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Marco Califo · April 4, 2011, 08:31 PM

I have several sets of Lee Rifle dies in 223. There are reasons for this that are not material to my question. I am looking at 3 different bullet seater dies. They have letter codes stamped into them: KO, J9, and HO. One of these is a "Dead Length" (no crimp) bullet seating die that came with the collet neck sizer. At least one of the others is Lee's standard crimp die. I am hoping the other is a factory crimp die, but am not confident any of them are. They are not in there original boxes. My question is what do these codes reveal? Which one is which? I have not been able to locate any reference material from Lee that would explain these codes.

The reasons for the multiple dies is I reload USGI brass that sometimes has been fired in SAWs (223) or M30's (308). These weapons have loose chambers and "puff" the cases such that resizing is mandatory, and requires considerable lubrication, a lot of leverage, and sometimes results in stuck cases, and other irritations. I tumble cases several times: after de-priming, after resizing, etc. I reload for both semi-auto's and bolt guns. So, I neck size the brass to keep the fire-formed dimensions for the bolt guns. Since Lee dies work, and are inexpensive, I have ordered sets, rather than single specialty dies. This results in some redundancy. I also use one single stage press, one turret press, and one progressive press, so the extra dies can be put to use at times, depending on what I am doing. This latest scenario occurred as I was collet pulling NATO spec SS109 projectiles, and replacing them with 55 FMJ's, so I can shoot them at my club. I buckled the first few cases, and then started to look at my other seating dies.

April 4, 2011, 08:31 PM	#1
Marco Califo Senior Member Join Date: April 4, 2011 Location: LA (Greater Los Angeles Area) Posts: 2,598	Lee Rifle Dies I have several sets of Lee Rifle dies in 223. There are reasons for this that are not material to my question. I am looking at 3 different bullet seater dies. They have letter codes stamped into them: KO, J9, and HO. One of these is a "Dead Length" (no crimp) bullet seating die that came with the collet neck sizer. At least one of the others is Lee's standard crimp die. I am hoping the other is a factory crimp die, but am not confident any of them are. They are not in there original boxes. My question is what do these codes reveal? Which one is which? I have not been able to locate any reference material from Lee that would explain these codes. The reasons for the multiple dies is I reload USGI brass that sometimes has been fired in SAWs (223) or M30's (308). These weapons have loose chambers and "puff" the cases such that resizing is mandatory, and requires considerable lubrication, a lot of leverage, and sometimes results in stuck cases, and other irritations. I tumble cases several times: after de-priming, after resizing, etc. I reload for both semi-auto's and bolt guns. So, I neck size the brass to keep the fire-formed dimensions for the bolt guns. Since Lee dies work, and are inexpensive, I have ordered sets, rather than single specialty dies. This results in some redundancy. I also use one single stage press, one turret press, and one progressive press, so the extra dies can be put to use at times, depending on what I am doing. This latest scenario occurred as I was collet pulling NATO spec SS109 projectiles, and replacing them with 55 FMJ's, so I can shoot them at my club. I buckled the first few cases, and then started to look at my other seating dies.