over chammfored brass?

[Gnzrme]

I am reloading 303 british. I have just trimmed, chammfored and de-burred the cases and when I went to seat the bullet (174 smk's) it just slid right into the case....I have reloaded these cases before...Is the brass shot (pun intended), did I chammfer too much or am I not re-sizing enough. I am full length re-sizing in a Dillon die and its comming almost down to the case head. Its never done this before, so I am thinking I either cham'd too much or the cases are just shot up....

What cha think....

[StraightShooter]

It definitely sounds like a sizing issue. Even in you shaved off a lot of metal when chamfering there still should be a tight neck from the sizing. SOmething is wrong with the sizing die i think.

I am reloading 303 british. I have just trimmed, chammfored and de-burred the cases and when I went to seat the bullet (174 smk's) it just slid right into the case....I have reloaded these cases before...Is the brass shot (pun intended), did I chammfer too much or am I not re-sizing enough. I am full length re-sizing in a Dillon die and its comming almost down to the case head. Its never done this before, so I am thinking I either cham'd too much or the cases are just shot up....

What cha think....

[tankerman]

SOmething is wrong with the sizing die i think.

Or the wrong bullet diameter.

[Gnzrme]

bullet diameter is the same (.311)....used this box before with no problems.....Havent moved the locking ring on the die, so I dont think thats the problem....What I did move, is the decapping pin in the re-sizing die, and I thought that wouldnt change the neck diameter, but I guess so....

So now, how do I fix it....I tried re-running them through the sizing die and that didnt work...do I need to seat the sizing die deeper?

[Linus]

Or the wrong bullet diameter.

Are you using .310 diameter bullets? If so try a .311 or .312, if that doesn't help then your dies are the blame.

[Linus]

ah, I posted a second too late...

But yeah try pressing the case deeper and see if that helps

[Gnzrme]

Ok, thanks for the replies...Will let you know how it goes....

[Gnzrme]

ok, just back from the garage...that was it....seated the sizing die deeper and now the necks are tighter....thanks.....

[ar15barrels]

This does not make sense.
The neck should have been being sized over 1/4" or more of it's length already unless you had the sizing die grossly mis-adjusted to start.
How are you setting up the sizing die adjustment?

[Gnzrme]

I just screwed the sizing die down until it was just off the shellplate and then confirmed that it would cycle in my action. When I took out the decapping pin, I guess I loosened the die and messed it up...I just screwed the die down a half turn and that got the case necks tighter....

[jandmtv]

you need to invest in a case gage

http://www.dillonprecision.com/content/p/8/stype/?searchVar=case+gage

[ar15barrels]

I just screwed the sizing die down until it was just off the shellplate and then confirmed that it would cycle in my action. When I took out the decapping pin, I guess I loosened the die and messed it up...I just screwed the die down a half turn and that got the case necks tighter....

That still does not make sense.
If you only had to tighten the die down 1/2 turn, then you were already sizing the neck a good amount.

If a case will not hold a bullet, there are 3 possible answers.
1, the die is not small enough in the neck to squeeze the brass down enough.
2, the brass is much thinner than normal (see #1)
3, the expander button is oversized, not leaving enough neck tension to retain a bullet.

In my experience, #1 is very uncommon because dies are purposely made undersized so that the expander ball will stretch the neck back out to the proper inside dimension no matter how thin the brass may be.
#3 is easily fixed by spinning the decapping stem in a drill and polishing the expander ball down until it's about 0.003" or so smaller than bullet diameter.

[gunboat]

Check the diameter of your expansion plug -

[ar15barrels]

Check the diameter of your expansion plug -

From the post above:

3, the expander button is oversized, not leaving enough neck tension to retain a bullet.

#3 is easily fixed by spinning the decapping stem in a drill and polishing the expander ball down until it's about 0.003" or so smaller than bullet diameter.

[grywlfbg]

I vote for the expander. The OP did say he moved the decapping pin down which would have also lowered the neck expander. Perhaps before both the die and decapping pin were too high such that the case wasn't fully engaging the expander and so was working. Then when the expander was lowered (w/ the die still too high) it was overexpanding the mouth of the case.