Made some interesting mistakes, wasted bullets, wrecked brass.

S

Shadow9mm

New member
Well, I have been reloading for about 14 years. I was hanging out with my friend who taught me to shoot and reload and has been reloading longer than I have been alive.

We were both a little tired, we ran into a couple issues, and made a couple mistakes which I hope you will find interesting or at least entertaining. This is 357mag with 180g gas checked lead bullets.

from left to right
#1 my friend is used to seating and crimping in the same operation. However we were using my lee factory crimp die. the bullet was press fitted into the case ready to be seated, but we forgot to take out the crimp die and put the seater back in first, thus we have a round crimped just above the gas check.

#2 later on we decided to crimp and seat in 1 step due to issues. We set our dies for seat and crimp using hornady brass, and it was a touch shorter than the other brass we were switching over to, which we found out the hard way. Thus the crimp on the longer case, quite impressively, buckled the case.

#3 Not sure exactly how we did it, but we adjusted the lee factory crimp die down too far, resulting in a pretty crazy crimp.

#4, We ended up with a squib. We hade loaded 4 for testing, and realized we still had 1 powder charge in the pan on the scale. We were throwing around 15g of powder so we just weighed them out. put a sticker on it so it would not get lost.


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Happy and safe reloading.
 

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The buckled case is a total loss, the others can be salvaged with a kinetic bullet puller.

And, fwiw, I'm NEVER shooting your reloads. :D

Nothing wrong with seating and crimping in one operation, but it requires attention to detail setting the die, and uniformity of components, specifically case length and bullet type.
 
Sometimes you just very carefully double check the powder can label,then return the powder from the hopper to the can. Hang an empty primer box on the primer tube.
Quarantine anything you worked on.
Then turn out the light,close the door ,and let it rest till you have your ducks together.

Sear some meat. Enjoy some Tennessee sour mash.Solve the world's problems.

There are times to reload.or NOT!
 
higgite said:
How many beers were involved? Certainly you didn't do all that sober.
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No alcohol was involved. We were both just a bit more tired than we should have been. Using dies we were not super familiar with, and had inconsistent length brass, which will all be getting trimmed before I load 357 again.
 
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44 AMP said:
The buckled case is a total loss, the others can be salvaged with a kinetic bullet puller.

And, fwiw, I'm NEVER shooting your reloads. :D

Nothing wrong with seating and crimping in one operation, but it requires attention to detail setting the die, and uniformity of components, specifically case length and bullet type.
Click to expand...
That's a bit harsh. Everyone makes mistakes, reloading is not an exception. The important thing is to always double check your work as you go to find and correct any issues. And learn from the mistakes. Especially when working up new loads in cartridges and cartridge types you are new to.
 
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HiBC said:
Sometimes you just very carefully double check the powder can label,then return the powder from the hopper to the can. Hang an empty primer box on the primer tube.
Quarantine anything you worked on.
Then turn out the light,close the door ,and let it rest till you have your ducks together.

Sear some meat. Enjoy some Tennessee sour mash.Solve the world's problems.

There are times to reload.or NOT!
Click to expand...
Everyone has to know their limitations. But working with new dies and inconsistent components was most of the problem. We took a break, reset, double checked the components, streamlined down to seat and crimp in one operation, and got the workup finished, and called it a day. I'm going to trim up all my 357 brass before I load again. And the crimp and seat operation provided a better more consistent crimp than the lee crimp die.
 
Shadow, thanks for sharing. There's no demand to admit reloading mistakes to anyone but yourself, and appreciation is in order because you did it without concern for embarrassment. We learn from our own mistakes but they can be minimized by learning from others.
 
That's a bit harsh. Everyone makes mistakes, reloading is not an exception. The important thing is to always double check your work as you go to find and correct any issues. And learn from the mistakes. Especially when working up new loads in cartridges and cartridge types you are new to.
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Processes are the same across most cartridges. And this is a pretty basic one.
"New to me" isn't really a valid argument here if you have reloaded any other handgun cartridge.

Harsh? Did you note the smiley? There was some tongue in check.
But it is a very valid statement. If you make that many mistakes in a row and keep going, you're making another big mistake. Reloading isn't a game. When things are not going well, you make everything safe and walk away.
Throw in the towel for the day and come back when your mind is right.

Remember what it felt like to buckle #2 and to severely over-crimp #3. Those are big mistakes that should have been easily noticed while it was happening. Bullet seating and crimping should take minimal pressure. Finger-tip pressure. If you have to channel your inner caveman, something is wrong 99% of the time.

Do yourself a favor and throw the FCD into the corner of your garage or wood shed, and forget about it. It will save you some headaches and eliminate the false sense of accomplishment that comes from post-sizing the cartridges, which hides some bad practices earlier in the reloading process.
 
