Sending completed rounds through a full sizing die?

No. It will swage down the bullet and release your neck tension, increasing your odds of dangerous bullet setback.

Pull the rounds apart and size them again. You can save the primers, propellant and bullet to use over. Just deprime the live primers slooowy so you do not set them off and save them. I trust you do have an impact type bullet puller? If you do not have one yet save the rounds until you do and use it on them then.

Sounds like you have the push through sizer, right?

In that case, yes. You can put loaded rounds through it, so long as they're not oversize (cast). The push through sizer is basically an FCD without the crimp. People put loaded ammo through an FCD post-sizer ring, all the time. That's kinda what it's designed for. The only difference is you're pushing the entire cartridge through the post-sizer ring. This is what sizes the base of the case; this has no effect on the bullet or neck tension beyond what the normal FCD does.

Been there, done that. I ran a whole 100 rd batch through one. No problem. This actually proved to be slightly easier than doing empty cases, cuz the bullet guides the cartridge into the die.

Okay, if it's basically a factory crimp die with the sizing ring and no crimper, then ignore my reply. A regular sizing die would normally swage the bullet down but the words "case through" didn't register in my mind when I read the original post. A case through die I am not familiar with.

If you need to use something like this to get your rounds to chamber, you need to readjust your dies.

918v said:

If you need to use something like this to get your rounds to chamber, you need to readjust your dies.

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Or, if it is not the die adjustment, use properly sized bullets. An oversized bullet (or overly thick case walls, which is less common) will bulge the case and make chambering difficult.

The Lee FCD with the post-sizing ring will "cure" the bulged case and the difficult chambering. That is what it is designed to do. But, as cheeze points out, squishing the case to make it chamber also squishes the bullet. The brass case springs back (away from the bullet). The lead bullet springs back less. This disparity in springback leaves the bullet not held tightly and thus, subject to setback as well as insufficient pressure in the case upon firing, depending on random circumstances.

So, in curing one problem, the FCD MAY create another. Full understanding of the forces and operations involved are essential to its proper use (or refraining of use).

Lost Sheep

If you feel the FCD's carbide sizer ring post sizing the finished round, check the neck tension/bullet setback by measuring the OAL before and after feeding/chambering from the magazine and manually releasing the slide.

If you are experiencing significant bullet setback, you may have neck tension issue that needs to be addressed, especially if you are using near max/max powder charges.

IMO, FCD is a valuable tool to be used for jacketed diameter bullets (jacketed/plated) that may be out of round or inconsistent with sizing to chamber reliably but do not recommend the use with larger sized lead bullets. If you want to use the FCD with larger diameter lead bullets to ensure bulged/Glock'ed cases chamber fully, push-through resize the cases first using the Bulge Buster kit then reload normally to avoid post sizing and possibly reducing the neck tension.

Personally, when I come across a bulged case that won't fully resize with my Lee carbide resizing die, I will rotate the case 90 degrees and attempt to resize. If the case won't resize on the second attempt, I deem the case base wall/web far too stretched/thinned and toss the case in the recycle bin. You see, fixing the thinned case wall by push-through resizing won't ever make the case wall thicker.

Be safe.

An oversized bullet (or overly thick case walls, which is less common) will bulge the case and make chambering difficult.

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No it won't. There is not a .40 S&W chamber, especially a factory Glock chamber, that will not accept a properly loaded .400-.403" bullet and nobody makes them bigger.

918v, OP already posted that the cases get stuck at the base ... and we do not know what pistol/barrel OP is using either.

It could be that the OP is using Dillon resizing die that won't fully resize the bulge down on Glocked case which will require the assistance of FCD/G-Rx die ... I think we need more information from the OP.

rajb123 said:

just bought a Lee full length -case through resizing die for .40 Glocked cases. On empty cases it works great ... few completed cases that don't chamber fully and that get stuck at the base?

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IMO, FCD is a valuable tool to be used for jacketed diameter bullets (jacketed/plated) that may be out of round or inconsistent with sizing to chamber reliably but do not recommend the use with larger sized lead bullets.

Click to expand...

I think the FCD is a crutch for people that can't or won't properly adjust their dies or use quality dies to load ammunition. It's irresponsible to suggest a magic die that isn't needed and especially in a situation like this where more information is needed.

918v said:

No it won't. There is not a .40 S&W chamber, especially a factory Glock chamber, that will not accept a properly loaded .400-.403" bullet and nobody makes them bigger.

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Correction: I will point out that an oversized bullet WILL bulge the case. Just because nobody makes an oversized bullet does not alter that fact of life.

But you are 100% correct, a "properly loaded" cartridge will have no problems. It is the IMproperly loaded ones we have to deal with, cure or dissassemble, and then prevent.

Lost Sheep

Anyway, the Lee push-through die works well on empty cases and I suppose I will use it on all 40 brass now

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If you need to debulge your own 40 brass, every time, you probably ought to reduce your load a bit. Never know when a case will blow.

I only do the push through sizing once, on a new-to-me batch of bulged pickups/once-fired.

