How do I make a bullet seating stem?

[Dr.Doug]

Hi all.
Need some advice. I bought 500 JHP bullets to load in my 45 Colt. My seater stem is made for round nose bullets, but these have a basically flat, almost truncated cone-shaped nose. They tend to yaw when seating becuse of a poor fit.

I bought theses plinking bullets because they were cheap, and I don't want to ruin the savings by spending much money on a different stem.

Somewhere I read about making a temporary attachment for the seater out of sealing wax, but since I don't seem to have any of that lying around, I'm looking for other ideas.

Thanks,
Doug

 

[caz223]

What brand of die?
http://cgi.ebay.com/RCBS-38-357-Wad...ryZ31825QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
Note the message, he has the master kit, and is selling them one by one really cheap.
Final cost, about $7.50 shipped. (For RCBS.)

 

[Dr.Doug]

caz223
Thanks for the tip.
Doug

 

[Mal H]

Doug - you might want to go ahead and try the rounded seating stem. I know from experience that it will deform a JHP just a little, but not enough to matter for plinking ammo.

 

[The Bushmaster]

Mal H...I had that problem with SJHPs. what I did was to drill a hole in the center of the seating stem that contacted the bullet about half way down the nose of the bullet. On my SJHP bullets it leaves a just noticable ring in the lead. I would amagin that it would do the same for a solid lead bullet. I hate any amount of deformity of the nose of my bullets.

 

[HSMITH]

The last one I made was from an epoxy stick, the kind you knead to mix the components. I loaded a BUNCH of rounds and found the most concentric one, put a little oil on the bullet for a release agent. I put it in the shellholder and raised it, then as the epoxy was starting to harden on the end of the seating stem I screwed it down on the bullet until the bullet hit the metal of the stem making a perfect form of the bullet.

I did a SWC, and had to bevel the mouth of the epoxy a little to let the bullet center and seat correctly. If you did a HP you would need to dremel the tip out of the epoxy. I would also relieve the portion where the tip of the bullet is, to seat on the ogive of the bullet rather than the tip if doing a HP.

I am done with this sort of experimentation though. I bought Redding Competition Seating dies for the rounds I want the best from. They seat bullets dead straight, adjust easily and just plain work better than you can imagine until you use one.

 

[ReloaderFred]

You can also trade around seating stems. If you have dies for .45 acp, see if the stem will fit in your .45 Colt die. Sometimes even a seating stem from a smaller caliber will work, but not very often. Just look at the other seating stems you have and see if one will suffice, providing the threads are the same. This was a lot easier to do when most of them used 1/4-20 threads, though.

Hope this helps.

Fred

 

[Dr.Doug]

HSMITH,
I'd considered plumber's epoxy. Did you oil (for release) the inside of the die as well as the bullet? I may give that a try while I'm waiting for the stem I ordered using cas223's link.

Fred, I looked at my others, but didn't have any luck. Thanks for the idea.

Thanks for all your help, gentlemen.
Doug

 

[cracked butt]

I've made a few using a spare seater plug and JB Weld.

1. put seater stem inverted in a vise.
2. Coat the bullet with lube or grease. (for a HP, you will probably need to fill the HP cavity with grease or wax, don't know for sure, never did one of these.)
3. fill the seat4er plug with an excess amount of JB Weld.
4. Put the nose of the bullet in the seater plug as staright as you can get it, wipe off excess JB weld that seeps out, and allow to dry overnight.

 

[jeepmor]

alternative seating

Speer manual recommends using some aluminum foil. Ball it up and put into your stem and allow it to crush on setup bullets. I'd setup at least 2-3 dummies to make sure you've crunched the aluminum foil all it will be crushed. It will naturally form to your new bullets and should not cause any deformation.

Then, while loading the first several rounds, I'd check COL closely until you're satisified it's not crushing anymore, putting variation into your handloads. When your done, just toss it in the recycle bin with your cans.

Simplest method I can think of, but I have not tried it.

jeepmor