I am having an issue with sized brass that is still a bit sticky when I chamber it. I think I have narrowed it down to not getting a complete sizing of the base. From what I can find the die should be sizing down to somewhere around .469-.471. Mine are measuring around .4725-.4735. This is with a Redding Type S full length bushing die. Does anyone know what their base diameters size to with their dies?
Call Harrell’s and send them a piece of 2x or 3x fired and unsized brass. They’ll get you a custom fit die that does the job properly.
Send three pieces of 3x fired brass to Harrell’s. Only neck size those three pieces in between firings.
Wow, it looks like my redding die is way out of spec. That is disappointing as I splurged a bit thinking I was getting the best. Thank you all for the quick replies.
Your die might be just fine. How are you adjusting the die down to the shell holder? Touching? Turning a little past etc....? Just in the past month we’ve taken two different shell holders for different rounds and ground/turned some off the shell holder so you could adjust the die down properly to size the case properly and worked like a million bucks. Mark did one for a local customer and I had to do one for myself. Different calibers, different dies etc... Took approx. .010” off of each one. The one I had to do for myself I had the die made to my reamer print and a fired sample case. There was no issue with the die. I measured two different shell holders I had and out of the box they differed approx. .005”. Later, Frank Bartlein Barrels
Frank brought up a very good point.I have 4 RCBS shell holders for 6br boltface.They all measure different. You might need a small base die or get a custom dies as mentioned to fit you brass. So what do I do with 4 different shell holders. Put 3 away and only use one, same one always.
If you want to splurge buy a whidden fl bushing die and sell your redding set. You can use any shellholder you want then. Mine is an off the shelf die and sizes to .468-.469 and still has a gap over the shellholder to fit any chamber that one could ever cut short.
I remember running some of my 6 br brass through a 30-06 or a 308 die to size it down. Someone will chime in. Don
Currently my sizing die is set up to bump the shoulder just around .002-.003 with brass that was 2-3x fired so I don't think I want to run it down tighter against the shell holder and oversize the shoulder, or am I not doing that correctly? I am running them through a 6.5 creedmoor whidden die right now and it gets much farther down the base than the redding die was doing, but still unacceptably difficult to chamber. I'll double check but I think I am already camming over with this die. Lots of great suggestions her folks. Thank you very much. czim
After I realized that my problem wasn't headspace/shoulder problem, I obtained a small base 308 die, and problem solved. jd
I looked up a print and the 6.5 creed is .4714 at the base and I believe the 6br is .4729 [that what it lists the 30br as] So if you are bumping the creed die and it still isn't working, I would be wondering why. Anyone ?
So one thing at a time, Your sizing 2 maybe 3x fired brass? Humm let’s be sure your not trying to headspace brass that isn’t fully fire formed as you may not be sizing that .002-.003 you believe you are. Secondly, You may indeed have to adjust your Die closer to the shell holder maybe touch followed by a slight cam over. Thirdly, What’ Up with a Creedmoor Die on a 6 Br case? Fourthly, Size um just enough to chamber, take a few measurements and call it a day. J
@SPJ That is a good suggestion to double check I am headspacing correctly. I will start there. I used the creedmoor die on a whim to see if it had a bit tighter tolerance at the base and it definitely sizes farther down than my 6br redding die does. Thank you all, czim
Buy a Lee 45ACP carbide die and run those pesky cases through with the shell holder touching the die. Eric
When you size the base down smaller it pushes the shoulder forward. Re run back thru your shoulder bump die.
Well I had a chance to look at the suggestions made here and picked 5 pieces of brass at random to try some things with. Of the 5, one chambered with no problems, two had some resistance but not bad, and two were pretty tight. I started checking headspace and only the first piece passed my headspace test. So I went ahead and started screwing my sizing die down a little bit more at a time and testing again. Lo and behold @SPJ was right. I guess the brass that I though was fully fire-formed was not. Now all 5 pieces run through the sizing die chamber with ease and pass my headspace test. Going to load up some and give them a go this weekend if the rain ever stops in South Florida.
