Depriming Military Brass (5.56x45mm)

[blarby]

Ok, just stumbled on this, and it looks like you just found my only contribution.

If you get these in the future, hit them with a flash hole uniformer first before decapping, works like a charm.

The hole is snug, but usually the pin fits in the primer end, but not the case end... I think it's a punched vs drilled hole issue. Reaming out the narrow end with a uniformer saved me, as we get quite a bit of this brass in my area.

 

[CoalTrain49]

I have a universal decapping die for those stubborn primers. Lee's die pin is much more robust than a std sized die pin. Pops those babies right out of there with authority. Berdan, just chuck it.

 

[jeeptim]

So if the pin keeps sliding out you defeat depriming . So crank away and enjoy

 

[edleit]

The collet design is INTENDED to allow the pin to slip under abnormally high loads. This could include tight flash holes (if really undersized), or bottoming out on a case head as in the instance of Berdan primed or missing flash holes. Usually this is an indication of something that's not quite right and needs to be checked out before proceeding blindly.

The inconvenience of resetting the collet/pin projection seems minor compared to having to replace a broken pin and the associated down time, but hey, what do those engineers know about reloading processes anyway?

 

[jmorris]

Not very long ago I cam across some boxer primed cases where the flash hole was too small and it caused the problem your talking about.

If you crank down on the collet too tight you can eliminate its purpose and break the pin or shove it down in the tight hole and pull it out of the mandrel when you lower the ram.

 

[Dudedog]

Got frustrated decapping some .223 brass and cranked the nuts down tight. (lee universal decapper) ended up messing up a pin due to off center flash holes in GFL brass.
BTW I told Lee what happened and they replaced the pin for free anyway.
Won't crank them down so tight again, as mentioned earlier it defeats the purpose of the design.

 

[armoredman]

Aaaand last night I got my first ever stuck case, in my Lee .223 decapping/resizing die. Dagnabbit.