Thread: Fl sizer not sizing the neck?

i have a couple of sets of dies you can have a play with and see if theres a problem with your dies i travel to dunedin regularly i have them in my swap meet pile so no rush to geyt them back one set of lee one set of hornady mabe a neck sizing die there to not sure though

This has been on the back burner for a while, but today I just ran into the same issue with my 303 dies. I am possibly going insane. I've never had this before with other Lee dies that I've used a lot more. Both offending dies are Lee RGB ones, I've cleaned and lubed them both, but no improvement. There is little resistance in seating bullets, to the point where the arm almost falls due to gravity alone on the second half of the stroke. It must be just sizing the very end of the neck, as it feels finger tight, but it I seat to the cannelure, the bullet spins and wiggles. I'm wondering if it's maybe even the brass. I just noticed it's all European, Norma and S&B for both 6.5x55 and 303, could a different spec for thickness be the cause? Again, some of this stuff is new, once fired brass, so I doubt it's all getting work hardened and needs anealed already.

Merry Christmas etc.

Do you have good measuring gear? Measure the diameter of the expander ball, the neck thickness of the brass (times 2 for both sides of the neck) and add together. Compare to the inside measurement of the neck sizing area of the die and also the diameter of the bullet you are wanting to use and this will give you an idea of whats going on. The other one is size one case and mark it with tape and place to one side. Then take the expander ball/decapping pin out of the die and run another case through the die and again mark with tape (I use masking tape and write on them).

Try and push a bullet into both cases, if the bullet won't fit into the case that went through without the expander ball but drops into the standard resized case then you are getting to much expansion of the case neck off the expander ball when you are removing the sized case out of the die. If the pill drops into both cases the same, it would be most likely that you aren't getting enough resizing on the case necks i.e. the neck thickness is insufficient for the specification of that die. If you are finding that the case without the expander ball going through it grips the bullet but the expanded case doesn't - there are two situations that might be at play here one being the expander ball is too big and expanding the case too much, the second being that the brass is springing up too much for the size of the expander ball.

Ive had this happen with some once fired greek 303. No matter what you did it wouldnt size the neck down. I annealed it and I was back in buisness

Originally Posted by blip

Ive had this happen with some once fired greek 303. No matter what you did it wouldnt size the neck down. I annealed it and I was back in buisness

I havnt had the issue. But often hear about this and other sizing issues. Annealing is usually the fix.

Update on this issue. I annealer the 303 cases, and cleaned the die, and it still won't size with enough neck tension to be more than finger tight when I seat a bullet.

Other than the bullets somehow being 308cal and labeled incorrectly at the factory, I can't make sense of how this is happening. Maybe the mandrel is out of spec, I will try to measure it today.

OK, the expander ball on the 303 FL die is 0.3095, the inside of the case mouth of the offending case is 0.3105 and the outside of the mouth is about 0.336".

I measured the expander ball on my 50 plus year old Lyman .303 dies and came up with 7.88 mm (0.3102") so I suspect your dies are not reducing the neck enough or the projectiles are too small. Your inside case mouth dia is larger than your expander ball and barely larger than your projectiles which you may want to measure as well. Projectiles I have measured are around .311" for military and .312" for other. Projectiles for the Russian round would be too small.
GPM.

Worth trying to sand down the expander ball by a couple thou?

Been out in the shed. The dia of sized cases with the neck expanded ran from 0.335" CAC down to 0.331" Winchester so the problem is the die not reducing the neck enough to allow the expander to do its job. CAC cases with the slightly undersize Greek projectile seated 0.335". My Lee loader reduces the OD of sized cases to 0.331". This is way less than your die delivering 0.336".
That is the problem identified. The fix is a new die either FL or perhaps a Lee collet die.
GPM.

Originally Posted by tommygun

Worth trying to sand down the expander ball by a couple thou?

Won't help as the die is under sizing the neck. As with the 6.5x55 the problem is sloppy US tolerances and arrogance about non US rounds. Using a Lee collet neck sizing die, which will require neck annealing every few loads to work well, together with your existing die as a body die if and when needed could be your best and cheapest option. PM me for more detail if you wish.
GPM.

I think Lee advise against annealing. Can lead to collapsed necks on the collet die.

We're the dies purchased new?
If used perhaps the previous owner honed them.