Issues Depriming .45 ACP

[Inertiatic]

I'm pretty new to reloading still and started loading my second caliber, .45 ACP. I've been picking up my Speer brass and also have some other random head stamps mixed in.

I went to resize and deprime on my Lee Turret press and about every other case couldn't be deprimed. It seems that a lot of the flash holes seemed to be too small and the pin in the die would just get pushed up.


Is this a normal occurance and is there an easy way to fix this such as drilling the flash hole?

[stilly]

I'm pretty new to reloading still and started loading my second caliber, .45 ACP. I've been picking up my Speer brass and also have some other random head stamps mixed in.

I went to resize and deprime on my Lee Turret press and about every other case couldn't be deprimed. It seems that a lot of the flash holes seemed to be too small and the pin in the die would just get pushed up.


Is this a normal occurance and is there an easy way to fix this such as drilling the flash hole?

Are those small pistol .45 ACP? What you might want to do is switch to the Lee universal decapper and see if THAT helps any. Another thing to do is to maybe sand down the pin on the decapper rod and make the head be a little pointy or maybe rounded so that it can maybe hit the edge of the hole, but still be guided into it.

And yes there are issues with some brass and the flash hole not being uniform or centered properly and maybe just off by a tad. :\

There is also several folks that sell rounded off Lee rods on fleabay...

[Devilmonkey89]

I run a single stage lee (slow AF) but any .45 acp, .223, 6.8, and .308 it deprimes reliably. I'd say adjust your depriming pin. I broke a couple of depriming pins when i dropped them too low, but I dialed them back up and been fine ever since.

[Bill Steele]

The Lee pin in small enough for any flash hole. You might try adjusting the pin so the fat part bottoms in the case at the same time the ram has reached its max travel.

Occasionally, primer cups will bend far enough before popping out that your pin won't push them out. I usually only see this with 40S&W cases, but it could be happening in your case. Making sure the most amount of pin is sticking down as possible may cure your issue.

Also don't be afraid to really crank down on the pin. Buy a few extras so when you break one, a quick swap keeps you up and running.

Good luck.

[stilly]

I thought this was only an issue with RCBS dies...

OP what dies you got?

[Inertiatic]

I'm using Lee dies. And lost of the brass giving me trouble is SPP, but a few were LPP. Different SPP head stamps too, which is what confuses me the most.

ill give adjusting the pin up and report back. Thanks for all of the tips so far!

[Inertiatic]

I was able to get all but one of my troublesome brass deprimed.

I adjusted my die slightly and raised the decapping pin. My best guess from what I saw was that when the pin was too low, it deprimed brass with perfectly centered flash holes just fine. The others were out of luck.

Thank you all for the help.

[stilly]

Wow. When my decapper is too high it makes it NOT decap all the way. I have yet to have any of mine too low... :\

[someoneeasy]

After buying a bunch of replacement pins for my universal decapping die, I came across theseveral hardened decapping pins on amazon.

https://www.amazon.com/Squirrel-Daddy-3-Pack-Decapping-Upgrade/dp/B011AYRHNM

Haven't had a problem since.

[stilly]

These are the ones on fleabay:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/QTY-3-VGI-Decapping-Pin-Upgrade-for-Lee-90783-90292-universal-decap-die-/331610759383?hash=item4d358aa0d7:g:7GgAAOSwLVZVrqxZ

http://www.ebay.com/itm/QTY-3-Ball-End-Decapping-Pin-Upgrade-for-Lee-90783-90292-universal-decap-die-/321663165765?hash=item4ae49e6545:g:~S4AAOSwstxU-ma8

They do not say much and the people selling them do not seem to know much abou them either, but I think they might just be rounded off. It would be nice to have a hardened one that is rounded off.

[Inertiatic]

I'll have to check these out. Ty for the links!