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Excessive taper crimp

3K views 12 replies 9 participants last post by  jdon72 
#1 ·
So Fedex shows up today with a brand new Dillon 650 and all the accessories for it. I watched the video about adjusting the bullet seating die, must have miss understood I had the seating die body adjusted to low and it over crimped the rounds enough so that the Montana Gold JHP have a serious grooved indentation around them (I removed one too see). After seeing my error I readjusted it and everything works great now. Question is would they be safe to shoot? Using 4.7 grains of Win231, with 180 grain MG bullet, seated to 1.125. Playing with the press I loaded about 200 of them before I realized it

Thanks in advance
 
#2 ·
you forgot the caliber gun you are loading, I use Win 231 and it is a good pistol powder, but there is a good artical in Guns and Ammo this month about useing the right powder with the right cal, and bullet, if you are new to reloading I would get a good reloading book and stick to mid range loads, Hornady, Lyman and lee Books are all Good and not that much money.
 
#6 ·
They would be safe to shoot provided that you haven't crimped them so much that they are undersized and won't headspace as Popgunner suggested. I don't mean to be elementary but to elaborate just a bit the 40 headspaces off the mouth of the case meaning they may go in so deep that the firing pin won't reach them and the only real way to tell is to try to shoot them.
 
#9 ·
If you set up the dies per the instruction that come with them then you automatically get a taper crimp. The belling die bells the mouth of the case so that you can get the bullet to start into the case. The seating die (if set up correctly) taper crimps the mouth of the case and removes the belling. A taper crimp is hard to detect visually as the taper crimped case mouth is not a nice rolled piece of brass as you get with regular crimps on revolver rounds. If there is no sign of belling then chances are that the case is taper crimped.

In general, we taper crimp semi-auto gun ammo and roll crimp revolver ammo. An alternative for both is the Lee factory crimp die setup that is a little of both and is usable on the caliber for which they make the dies.

As for wellerjohn's over crimped ammo:

Remove the barrel from the gun and use the barrel as a gage. Drop each errant round in the chamber and make sure it drops in easily, and that it seats to a level the same as a known good round. Any that don't, tear down. The pulled bullets may be unusable again as the deep crimp may have dented the bullet so that a normal taper crimp may not be possible.

Reloading over time exposes the reloader to all kinds of mistakes that are better rectified immediatley instead of after producing many bad cartridgtes. We learn from theses mistakes and the best part of that education is when we revert to the instructions that we failed to read initially. I suggest that every part of reloading needs lots of study to understand the how and the why for each step of the process. READ, READ, and RE-READ the manuals and instructions packaged with the tools.

LDBennett
 
#10 ·
As for wellerjohn's over crimped ammo:

Remove the barrel from the gun and use the barrel as a gage. Drop each errant round in the chamber and make sure it drops in easily, and that it seats to a level the same as a known good round. Any that don't, tear down. The pulled bullets may be unusable again as the deep crimp may have dented the bullet so that a normal taper crimp may not be possible

LDBennett
Great idea LD, I forget that not everbody can step out side of there reloading room and test fire their reloads like I can.
 
#12 ·
As for wellerjohn's over crimped ammo:

Remove the barrel from the gun and use the barrel as a gage. Drop each errant round in the chamber and make sure it drops in easily, and that it seats to a level the same as a known good round. Any that don't, tear down. The pulled bullets may be unusable again as the deep crimp may have dented the bullet so that a normal taper crimp may not be possible.

Reloading over time exposes the reloader to all kinds of mistakes that are better rectified immediatley instead of after producing many bad cartridgtes. We learn from theses mistakes and the best part of that education is when we revert to the instructions that we failed to read initially. I suggest that every part of reloading needs lots of study to understand the how and the why for each step of the process. READ, READ, and RE-READ the manuals and instructions packaged with the tools.

LDBennett
The rounds due drop into the barrel just fine and seem to headspace correctly. Thanks for the suggestions.
 
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