Hey all, I am reloading 45 acp for my M&P 45. I have been reloading other calibers but this is my first go at the 45. I'm using a Lee 4 die set which included a factory crimp die as my 4th stage. According to specs I am getting pretty consistent crimps at .473. The book recommends .473 and some of my store bought ammo is coming in at .467 up to .473. What has me puzzled is that some loads when I put them on the gauge the pressure from the gauge shoves the bullet way down into the case, only 2 so far out of 25 hand loads. Here is my question. Should I tighten up the crimp to the lower setting .467 or should I just be cautious and watch for shells that have expanded so much that the bullet slip down in the case/. Thanks for your time. John

Sounds like you're over expanding the case mouth prior to seating.

Open the case mouth just enough to start the bullet in without shaving the jacket.

Your crimp should only straighten the case mouth back out.

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Thanks, I'll look into that

I agree with this view, I too when starting out 30yrs ago did the same thing, now I am much smarter due to a loader who was wise in his years. The 4 piece Lee set is perfect for the .40 and .45 because of the extra crimp die. It was amazing to me how consistant my shots were when I crimped the cartridge correctly. jb

I am not familiar with the Lee dies but I guess I am the odd man out here. I do like a little taper crimp on my .45 Auto handloads. You don't have to go right down to .467" - that seems pretty tight. A couple thousandths above that is what I aim for.

Some folks will say a firm taper crimp is not conductive to best accuracy. May be for them. In my own case, I have never been able to see that. My best shooting .45 handloads use H&G #68 bullets seated to 1.250" with a .468-.469" taper crimp. Over the years I have found that to work so well that I always keep a close eye on those numbers and do not stray far from them.

For me when I start seeing "keyholeing" at 25 yards the crimp is too tight. A nice clean hole in the target all is good.

As you probably know it's not the crimp that holds the bullet in place, it's neck tension. Like said above, crimping too much can actually loosen the hold on the bullet. I agree you should only crimp enough to remove the bell placed in the case to aid in seating the bullet.

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SWCA #3437

How is the case gage moving the bullet? A case gage has no rifling, so only tells you if the round is sized & crimped properly. Most factory ammo is over crimped IMO, based on pulling bullets & measuring them. As noted, a taper crimp can NOT hold the bullet in place, proper neck tension does that. Measuring the crimp is fine, about 0.471"-0.472" works in most guns w/ mixed brass.

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NRA Cert. Inst. IDPA CSO

What bullet are you using lead or FMJ?

Just a note , the LFCD can not, can not,over crimp a taper crimp. You can turn it in 1/2 turn or 1 full turn it will not over crimp.

What gauge are you referring to?? Your barrel should be your gauge.

#6
http://leeprecision.com/cgi-data/instruct/Pistol4.pdf

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Still Running Against the Wind

Are you sure your sizing die is set up correctly and sizing enough? If you're not sizing correctly you'll never get the neck tension needed to hold the bullet no matter what you do with any other station.

I also do not like the LEE FCD in my experience I've found it to swage my lead reloads which causes a loss in neck tension since it sizes everything down (including the bullet) but brass "springs" back a little when worked.

Regardless of How you crimp it should be around .470 to .473 it isn't that critical as long as the bullet passes the "plunk test" in you barrel.

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Still Running Against the Wind

Thanks everybody. To answer some of your questions. The gauge I speak of is my Lyman caliper, and I do the "plunk' test in the barrel of my 45. I am using a Winchester 230gr FMJ, Hodgdon Universal powder at 5.2 gr. The odd thing is that I checked my sizing die and manually placed bullets in the case to see how they are sitting. The 2 cases where the bullet slid down I could easily push it in no effort. I am thinking that the neck on these somehow was over expanded by firing? does that make sense. Thanks again for your input. John

Either you missed resizing those cases or perhaps you have a few odd bullets??

Resize the cases again and try to put a bullet in, it should not fit without flaring it a bit and even then should not slide in easily.

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Still Running Against the Wind

You do know you MUST resize every fired case right? The case must expand after firing, it's how the bullet is released. Then you resize & decap, flare, primer, pwoder & bullet, crimp. You need to ead the manuals again, sounds like something is very wrong. BTY, caliper are calipers, & a case gage is a totally diff piece of equip.

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NRA Cert. Inst. IDPA CSO

Agreed. Case neck tension holds the bullet in place, not a crimp. Actually, forget the term "crimp" when talking about semi-auto cartridges. A taper crimp die is used to straighten out the flare in the case mouth enabling reliable seating. Also your FCD may be swaging the case and bullet, the case springing back a bit but the bullet doesn't, leaving it loose in the case. I'd say ferget the FCD, and use a regular old taper crimp die to straighten the case mouth (in a separate step from seating).

It's normal for bullets to be extremely loose in fired cases that are not resized. Make sure you don't miss resizing some and that your sizing die is correctly set up. Also make sure it's the correct sizing die.... it happens

I never have measured a crimp. The freshly loaded cartridge will freely fall into the chamber of your gun or it won't.

Crimp it just enough so it will.............before you use the factory crimp die.

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Thanks for everybody's input. Got my preliminary loads and found them to be very similar to factory loads and I think even more accurate. 80% of my rounds were within A hands breadth at 25 yards.. Not to be a niggler but my hand loads were showing more blackening on the ejected shells and the barrel was dirtier. Anybody have a recommendation for tweaking the load? Thanks again and thanks a lot.

Yeah, sometimes you'll have that.

First, I suspect that those two casings that didn't have any neck tension were missed somehow during the sizing operation. If you are using a single stage press this is something that can happen, all it takes is decapping separate from sizing and an interruption at just the wrong moment when sizing the cases. IF you were decapping and sizing at the same stage then the next obvious suspect would be undersized bullets.

One thing to be remembered is that Lee does a LOT of self promotion. Since they offer an excellent product at a more than fair price this doesn't bother me, however it does mean that in some cases their claims are more promotion than fact.

In the case of the Factory Crimp Die for the handgun calibers this is the case. Unlike the Rifle Die that produce a collet crimp the handgun caliber Factory Crimp Dies are nothing more than a Taper Crimp die of slightly different design. Instead of the taper crimp being produced by a machined surface in the body of the die in Lee's case the crimp is produced by a sliding carbide ring. Additionally this die does NOT do any sizing of the case UNLESS the case bulges due to an over aggressive crimp.

That said, Lee's Factory Crimp Die does do a good job of taper crimping the case if you set it up correctly and the overall length of your cases is consistent enough. It also separates the seating and crimping operations and IMO this flexibility allows you to produce properly crimped ammunition with an overall length exactly where you want it. Keys to using this die is proper setup and either sorting or length trimming your cases if required. As for allowable case length variation, it's an opinion but I believe that variations of 0.002 or less won't require sorting or trimming. However, you should always measure the length of a group of casings and use a middle of the pack case length to set up the crimp die.

Dropping a cartridge into a chamber should not move the bullet, even in an unsized case. You don't say what bullet you are using, but you may have gotten some that are undersized or are for a different caliber. Pull the two that you mentioned, and mic them to determine the caliber.

My reloading book shows 5.5 as the starting charge for universal so you aren't getting a good burn, that will be part of the problem with your dirty barrel and scorched brass. Bump it up some and you should see an improvement.