Out of curiosity, when you say 4-5 of your reloads won't chamber fully because of bulged bases:
Do you mean they don't chamber freely when dropped in your barrel?

Or do you mean they physically don't chamber all the way when you rack them in the gun? And if this is the case, do you need a mallet to open the slide, or what!?

I load for a lot of .40's as well as other cartridges and firearms and have never had any problems with buldged cases. I load jacketed only, use full charges of slow burning powders, and use standard sizing dies such as RCBS or Lee carbide dies. I curently load for several XD's and XDM's, sub compacts, and also a couple Taurus 24/7's. I have never had a round not drop in or out of a chamber freely.

So far as brass is concerned, I load anything I can scrounge off the ground along with my own sourced brass so long as it isn't cplt or other wise unloadable. I do see brass I've picked up that appears to be buldged, but once it goes through the resizing die it always chambers up freely.

I would be under the impression that brass that won't chamber properly after being loaded has in some manner not been properly processed / loaded.

GS

“readjust your die” then there is the part where someone says “size the base because the base will not chamber”, before that the OP ask “Can I do that” and then there is “This seems a tad dangerous to me”. All of that after he watched a YouTube video, seems the You Tube video link should have been part of his original first post.

Adjusting the die to size? Keeping up with more than one thought at a time: The deck height of a shell holder is .125”, forget sizing the head of the case, the case is in the shell holder,+, + the radius of the die. Then there is work hardening, fire the case, the case head is not supported, the case head expands, then resize the case head again, finally, the case head no longer has the ability to expand, then?

Someone should set down at a bench and fire then size the base on a case without case head support, load and fire again, and continue sizing and firing until the case head gets so tough it does not expand or the case head gets so hard and brittle it cracks, splits etc. then? a reloader says when placing blame “I do not know what happened, it handled like a doll buggy right up to the point it swarmed and was rendered scrap.

Anyhow, I have a 45 ACP, it likes new, factor, over the counter ammo. It does not like reloads, one very disciplined reloader suggested I was doing something wrong, he suggested I meet him at the range and we would shoot his reloads, it is good I came to the range with a suit case full of stuff, his reloads did not work, he offered 45 ACP ammo to everyone, his reloads worked in ever 45 ACP at the range, except my 1911. I informed him I built the pistol, I informed him the pistol was very accurate, to shoot reloads I had to match the appearance of new/factory ammo. The pistol would not shoot rounds that looked like they swallowed a bullet. To get that new case look I used a RCBS 45 carbide full length sizer die, I sized the case down to the beginning of the expanded case, the pistol can not distinguish the difference between new and reloaded ammo.

After his ammo did not work in my 1911 I left the range, went home and sized his cases with the full length sizer, after returning to the range with his ammo. I fired his rounds, they flew through the pistol like they were new.

For those with impact inertia pullers, measure before and again after, when pulling bullets and repeating the “if you do that the bullet will get loose and slide back and forth etc..”, Pull bullets first, then size the bulge out and then pull the bullets, try to determine if the bullet got loose because of reduced bullet hold.

This works form me, unlike the video I do not suggest anyone use the full length sizer die to remove the appearance of a case that swallowed a bullet, then there is the other 45 ACP, same thing.

F. Guffey

You are absolutely sure the cases are being stuck at the base and not getting stuck when the bullet is stopping at the front of the chamber?

Something seems wrong if empty resized cases fit, but when you load it, the base seems to expand.

You need to measure the neck of a factory loaded cartridge and your reloaded cartridge that will not fully chamber. You should also measure the part of the seated projectile that is sticking up above the neck to make sure it is not oversized compared to a factory loaded projectile.

When I first started casting lead truncated cone bullets, I tried shooting them unsized. A few hung up about 1/16" before going fully into the chamber. I had to either seat them deeper so that no straight portion was exposed (and reduce the powder load) or size the bullets down. I now size them all and get no hang ups regardless of how much is sticking out.

P.S. I do use the FCD to take out the flare with the post sizing ring and have no neck tension problems whatsoever and very consistent MV's when run through a chrono.

Set your OAL correctly for the bullet profile you are using. If using lead bullets then yes you will have an issue with oversized bullets. And if you are using a pistol without a completely supported chanber, you will need to use the bulge buster to straighten the base of your cases, even for your own gun.

The bulge buster die with the FCD should work every time. If you notice your cases are growing in length after using the bulge buster, then that is your problem since the case indexs on the case mouth and will not go to full battery, trim the cases or toss because they are getting too thin.

Jim

I would be under the impression that brass that won't chamber properly after being loaded has in some manner not been properly processed / loaded.

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Just cuz your gun easily chambers all your bulged and resized pickup brass does not mean that other people don't know what they're doing.

Sounds to me like your chamber might be cut a little looser than average, or you just haven't run into the kind of brass in question, yet.

Heck, you can sometimes not easily drop NON-bulged FLR'd brass into a tight chamber, if it was fired in a chamber cut on the loose side.