Master Blaster
Member
I went to load some .45 acp in my LNL AP this morning, it had been running pretty well for the last few hundred rounds, all of a sudden I felt the decap pin silde up in its collet. Pulled the case and sure enough it had not decapped the case, the primer is still there. Now this is not one of the common malfunctions I have experienced, over the 8 years I have been loading .45 acp on the LNL. SO I fix the decap pin and rerun the case, it was a winchester not a problematic brand, it decaps fine. Couple more cycles of the handle and the same thing happens, this time its a speer case. Indexing OK? check, center bolt tight?, check. Ah the problem is the primer punch its not allowing the shellplate to index positively as its dragging on the underside of the shell plate. Apparently some powder and grunge had gotten under the seating stem/ primer punch and it was not allowing the spring to retract the punch fully in its housing. That was causing the shell plate to not always index completely, it was off by just a hair. That was enough for the decap pin to not be centered on the primer.
I am posting this as a cautionary tale to help other Lock and Load Owners if they are having a problem with the press running smoothly, check the primer punch, especially if its the large punch as it is stepped and vulnerable to this problem.
I am posting this as a cautionary tale to help other Lock and Load Owners if they are having a problem with the press running smoothly, check the primer punch, especially if its the large punch as it is stepped and vulnerable to this problem.
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