reaming dies with chamber reamer...

[brian923]

i have heard of some guys, after reaming there barrels, also ream out there reloading dies. this makes sense to me, but does it really make a differeance. i am asking because i am going to try renting a reamer, and was wondering if this would be agood thing to do as long as i have the reamer??


thanks, brian

 

[TonyR]

Yes and no. It could be a good idea for your seating die but would probably not make sense for your sizing die. My gunsmith made me a custom in-line seating die by running my chambering reamer into a Wilson die for the standard cartridge. My case is a wildcat which is slightly larger than the standard case. It makes highly concentric loads. I have also had custom sizing dies made but I don't believe that this would be a way to do it because resizing dies are hardened already and because the resizing die needs to make the case slightly smaller than the chamber. The chamber reamer would cut it too big assuming it could cut the hardened metal at all. I believe that suppliers like PT&G will provide a resize reamer to match a chamber reamer which can then be used to ream 'soft' die blanks prior to hardening. You can also have commercial resizing dies, which usually size the brass more than you need, custom ground to fit your fired cases by several suppliers but they are not using a chamber reamer as far as I know.

 

[rockrat]

Wonder if you could ream the die, all except the last 1/2' travel of the reamer, then put the reamer in the fridge. Warm the die with a heat gun to about 200 degrees or so to expand the metal, then ream with the cold reamer to finish.

When the die cools to room temp, might there be enough shrinkage to where when sizing the brass, there is enough clearance to chamber the round?

 

[Cheechako]

JMHO, but if you plan on trying any stunts like heating/freezing or reaming hardened dies, the guy who rents you the reamer would not take kindly to it. If he finds out, you've probably bought yourself a reamer.

Ray