I have been playing with my new single stage setup the last few weeks. I bought an Ultramag on the site setup for lnl bushings. I have loaded .243 and .308 on it using new Nosler brass since I got it. My seating depth has been a little inconsistent and I have been working on fixing it. Tonight I decided to start over and really dial down my setup. My .243 seater is a Forster Micrometer setup. I am sizing .243 with a Redding Type S. I always used Hornady lock rings on all my dies. In the past I tightened them down using a Hornady wrench when setting up the die and then tightened the Allen key. HOWEVER after viewing many die setup vids I never saw anyone use a wrench. Everyone just hand tightened the lock ring then locked them down with the Allen key. My .308 setup is a Hornady micrometer seating die and a Hornady bushing sizing die. I went back and followed all die instructions for all of them and set them back up but this time I didn’t wrench tight my lock ring. I hand tightened them and then locked them in with the Allen key. Initial tests of seated rounds looks very good. I consistently loaded 5 .243 cases without moving the initial micrometer setting all within .000 on my accuracy one comparator. I only loaded 3 .308’s before I decided to get some sleep but they also were .000 on my number 2 comparator from accuracy one. Hopefully I have found the solution to some consistency in seating depth. My older T7 I setup long ago and I am using it to load .204 with all Redding dies but if my results are consistent with the Ultramag I may go back and reset it as well. I have been looking for an excuse to clean up my dies in the T7 anyway. I wasn’t having as much of a seating depth variation with the .204’s but that was before I got the accuracy one setup (I was using calipers before with a Hornady comparator kit) any improvement is welcome along with consistency. I still need to test my bullet runout with the ultramag but it’s getting too late tonight.
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