That's a bit harsh.
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Hey, I said it with a smile! :D

And, tis not a personal criticism, I don't shoot anyone else's handloads, and you're half way across the country from me, and I'm a "bad fruit" -I don't travel well. (or at all if I can help it) So, I feel pretty confident stating I'm never going to shoot your reloads. :D

As to making mistakes, oh yes, been there, done that, still have scars...I've made about every handloading mistake possible, short of blowing up a gun, and I came very, VERY SCARY close to that in 1974! :eek:
That case still hangs in a baggie over my reloading bench. "LEST WE FORGET!"

Some of them have been what the frack happened?? and some have been facepalm I'm such a barking idiot moments. I always figure out what did happen, and oddly enough, its ALWAYS MY FAULT!! :o

and, nearly all (not all but NEARLY all) happened in my early days, when money was very tight and every case, bullet and primer was precious.

The SECOND time I seated a bullet with the expander die, I gave up on turret presses. I created the "suspendered magnum" by running a .270 Win case into the .357 Mag expander die. (had to be suspenders, it didn't have a belt :rolleyes:) case collapsed in a 3 fold accordian looking thing at the shoulder.
First couple years I used a progressive press, I loaded more bad rounds than I had in the previous decade.

Didn't mean to sound harsh, I've been where you are, only some 30 or 40 years earlier. ;)
 
FrankenMauser said:
Processes are the same across most cartridges. And this is a pretty basic one.
"New to me" isn't really a valid argument here if you have reloaded any other handgun cartridge.

Harsh? Did you note the smiley? There was some tongue in check.
But it is a very valid statement. If you make that many mistakes in a row and keep going, you're making another big mistake. Reloading isn't a game. When things are not going well, you make everything safe and walk away.
Throw in the towel for the day and come back when your mind is right.

Remember what it felt like to buckle #2 and to severely over-crimp #3. Those are big mistakes that should have been easily noticed while it was happening. Bullet seating and crimping should take minimal pressure. Finger-tip pressure. If you have to channel your inner caveman, something is wrong 99% of the time.

Do yourself a favor and throw the FCD into the corner of your garage or wood shed, and forget about it. It will save you some headaches and eliminate the false sense of accomplishment that comes from post-sizing the cartridges, which hides some bad practices earlier in the reloading process.
Click to expand...

In this case I feel new to me is valid. I reload for 9mm, 223, 308, 30-06 and now 38/357. Dealing with roll crimps, and apparently having to trim handgun brass so they line up with the crimp grooves is something new for me.

Agreed, we made the first 3 mistakes in short order when we started. we took a break, reset, and until the squib at the end we had not more issues. Normally I would have just called it a day, but I was at my friends, he was letting me play with some of his H110, and we were only loading 4 at at time and stepping out back to test and I had limited time. I know poor excuses, but we did take a break, and came back much clearer headed.

We were using a rock chucker. Thing has a LOT of leverage. It felt a bit more than normal, but not anything crazy. the seating was normal, things dod not go bad until the crimp. since we had set it up with a shorter case, the crimp ring binding is what buckled the case.

I'm torn on the FCD. I don't like seating and crimping in the same step as the bullet is still moving as the crimp is applied. I also feel there is some value in post sizing. In the case of 9mm, it goes in a couple different guns. Thus uniformity and consistency is very important, not just tailoring for 1 gun. The goal is factory like uniformity and performance and the FCD really helps with that, especially when using mixed brass with varying wall thicknesses like I do. I will say though that I hate the roll crimp it puts on 38/357.
 
44 AMP said:
Hey, I said it with a smile! :D

And, tis not a personal criticism, I don't shoot anyone else's handloads, and you're half way across the country from me, and I'm a "bad fruit" -I don't travel well. (or at all if I can help it) So, I feel pretty confident stating I'm never going to shoot your reloads. :D

As to making mistakes, oh yes, been there, done that, still have scars...I've made about every handloading mistake possible, short of blowing up a gun, and I came very, VERY SCARY close to that in 1974! :eek:
That case still hangs in a baggie over my reloading bench. "LEST WE FORGET!"

Some of them have been what the frack happened?? and some have been facepalm I'm such a barking idiot moments. I always figure out what did happen, and oddly enough, its ALWAYS MY FAULT!! :o

and, nearly all (not all but NEARLY all) happened in my early days, when money was very tight and every case, bullet and primer was precious.

The SECOND time I seated a bullet with the expander die, I gave up on turret presses. I created the "suspendered magnum" by running a .270 Win case into the .357 Mag expander die. (had to be suspenders, it didn't have a belt :rolleyes:) case collapsed in a 3 fold accordian looking thing at the shoulder.
First couple years I used a progressive press, I loaded more bad rounds than I had in the previous decade.

Didn't mean to sound harsh, I've been where you are, only some 30 or 40 years earlier. ;)
Click to expand...

That's fair. There is only one person whose reloads I would shoot, and he taught me a good bit of what I know.

I have been reloading a few years now, and we caught them all as they happened thankfully. but it is best never to get too comfortable when reloading.
 
