Primer Questions

[Lttuna]

I am a newbee to this hobby so bear with me.

I purchased a Lee Breech lock Challenger kit. Sent it up, primer discharge tube connected and small metal plate screwed in the side. The problem is the primers are coming out the backside of the shaft. It looks like on the side that its suppose to discharge the primers it has a hole. The backside of the shat has a longer slit it in and this is where the primers seem to be coming out, not down the tube. Hope I explained it well enough.

Second issue- when using the resizing die, I put the die just far enough that it touches the top of the shaft. Secured the die. Ran some cleaned brass thru it and resized and de-primed. Question is some of the holes in the primer pocket look perfectly round while some seem to have a irregular shaped hole, sometimes looking like a star pattern. Something I am doing or is this ok?

Third- on 9mm pistol rounds do you always clean the primer pocket?

Any help would be greatly appreciated

[Alpo]

The holes you mention in your third paragraph. The flash hole? If so, it is perfectly normal. The holes are punched, not drilled, and they are more often irregular than they are perfectly round.

I clean the primer pockets on every round of ammo I load. Many people never clean the pockets. It is, I suppose, up to you.

[BlackEagle]

Welcome to the forum, Lttuna. There are many here who can help, like Alpo.

As Alpo says, cleaning the primer pockets is personal preferance. Sometimes I clean the pockets, sometimes I don't on pistol caliber. Time and inclination are two factors; I have a feeling that clean pockets make for more consisant ammo. I make it a point to clean my .223 pockets every time.

If you could post some pictures of your primer discharge problem it might help us diagnose the problem.

[ryan42]

I have the same press.The reason your primers are popping out the wrong side is because you dont have the primer arm installed .Thats the little arm that goes in shaft your talking about that has the long slot in it.Once you install the correct primer arm your primers will go down the tube no problem.Your kit comes with two primer feeders and two primer arms.one is for large primers and one is for small primers.The one with the white end on it is for the large pistol primers and thats the one you want.Just make sure you use the correct primer arm to go along with it.You should clean every primer pocket in each casing,it only takes a second with the tool that came with your kit.Good luck.

[Lttuna]

Thanks for all the info, will set it up correctly later. But makes more sense now

Lt

[ryan42]

Let us Know if that helped you out.

[Crracer_712]

You mention you seat the die against the shaft, do you have the shell holder installed in the shaft when you do this? If not, the shell holder should be installed before you set your die depth.

[Lttuna]

Yep shell holder is in. The primer problem was corrected . This is a great forum for the new person !

On to the next step of hand priming cartridges. Cartridges have been tumbled, deprimed, resized , inspected and overall length checked. Will be hand priming with Lee hand primer. One step at a time to understall overall what it takes to make a round.
Thanks again for all input

LT

[gcalloway]

Sounds like you are doing great. Do yourself a favor if you have not already done so and read the front part of the reloading manuel/manuels you are working with. That will answer lots of questions for you. Then you can ask anyway and see if we know what we are talking about. Welcome to the Forum.

[BlackEagle]

Welcome to the forum, Lttuna. You'll find this is a great place with lots of helpful advice on many subjects, and friendly people who care for each other.

[madbuck22]

he said he cleaned before resizing. are u supposed to clean before resizing and poping the primer out? or other way around?

[Alpo]

Some do it one way, so the other.

If you clean first, then you don't risk bringing trash into your die, and possibly scratching it.

If you clean after sizing, your cleaning also removes the sizing lube, and might partially clean the primer pocket.

If you clean after, you stand the chance of getting a piece of shell or cob stuck in the flash-hole, and causing a misfire.

If you clean before, the act of depriming will clean anything foreign that might be in the flash-hole.

Or you could to like I do. Clean first, to protect my dies. Clean after, to remove the lube.

Use a primer-pocket brush after the second cleaning, which completely cleans the pocket and also knocks out any media that might be clogging the flash-hole.

It's all up to you.

[madbuck22]

got it thanks