Whidden Arbor Dies consistency

[Ajwilly96]

I’m waiting on my first arbor press, and I went ahead and ordered the $30 conversion for my Whidden die from a micrometer seater to an arbor seater.

Without actually being able to load and just looking at the die my first concern is that it uses spring tension.

My first concern is this is not going to provide an accurate seating pressure on the gauge because it’s going to measure seating force plus the spring tension, my second concern is that overtime the spring will most likely vary in its readings.

So I assume you were just looking for consistency but it’ll be much higher on the gauge with the spring or am I missing something here?

 

[Murray Brook]

I am not familiar with these dies but could you not just remove the spring. I do this with my Forster benchrest dies to get a better feel for the bullet seating pressure.

 

[Ajwilly96]

I am not familiar with these dies but could you not just remove the spring. I do this with my Forster benchrest dies to get a better feel for the bullet seating pressure.

I could be wrong but I believe the spring presses against the seater plug and chamber sleeve

 

[Murray Brook]

As I posted I am not familiar with these dies. The spring in the Forster seater die lies on top of the caliber chamber. If the spring is not exactly true it could tilt the chamber somewhat and induce some run-out. I found that with the spring removed I got slightly better run-out #'s and more consistent feel to the bullet seating.

 

[Ajwilly96]

As I posted I am not familiar with these dies. The spring in the Forster seater die lies on top of the caliber chamber. If the spring is not exactly true it could tilt the chamber somewhat and induce some run-out. I found that with the spring removed I got slightly better run-out #'s and more consistent feel to the bullet seating.

Good call, I just took the die apart and the spring only sits on the chamber sleeve. I took that out and it feels much better. interesting that they don’t tell you to take it out in the instructions though so I’m curious how others are running the die