Weep hole.

Am I the only one that didn't know that there are weep holes in bottleneck rifle sizing dies? Also is it important that the weep hole be open? Whit I mean is, breachlock bushing is covering the week hole, is that gonna cause me problems? I'm sizing .223 with a Lee full length size die.

Thanks for the replies.

Blue68f100 said:

Once I had a RCBS die that the lead shot on the locking ring sealed off the vent hole. At least with the bushing you have clearance.

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This is the new spline drive style bushing that comes with the APP. It's got a pinch bolt like Hornady or Forster lock rings. The weep/vent hole is under the lock rings portion of the bushing. I cleaned the Cole out. It was completely full of gunk. I had no idea that these things had vents. It makes perfect sense that they do though.

Image of the plug of gunk that came out of the die and the new style breech lock bushings for reference.

rfwobbly said:

Just don't weep over spilt lube.

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That was a good one. Well done.

It's crazy to me to think I've never noticed the holes in the dies. It's also crazy to me that I've never read about them either in the instruction manual or on the forums.

Walkalong said:

My old RCBS manual mentions them.

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To be clear I was referring to the instructions for the die sets. There is a wealth of knowledge in loading manuals that I didn't know about for a long time. I always just quickly flipped through the pages until I found the cartridge I was looking for. It wasn't until I got bored and started thumbing through the Hornady 8th edition that I found out about all of the information the put in the books. Of course the information is there, I just never thought to look. I went straight to the forums like I've done with everything else I've needed to learn about.