Square Deal "B"

[ormondopen]

my question is how do I dispense powder into a an empty cartridge for charge adjustments with a full primer magazine, it seems everytime I cycle the machine whether I am making adjustments a primer is seated as long as the magazine has primers. I dont want to waste primers while I try to make charge adjustments.

forgive me is this has been asked and answered before.

[ima45dv8]

I used to just put a single case in mine when making powder adjustments. The press will attempt to present and seat a primer every time it's cycled, but if there is no case at the priming station, it will just retract it and try again on the next stroke. Then on the next stroke, just like before, if there's no case there it will keep retracting it and presenting the same primer on each stroke until there is a case there to be primed.

Just use one case when making adjustments, but check it again when in production mode to ensure it delivers the expected charge with a full compliment of cases in the press.

[Jeff686]

The Square Deal B primes on the top of the up-stroke, past the natural resting point of the lever. After the down stroke, simply return the lever to the natural resting place, instead of pushing it all the way to the stop. This will prevent it from attemping to prime the brass.

You can cycle the lever as much as you want without hurting the mechanism. If it doesn't prime the brass, it just doesn't pick another primer from the tube, no harm.

Load it up with primers and cycle the whole mechanism without brass. Watch closely. You'll see how it works.

When I'm adjusting the powder measure, I take the brass buttons out of the primer/powder and bullet seating station. I resize and prime one piece of brass. I drop powder into the brass, then remove the brass after it rotates to the bullet seating station and measure the charge weight. I make adjustments to the powder bar, put the brass back in at the powder station and repeat. I continue to cycle the same brass through the process until I get the powder bar adjusted.

Done.

The brass gets a little too much bell in it after a few cycles, but that usually doesn't hurt anything.

[kevin c]

What Jeff686 said.

Also, when adjusting the powder drop, I use a case with a spent primer fully seated in the pocket. This makes it impossible for the priming ram to seat the fresh primer in the cup if you happen to overshoot on the up stroke. It also prevents fine grained powders from leaking out through the flash hole of the case, which will not only foul your press but make your measurements of the dropped charge inaccurate.

So far, using this technique I have not set off any of the Winchester primers I routinely load if I inadvertently push the fresh primer up against the dead primer already in the measurement case. My understanding is that the primer needs to be sensitized by compressing the anvil against the base of the cup. A sharp point impact seems to be needed for ignition once this is done. That, I guess, is why the primers don't routinely go off just being pushed into the cup, even with firm pressure. I've even had bits of debris such as a flake or granule of powder in the ram that left impressions in the brass face of the seated primers without any premature ignition problems. Still, maybe somebody with experience loading more sensitive primers like the Federals has a different story to tell, so what I say applies only to my experience with Winchester primers.

Kevin C

Edited December 4, 2007 by kevin c

[ormondopen]

thanks a bunch, worked out great.