Speer bullets

[jj320]

I was looking for .243 bullets and came across a review that only gave speer 1 star because they were not compatible with lee dies. i have not used speer can anyone advise. i have lee dies and have not heard of this before . thank you

[Adamantium]

I've never had a problem with Speer bullets in Lee dies, though I don't reload .243 (6.5x55mm and 303 British for rifle). My first thought it there are a lot of poor reviews out there.

[FlyFish]

I believe Lee and Speer (same parent as RCBS) are caught up in some sort of pi$$ing contest that you can safely ignore.

[jj320]

thank you i didn't think there would be just wanted to get a few thoughts on it

[Unclenick]

The seating stem design of the Lee has trouble seating some short bullets deeply enough. This doesn't apply only to Speer bullets, though. Lee will fix it for you.

[oneoldsap]

Probably 50% of reviews are written by people that don't know their ass from their elbow in the first place !

[cryogenic419]

A word about online reviews...

Say you go on a site like Midway and see 5 negative reviews and nothing positive? Does that mean a product is bad? Not always, as there may be 1000people who have ordered the product and it lived up to their expectations. If a product does what you feel it is supposed to do would you feel the need to go online to try to warn others or would you just go on with your day?

Oneoldsap also touched on another part of the online reviews, some people just don't know what in the hell they are talking about. You can see that here in spades. Somebody who has never reloaded before orders a progressive press and immediately expects to just be able to start cranking out ammo and when 1 little thing goes wrong, this press sucks, these dies suck, etc. After a little prodding and numerous people trying to help them troubleshoot the issue, you discover that they didn't adjust something properly or one of their techniques is way off. So for the average passerby all they see is "oh this product sucks" and unless they are willing to dive deeper into the issue will not see that sometimes it is the user and not the product.

There are also times when a substandard product will get a glowing review because someone may not have dealt with anything better. My best analogy for this would be somebody takes the bus everywhere they have to go. One day they can afford to get a used car, a 1986 Chevette. To them this is now the best damn car on the road EVER. Even though its nowhere near the best car ever, in their view it is because they haven't owned and driven a Mercedes Benz or something else high end and all the other cars in between. They have nothing to gauge against.

On the other hand, sometimes a product does just plain out suck.

Speer makes decent bullets and never had a problem with using them. Might just be some weird quirk with the Lee dies but somebody mentioned that Lee will fix the issue.

[Unclenick]

As I already said, it's a known Lee issue. On another forum we had a fellow who couldn't seat some light .223 bullets with the Lee die. Lee had him send a couple of bullets and cases and the die to them, and they made him a custom seating plug at no charge and returned it in working condition.

[hooligan1]

Years ago I started loading my 7mm rem mag with Lee dies and had some run-out problems after seating so I took the seating stem out of the die and set it on the top of a bullet I was using at the time, and I didn't like the way the stem set down over the bullet point so I switched to RCBS, and took the stem out of that die to get perspective and it was amazing the difference in fit over the tip of different bullet styles, the Lee for some reason did not fit well, and I'm sure it caused certain runout in my finished cartridges..... just looking back.

[reynolds357]

I love Speer Hot Cor bullets. They have killed a mountain of deer in my 7Rem mag. Deadly accurate and they were the first bonded bullet available to the U.S. reloader at an affordable price. Since I deeply detest Lee dies, I have no idea if they work with Speer or not. I seriously doubt Speer cares either. If the two are not compatiable, it would seem to me that Lee and not Speer is the one with the problem.

[LarryFlew]

No speer problems in lee dies here for 223 and 300 blackout.

[hooligan1]

My son found a load for his Handi-Rifle (.270 Win.) using 130 grain Speer BTSP, they're cheap too!!

[Unclenick]

A little thought will reveal that this issue is not about the Speer and Lee brands, but about geometry. If the ogive radius of the bullet is long enough and the bearing surface short enough, you can run out of adjustment in the Lee Dead Length seating die because its seating stem is stopped before reaching the case mouth. It doesn't matter what the bullet brand is, just what the geometry is. For the vast majority of common bullet shapes this won't be an issue.

(BTW, it was not Speer, but Sierra that had the advertising grudge match going with Lee long ago. It was the Lee Factory Crimp Die being applied to match bullets that Sierra objected to because it indents the bullet profile. It was not over seating dies. Lee said, try the FCD and see for yourself. Sierra objected some more, so Lee finally got annoyed and started to advertise the FCD worked with all bullets except Sierra bullets. Can't really blame either side. Both valid perspectives. Some percentage of the time the FCD does improve accuracy in some rifles with some loads, at least to moderate ranges, by increasing consistency of bullet pull. I expect the slight indentation to cause a small decrease in ballistic coefficient and, if not perfectly symmetrical, some increase in wobble, so I doubt 1000 yard shooters would want to mess with it. It just depends what you are doing and how you use it.)

[Magnum Wheel Man]

as you get more into reloading of different cartridges & bullets, you may find that you end up with different seating stems as maybe you are using trunc cone bullets & the seating stem is for pointed bullets... it's not really uncommon, I have several die sets, that have more than one seating stem... I don't remember the cartridge off the top of my head, but think I have one die set that has 4 different seating stems...

I find the Lee dies to be one of the best values, but if the standard seating stem is known not to fit a bullet you want to use, you should probably just get another brand that better fits it...

[PawPaw]

+1 for Uncle Nick.

Seating stems in Lee dies, and perhaps others, are easy to modify for a particular bullet profile. If you have a basic understanding of bedding a rifle, then you can make your seating stem match the bullet profile. Simply coat the nose of a bullet with grease or wax, then mix up a dab of epoxy. Put the dab of epoxy in the recess in the seating stem and put it on the nose of the bullet. Wait until the epoxy hardens and remove the bullet. Voila, a perfectly formed seating stem for a particular bullet. I have three of those stems in my .45-70 dies. One for flat-nosed lead bullets, one for round-nose lead bullets, and one for Lee's pointy 459-500-3R bullet. Lee sells those extra seating stems for $2.00 each.