Number three was surprising to me. I use the factory crimp die on several cartridges and it seems to me that a factory crimp die to do that must be adjusted way too far. I have made my fair share of mistakes as well. The important thing is that you learn from them.
 
kilotanker22 said:
Number three was surprising to me. I use the factory crimp die on several cartridges and it seems to me that a factory crimp die to do that must be adjusted way too far. I have made my fair share of mistakes as well. The important thing is that you learn from them.
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Yeah, im still not sure how that happened. I remember backing it out when setting up, maybe not far enough. I may load a dummy to see how far down it would let me crimp, just out of curiosity.
 
Let's hear about more mistakes: is anyone among us a virgin in this regard? We can all learn from it: from preventing the occurrence to reflecting, "Hey, I just read about that."

I recall mentioning this moons ago so newbies may have missed it. I reloaded my new Casull .454 with inserts supplied by Freedom Arms to convert the primer pocket from Large Pistol to Small Rifle primer. They didn't seat well, but I was new to this hobby, so I just forced them in and went to the range. One round fired. The next....nothing happened other than a "fizz." I wondered if I missed putting powder in that round and cranked the next cartridge into position. Then I reflected, "Where did the last bullet go?" As it turned out, it was in the barrel. Had I fired the next round successfully, responders may have found me in a bit of physical disarray. There was powder in that load but the primer was damaged by the insert such that it did not properly ignite the charge. The new Freedom Arms cases are seating Small Rifle Primers. End of problem. I still have those original LP primer cases and I look at them every now and then to remind myself of that event.
 
#3 is easy to do with bullets that have a shallow crimp groove. And there are bullet designs that don't give you much to crimp into.
As you know, there are two different Lee crimp dies that get called "factory crimp die" on forums. The first is the one you are using, which makes a very good crimp into an existing crimp groove. The second is a collet die that will put a crimp groove into a bullet if you use enough force. I've over-crimped with the first style trying to fix a bullet jump problem.
Thank you for the excellent pictures!
 
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Thus uniformity and consistency is very important, not just tailoring for 1 gun. The goal is factory like uniformity and performance and the FCD really helps with that, especially when using mixed brass with varying wall thicknesses like I do.
Click to expand...
All of my 9mms* get fed ammo that is put together to meet the same standards.
None of it goes through an FCD. Some of it is in mixed brass.

Refine the process and you'll understand what is going wrong, and where; and why the FCD is a bandaid.



*(This goes for all of my firearms, be it rifle, handgun, or shotgun, unless they're a loner or something special - like a wildcat, special chamber, antique, obsolete that requires making brass, etc.)
 
Catching back up to this thread I noted this...

I don't like seating and crimping in the same step as the bullet is still moving as the crimp is applied.
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I'm sorry to tell you, but you've got this entirely wrong. The bullet is stopped. The CASE is moving.

You may not like seating and crimping in one step, but there's absolutely nothing wrong with it, lots of people have been doing it longer than both our lifetimes put together.

Roll crimping is a "pay me now or pay me later" kind of thing. And what I mean by that is, you either put effort into correctly prepping the brass and adjusting the die, (paying upfront) or you spend effort dealing with over/under crimped rounds and possibly even destroyed cases and bullets (pay me later).

I've loaded ammo from non-uniform case batches, (knowing in advance this was their condition). Its not difficult, its just tedious, because you literally adjust the seating and crimping differently for every single round. You also need to have developed the ability to "feel" when things are different, and the wisdom to know what to do when something feels different, (and that's usually STOP at that point, not finish the ram stroke and see what comes out :rolleyes:)

As you've already discovered, too much crimp /crimp in the wrong place / case too long for the die crimp setting can buckle the case, and even squash and distort the bullet in extreme instances, destroying both for any use but scrap.

Sometimes the damage isn't that severe and the components can be salvaged, but often the case will be a total loss.

I fully agree with tossing aside the "factory crimp die" I don't have one, not getting one, don't see a need for one. I think its a waste of money. But its your money, waste it if you want. What bothers be about the FCD is that, from what I read (here, mostly) people seem to think that they don't need to pay attention and load their ammunition correctly, they can be sloppy and "fix" any mistakes with the factory crimp die.

In my (admittedly warped and highly opinionated :rolleyes:) world the only tool for "fixing" my loading mistakes (that I shouldn't have made in the first place) is a kinetic bullet puller. I've used (and still have) the RCBS collet type that goes in the press, and my experience with it (in several different calibers) has ranged from less than fully satisfactory to "this sucks!".
I got one of the Lyman "Orange hammers" some years ago its it has been flawless (provided you know how to use it correctly, there is a right and a wrong way).

I've been loading since the early 70s, and I'm very experienced with the tools I use. I've also made about every mistake in the book and some that aren't in the books. over the years, each one a teaching moment, and few were painful lessons. I won't claim to be error proof even today, I still make mistakes, rarely, but rarely is not "never". And each and every one my rare mistakes today is always due to the same cause. Me.

Insufficient attention to detail, usually the result of complacency (today. in the past it was ignorance, but I've learned since then...:rolleyes:)

Thanks for having the guts to show your screwups in public, its always possible that someone else can avoid the same thing if they know about it.
 
I can see how the first three problems would happen, but can't wrap my head around the loading error that put that blue tape around the fourth one. ;)
 
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