Four hole turret press question?

[FullCry]

I think I've seen this same question on here recently but not sure. I have a Lee four hole turret press and I'm loading 40 cal pistol rounds. I have the four set die with the factory crimper. I have the press indexing right but when I put the round through the factory crimper sometimes it goe right in real smooth but most of the time it goes in rough. Is there a problem with this or is this normal. If there is a problem then what is going on? Thanks for any replies FullCry

[atomictaco]

It's really difficult to tell from your description. Maybe your round is not fully in the shell holder and the nose of the bullet is hitting the inside wall of the die? I keep the opening of the shell holder facing 9 o'clock on mine, it has helped with the brass syaing centered in the shell holder properly.

[Jim243]

Just finished 200 rounds of 40 S&W, and yes I use the Classic Turret Press and all four dies. The reason you are feeling the resizing of the crimp die is because A) your seating die is not set low enough B) Your bullets are wider than .400 like .401 or .402 or C) Your cases are thicker than normal (heavy brass). or all three, or you have the crimp die down too much.

If that doesn't cover everything I don't know what will.

About every 3rd round I load is resized by the crimp die. Mine is set so it will not do a crimp but just resize the case if it is out of spec after the bullet is seated. I think that bullet size is a quality issure for Remington and that too many are out of spec. The reason I do this so that the final finished round will not run into a failure to feed problem. So far it has worked with no failure to feed issues. Actually I am doing this with all my pistol rounds now.

Jim

[raddoc]

Agree with Jim. For me, it happened when I was reloading plinking rounds with Berry's. I put the caliber to them and they were 1 to 2/1000ths bigger than specs. Doesn't happen when I use XTP's.

[dsv424]

Another reason why this may be happening is if your using mixed brass. Not all brass has the same thickness. I have experienced the same thing when using mixed brass. You may want to note the brass you are using each time.

[FullCry]

Yes, I'm mixing brass. My Col is right and my pistol is feeding good like one no return out of 200 rds. Should I still try to adjust the crimp? And I will measure my bullets which are Rem. Golden Sabers. Btw the round goes in and out of the crimp rough.

[Mobuck]

It could be that some of your brass is a little longer and therefore gets flared more than others. This will cause a drag entering the crimp die. As for the drag coming out, if that brass is also thicker that could be a cause. If the factory crimp die is actually sizing the finished round, it will have some resistence on the return stroke. I use the LEE dies on a 4 hole but don't pay that much attention when using mixed brass. Set the noticeable round rounds aside and see if there is a pattern as in brand or some such.

[FullCry]

Thanks everybody for the advice, I can't see or find any measurement differences in the rounds.

[Brian Pfleuger]

How tight is that die screwed down? If it's too tight then it won't be able to "float" and correct minor misalignment issues.

[FullCry]

I screwed it down until it touched the shell holder and finger tightened the nut. I backed out the top adjuster and put a loaded round in the shell holder and pushed it up into the crimper. I then screwed down the top adjuster until it just touched the casing. I dropped the round a little and tightened the top adjuster one half turn. This is what I gathered from the instructions plus adjust one turn for a tighter crimp or more for an even tighter one. I readjusted this morning and as soon as I need to load some rounds I will check and know the deal. If you have anymore insight into this please let me know or if you see anything wrong with this series let me know also. Thanks for your time, FullCry

[FullCry]

I measured five bullets and I have two mics. Both mics showed 4.000 on all five bullets. I have once fired brass.I measured two Win and they were .835 and .841 before resizing. After was .838 and .843. Another two Win were .836 and .837 and after was .842 and .841. I also measured some PPU brass and three were.838 then .841, .843, .843. I measured more but this should give and idea.Is .002 or.003 length going to affect a load or even .005? Thanks, FullCry

[gregjc9]

I have the exact same setup, and noticed the same thing not long ago when reloading .380, with mixed headstamp. I looked more closely at which headstamps were rough going through the FCD, and which were not. All the rough ones were the same (Federal I think), and the ones that went through smoother were also the same headstamp (dont recall those). I then weighed some of each, and noticed the rough ones weighed quite a bit more that the others (dont recall the exact weights at this time). I think the cases I weighed still needed to be deprimed. The the cases that were rougher going through the FCD obviously had more metal to them, probably thicker case walls, which most likely resulted in the roughness going through the FCD. You're probably experiencing the same thing.

[FullCry]

Thanks a lot, that is probably the problem but I'm going to do as you did and check mine out to. Thanks again, FullCry

[DocAitch]

I am loading .40S&W on a Dillon 650, so I may be comparing apples to oranges, but I found that once fired mixed .40 brass(range pick ups) varied significantly in force required to resize/decap, and that up to 20% of my rounds were not gauging with my Dillon gauge. The Glock fired brass was the worst.
I read on the net about 5 years ago about pushing the brass completely through a Lee Factory Crimp Die with the the stem and crimper removed. This returns the case to a uniform cylinder shape, removing any bulges missed in the usual in-and-out reforming/decapping process.
Now both Lee and Redding are marketing dies and pushers to accomplish this.
Although is involves a couple of extra processing steps, I am able to produce .40 S&W rounds that gauge and function every time. For me, this is well worth the extra time.
DocAitch