New to reloading couple of questions.

C

Canada

Inactive
Hi folks,

New to the forum here. I just purchased a bunch of new toys, got rid of some old guns I inherited to buy my .270win T3 Laminate and Blackhawk 3-15x50 ffp scope. I'm excited to get into long range shooting and I need some info. Any help would be greatly appreciated as I have not found much info online for these 3 issues I have.

I purchased the Lee Collet die set (2 dies) to reload .270win, Hornady 130 gr SSTs and new unfired Winchester brass. I am using my dad's old Bonanza press model 68 (not the coax now made by forster).

First of all, is it normal for virgin brass to have defects? I have one casing that has a gouge/crack right THROUGH a neck (I can see light go through it). Seven other cartridges have what look like gouges or heavy indented scratches. One of these gouges wraps around the base of the cartridge about half an inch from the extractor groove. One of these has a dent in the shoulder, which I would guess is probably safe, but I'm gonna leave it aside as well and send them all back to Winchester for inspection. I have some pictures posted at the bottom of this post.

Second question, (searched and couldn't find and answere on this one) when I size the necks using the Lee collet sizer, I was under the impression I could somewhat seat bullets in by hand, but the necks are tight and I can only seat the boat tail base of the bullet about 1/8" then it gets pretty tight. All I've been able to find is info where most guys find the case necks are too loose, and can therefor sand the mandrel down .001" to make the necks a bit tighter. Just wondering if this could cause problems when seating bullets (ie. if the bullet is off to the side when going up in the die will that cause it to seat unevenly?).

Third question: My Frankford Arsenal DS-750 scale seems to "drift" by about .2 grains and I'm not sure how picky I should be. I do expect on shooting tight groups and long ranges.

Any advice is greatly appreciated!

-Alex in Toronto
 

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I'll just respond to your first question. Yes it is common for new brass to have defects but I have never come across what you have shown. Almost all of the defects I have experienced are deep creases along the length of the shoulders and these are discarded. Most are Remington cases. What are your cases? I load for over 50 different rifle calibers so I'm more likely to come across defective cases than most reloaders.

But as far as the second question, I have never used the Lee collet die but it just doesn't seem likely that the case neck would be loose enough to allow bullet seating by hand (and then I assume crimped by the collet die). The neck tension would be too loose.
 
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Thanks for the reply condor. These are Winchester cases. Would you say you see these creases 5 to 10 cartridges out of 100? Do you send them back to the mfg or just bite the bullet and load the balance?

I think I answered my second question on the loading bench this evening. My bullets are seating fine even though they are off to the side a bit when I initially insert them into the casings.

As for my third question, my scale is kinda frustrating me cause the manuals are giving pretty specific load data ie. 56.4 grains so I assume my scale should hold at .1 grains. I am aiming for 55grains and I usually get 49.9-51.1 as it drifts a bit. I'm not sure what the normal tolerance is.
 
I just read an article that talks about tolerance in powder through, which put things into perspective: .2 gr over 55 gr = 0.3% = not a big difference.
 
No definitely not 5 to 10 out of a 100; that's far too many. I never returned any but perhaps you should if the defects seem serious enough.
 
I went through this mess before. You have to take pictures of the defects, email winchester, once they reply they usually say some gibberish and then have you send your new brass into them so they can figure out what happened. In the mean time they make it sound like it's all your fault till finally down the road they cut you a check for your loss.

I had a bag of 30-40 Krag almost 2 years ago. It's limited run so when I opened the bag and 50% of the case mouths were screwed up (short, cracked, rough, bent). In the end I got 30 pieces of brass out of 50 and I wasn't happy.

 
The cracks is probably due to a bad batch. If you can return those brass I think they will replace it.

In general I always put new brass through a neck die before I reload them for the reason to get neck tension all equal and to correct any dented case necks.

I heard more than one guy complaining about the Lee Collet Die that does not size the necks properly. Sanding off the expander could help as you mention.
 
It looks to me like you are not using enough case lube and you are buckling the cases and almost sticking them in the die. One of those cases clearly is a case head seperation and with new cases there is only one way that you can do that is by sizeing with not enough lube. It looks to me that you wer just lucky that you did not rip a rim off and have to deal with removing a stuck case.
 
If you want trouble free weighing, get a good balance beam scale: RCBS 5-0-5, RCBS 10-10, Hornady, Redding, or similar balance and a set of calibration weights. Cheap electronic balances are not worth the trouble. Good electronic balances are expensive ($160 and up) and they are more difficult to set up properly. These observations are based on 40+ years as an analytical chemist.

Bob
 
It looks to me like you are not using enough case lube and you are buckling the cases and almost sticking them in the die. One of those cases clearly is a case head separation and with new cases there is only one way that you can do that is by sizing with not enough lube. It looks to me that you were just lucky that you did not rip a rim off and have to deal with removing a stuck case.
Click to expand...

I purchased the Lee Collet die set
Click to expand...

Lee collet dies do NOT require lube to size rifle cases.

Those cases are junk! They are bulk cases that are dumped in huge crates at the factory where they are made. Little care is taken to prevent dents and scratches. Those cases are deeply scratched, maybe even had some crap in the case forming dies that made those dimples.

I've given up on bulk winchester brass, or for that matter remington. If I really need brass, Nosler, Lapua, or starline is where I go for new brass. Yeah, it's sometimes twice the price, but you won't have those problems.
 
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