09-01-2023, 12:56 AM
(This post was last modified: 09-03-2023, 01:08 AM by lazyengineer.)
FWIW, I prefer:
-FW arms decapping die (then wet tumble with pins)
-Forester Bushing die, with one of the bigger bushings that still works. I remove the expander ball completely, to avoid overworking the brass
-Sinclair mandrel die (with the hardest mandrel option, which is TIN coated or Carbide; so that it doesn't require any lube).
-Hornady seating die (the sliding sleeve is pretty great, IMHO)
In this manner I never need mess with lube inside the case mouth or neck, and even the neck outside needs very little lube, if one get at least the TIN coated or carbide bushing. I do this for .223 and 6.5 Creedmoor. I haven't gotten a Forester bushing for my Grendel yet, so I run just a Hornady factory die with the expander stem completely removed, for 6.5 Grendel. I probably should, since the Hornady factory die is probably over-working the neck-brass.
That's how I prefer to run it at least. Why? Because of my own methods and practices. In particular, I bulk process a lot of brass, and much of my brass is actually sourced from random range pick-ups. This means unknown internal debris contamination. Which means I need to wet tumble with pins to really recover the brass to attractive condition, and the pins pulverized whatever might be left over inside the casing - making it gleaming bright on the inside, and I'll see, if there are problems.
I decap first, so that the primer pockets get scoured clean. It's pretty (nice), but more importantly, it allows the wet-tumble with pins to removes gunk allowing more consistent primer seating.
I don't like spray lubes -I've had bad experiences - many times. Maybe I'm just not as competent and should feel bad, but I'd gotten way way waaaay too good at Stuck Case remover and finally gave up and went back to wet lube. No more stuck cases for me. Problem with wet-lubes is if they get inside the casing, the can cause media and such to stick inside the casing. And they are messy. I address this below. But first, I resize the wet lubbed brass by the next step below
I resize with a bushing. and with the expander and decapper completely removed. This eliminates the need to lube inside the neck, and basically this is how the winning service rifle team at Camp Perry said they process brass, so I copied that part. If I don't have a bushing die, I just do it with a factory sizing die I removed the spindle from - same thing as a bushing die, but with a small sized fixed position "bushing"; if you will.
To deal with the afore mentioned messy wet lube in my now sized casing, I no-pins tumble it in water again, this time with a little turtle wax or RainX, to leave a thin film to mitigate cold-welding.
Then I trim it in a Giraud trimmer. That system is a QC check to assure the neck got resized, in addition to be a good trimmer.
Then I Mandrel inside size the inside of the neck. Tihs requires no lube.
I then seat the bullet, typically doing a half-seat/rotate/finish seat, to help with runout. (it helps quite a lot doing it that way, in fact).
Then, many times I'll Lee Factory Crimp. I personally like the LFC, even on bullets without a cannular - though I back it off a bit, when no Cannular.
I then keep it segregated by headstamp and number of cycles. If it's near end of life, I'll make the head with nail-polish to seal the primer, but also leave a resilient weather resistant marking on it, so that I don't pick it back up again, even if it's still there 4 weeks later.
Others do it differently, and I don't have a single bad thing to say about that. That's just how I do it, that I find works best for me. It's a tailored approach that's particularly good for processing brass of mixed or even unknown provenance and mixed degrees of tarnish and dirt inside, and probably isn't the route for everyone.
-FW arms decapping die (then wet tumble with pins)
-Forester Bushing die, with one of the bigger bushings that still works. I remove the expander ball completely, to avoid overworking the brass
-Sinclair mandrel die (with the hardest mandrel option, which is TIN coated or Carbide; so that it doesn't require any lube).
-Hornady seating die (the sliding sleeve is pretty great, IMHO)
In this manner I never need mess with lube inside the case mouth or neck, and even the neck outside needs very little lube, if one get at least the TIN coated or carbide bushing. I do this for .223 and 6.5 Creedmoor. I haven't gotten a Forester bushing for my Grendel yet, so I run just a Hornady factory die with the expander stem completely removed, for 6.5 Grendel. I probably should, since the Hornady factory die is probably over-working the neck-brass.
That's how I prefer to run it at least. Why? Because of my own methods and practices. In particular, I bulk process a lot of brass, and much of my brass is actually sourced from random range pick-ups. This means unknown internal debris contamination. Which means I need to wet tumble with pins to really recover the brass to attractive condition, and the pins pulverized whatever might be left over inside the casing - making it gleaming bright on the inside, and I'll see, if there are problems.
I decap first, so that the primer pockets get scoured clean. It's pretty (nice), but more importantly, it allows the wet-tumble with pins to removes gunk allowing more consistent primer seating.
I don't like spray lubes -I've had bad experiences - many times. Maybe I'm just not as competent and should feel bad, but I'd gotten way way waaaay too good at Stuck Case remover and finally gave up and went back to wet lube. No more stuck cases for me. Problem with wet-lubes is if they get inside the casing, the can cause media and such to stick inside the casing. And they are messy. I address this below. But first, I resize the wet lubbed brass by the next step below
I resize with a bushing. and with the expander and decapper completely removed. This eliminates the need to lube inside the neck, and basically this is how the winning service rifle team at Camp Perry said they process brass, so I copied that part. If I don't have a bushing die, I just do it with a factory sizing die I removed the spindle from - same thing as a bushing die, but with a small sized fixed position "bushing"; if you will.
To deal with the afore mentioned messy wet lube in my now sized casing, I no-pins tumble it in water again, this time with a little turtle wax or RainX, to leave a thin film to mitigate cold-welding.
Then I trim it in a Giraud trimmer. That system is a QC check to assure the neck got resized, in addition to be a good trimmer.
Then I Mandrel inside size the inside of the neck. Tihs requires no lube.
I then seat the bullet, typically doing a half-seat/rotate/finish seat, to help with runout. (it helps quite a lot doing it that way, in fact).
Then, many times I'll Lee Factory Crimp. I personally like the LFC, even on bullets without a cannular - though I back it off a bit, when no Cannular.
I then keep it segregated by headstamp and number of cycles. If it's near end of life, I'll make the head with nail-polish to seal the primer, but also leave a resilient weather resistant marking on it, so that I don't pick it back up again, even if it's still there 4 weeks later.
Others do it differently, and I don't have a single bad thing to say about that. That's just how I do it, that I find works best for me. It's a tailored approach that's particularly good for processing brass of mixed or even unknown provenance and mixed degrees of tarnish and dirt inside, and probably isn't the route for everyone.
4x P100