Did i get the wrong die set?

[landslide03]

Hi,

I am new to reloading rifle rounds, so far i have reload a few thousand 9mm rounds on my Lee progressive 1000 press. I just bought the lee 223 deluxe die set. It came with a neck sizing die, overall sizing die, and a bullet seater die. Once it arrived i noticed there was not an expander die. Do i have to get that separately? Since I only have three spots in my lee progressive 1000 press should i use the Overall sizing die or the neck sizing die for the first stage?

[zfields]

Im not a rifle reloader, but If I remember correctly, you dont flare rifle brass.

[rero360]

Correct, you don't flair the mouth of rifle brass the way you do with pistol brass.

As to which sizing die to use, are you shooting this ammo out of just one rifle? and if so is that rifle a bolt gun? if so you can use the neck sizing die, but keep in mind after 4 or so reloads you'll have to full size the cases as the shoulder will have moved enough to making seating difficult, all depends.

However if you plan on using this brass in multiple rifle and or out of an semi auto then always full length resize as to keep from having issues with chambering and all that.

[Boots]

It depends on the type of dies. Many will size the neck down on the up stroke of the piston and on the down stroke an expander will bring the neck to the dimension of a round that you are loading.
Although I've never used one, there is also a bushing type of die that just sizes the neck down to just a few thousands of the bullet you will be seating... and you can get different bushing to match what you are loading. This process only works the brass once thus it won't be hardened as quick and prolong the life of the brass. (unless you do annealing.)

[gunboat]

Is there not a decap rod with an expansion button in the sizing dies ?-- or at least one of them.
Rifle loading is often done with just the two dies, decap/size/expand and the seat/crimp die. Neck sizing only for reuse in the same bolt gun. Autos usually require full length sizing.
My Ha-penny

[bohoki]

no expander if you use flat base bullets you need to have a good chamfer

boattails slide right in

ive never crimped but i am not making ammo for the army so ymmv

[gunboat]

Bo -- I do not understand your statement of not expanding -- I have never seen a standard die set that did not size the case to a smaller diameter than factory case dimensions then use an expander plug or expander die to bring the diameter back to a thou or two smaller than the intended bullet diameter. Say about .306 for a jacketed 308 bullet and about .309 for a .311 cast bullet. I bell the case mouth for both jacketed and cast but many only bell for cast. --
my ha-penny

[landslide03]

Thanks guys, I am planing on using them on a few diff ar's i have a case trimmer, So after i run them trough the case trimmer i thing i will put them through the sizing die. Thanks for the good info

[rsrocket1]

If you are using the .223 die set for AR's then you are in the same boat as me and bought 1 die too many. There is no need for the neck sizing die because you want to full length resize all brass for autoloaders, even the ones you shot through your own gun.

I do use the neck sizing die once in a while to knock out priming mistakes from the hand primer (where a primer gets started in sideways), but otherwise I now know better when buying dies not to spend the extra money if I'm reloading for multiple guns or autoloaders.

You don't need to expand the case unless you are loading lead bullets or bare frangible bullets and don't want to shave the projectile as you press it in. On top of that, if you expand, then you'll also have to get a crimper to bring the opening back to at least vertical.

I would put the cases through the sizing die BEFORE trimming. On my .308's I see about a 5 mil growth in case length when resizing cases. I haven't had to trim any .223 yet, even with heavy resizing.

[bohoki]

If you are using the .223 die set for AR's then you are in the same boat as me and bought 1 die too many. There is no need for the neck sizing die because you want to full length resize all brass for autoloaders, even the ones you shot through your own gun.

I do use the neck sizing die once in a while to knock out priming mistakes from the hand primer (where a primer gets started in sideways), but otherwise I now know better when buying dies not to spend the extra money if I'm reloading for multiple guns or autoloaders.

You don't need to expand the case unless you are loading lead bullets or bare frangible bullets and don't want to shave the projectile as you press it in. On top of that, if you expand, then you'll also have to get a crimper to bring the opening back to at least vertical.

I would put the cases through the sizing die BEFORE trimming. On my .308's I see about a 5 mil growth in case length when resizing cases. I haven't had to trim any .223 yet, even with heavy resizing.

wow almost every .223 case i find in the wild after full length resizing is 1.77 or more only the ones i fire out of my mini 14 that i trimmed to like 1.745 after my sizing comes out to about 1.755

[Boots]

The thing about the Lee dies the OP purchased is that they do not use a expander, but instead use a mandrel that the neck sizer pushes the shell's neck against. So yeah, there are rifle dies that don't use an expander.

[landslide03]

Hey guys I have another question on these dies, on the lee progressive press do i have to buy a seperate die for the auto disk loader to screw into it? The neck sizing die has threads in it but it is a different size than the ones on my auto disk loader. Any ideas which one i should get?

[Boots]

Hey guys I have another question on these dies, on the lee progressive press do i have to buy a seperate die for the auto disk loader to screw into it? The neck sizing die has threads in it but it is a different size than the ones on my auto disk loader. Any ideas which one i should get?

You'll need the Lee rifle charging die

http://www.leeprecision.com/cgi/catalog/browse.cgi?1288841241.1991=/html/catalog/powhan1.html

[NorCal Mtn Flyer]

I'm still quite new at reloading, but when researching which press to buy, I was told that the Lee Pro 1000 was not suitable for reloading rifle cartridges. That is why I ended up with the Lee Deluxe Turret press instead of the Pro 1000. Is this not the case? (no pun intended...lol)

[rsrocket1]

I'm still quite new at reloading, but when researching which press to buy, I was told that the Lee Pro 1000 was not suitable for reloading rifle cartridges. That is why I ended up with the Lee Deluxe Turret press instead of the Pro 1000. Is this not the case? (no pun intended...lol)

The Lee Pro 1000 can be set up to load .223, but I think you made a better choice with the Turret press. You can use it like a single stage press until you are comfortable with all the stages, then turn on the indexing to do a complete load on each bullet.

Many rifle rounds take a bit of case prep before you get to the priming stage anyway so you don't get a lot of advantage with a progressive.