very little crimp with a u-die.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beastly Posted January 21, 2016 Share Posted January 21, 2016 Except in reloading - where minimal flair and crimping is a good thing. If you crimp just enough for your calipers run smoothly over the case mouth area and not hang up at the end then IMHO it is sufficient. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rev1911 Posted January 21, 2016 Share Posted January 21, 2016 I had the exact same problem with Bayou 147 on my 550b. I finally figured out that it was being caused by the seating stem (dillon dies). I was using the flat nose stem, because that made sense, but when I switched to the round nose stem, the bullets all went in perfectly straight and the shaving stopped. If you're using a Dillon seating die, try switching the seating stem and see what happens. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kepo Posted January 22, 2016 Share Posted January 22, 2016 Your seating die is crimping as you seat the bullet. do a test, run a case to every stage after the case is belled take a measurement, now run it in the seating die with a bullet, take a measurement. did the measurement change? Exactly this Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
7sst Posted January 23, 2016 Share Posted January 23, 2016 Increase flare and decrease crimp a bit Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
packers Posted February 5, 2016 Author Share Posted February 5, 2016 I've been out of town for a couple weeks. Finally back and wanted to report back on the resolution to this problem. I made two changes which corrected the problem. Installed the Mr. Bullet funnel and also turned the seating die the other way around (now using the round end rather than the truncated cone end). No change to the crimp. I can definitely see why everyone likes the Mr. Bullet funnel over the stock funnel. There is barely any bell at all, but yet the case is expanded and firmly holds the bullet straight. I ran a test: 5 without crimp, and 5 with crimp. None of the pulled bullets had any scrape at all on the coating. In hindsight, I don't think the flip of the seating die was necessary at all. Evidently the problem all along -- as several of you pointed out -- was that the bullet was not being held straight while seating. The Mr. B funnel removes this problem. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IDescribe Posted February 8, 2016 Share Posted February 8, 2016 In hindsight, I don't think the flip of the seating die was necessary at all. I wouldn't undo it that change. Even if it no longer shaves the coating with Mr. Bullet Feeder alone, the ogive side of the anvil is still the better seater. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MilkMyDuds Posted March 8, 2016 Share Posted March 8, 2016 I had the exact same problem when I started loading BB147's. I increase my flare and it instantly fixed it. Also, I barley... barley crimp my rounds, now that they feed fine in my CZ. This is the right solution. Increase flare. I use Mr. bullet feeder expander die in place of dillon one. Every 10,000 sounds or so, I have to adjust the flare to avoid shaving, because it seems the expander would expand less and less over time. I just started noticing shaving again, and I am going to adjust the flare again. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rancher5 Posted March 8, 2016 Share Posted March 8, 2016 Agreed after extensive testing,I use O crimp,best uniformity, also have my Lee flare die set low,max flare,passes plunk test ,barrel and EGW case gauge, I never sort brass so using a partial crimp results in a very erratic crimp, Yes bullets cycle and pass all test Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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