Lee factory crimp die

[satexas]

First off, let me say that I am really glad I found this forum. I've been lurking for a few months and this seems like a really great place to be. It is very informative and you members are actually professional and mature, as well as helpful compared to some others I've been to. No drama here!!

Ok, as to the subject, I've read that the Lee crimp die works great for .223 ammo. I am prepping a couple thousand pieces of 7.62 and have never crimped my cases in the past. I've also read that crimping will give more consistent results. Who's tried the .308 crimp die, and do you recommend it?

 

[earplug]

Crimp or not

Bench rest shooters do not crimp.
A crimp distorts the bullet. A crimping cannelure distorts the bullet. Look at the various bullet catalogs and many bullets don't have a cannelure. The long range target bullets don't have cannelures.
A crimp works the brass more, which shortens its life.
A crimp is used for ammunition that will see rough use and repeated loading and unloading in magazines or chambers. Crimping avoids bullet set back which will raise pressures. Crimping helps keep a loose bullet from jamming into the rifling when chambered and then extracted. The military crimps. We used our ammunition as take down tools and constantly loaded and unloaded our magazines.
I don't crimp my rounds used in my AR. Firm neck tension is all I use.

 

[KansasPaul]

The Lee Factory Crimp die is a taper type die as opposed to a roll crimp die. I do use one for .223 reloads that go into my AR (I also use a small base die because this particular rifle has a tight chamber), I like the tighter neck tension for that particular application. I do not use the Lee FC die for my bolt gun and although I do reload several .30 caliber rifle cartridges I don't use a Lee FC die for those as I've never had a problem with neck tension as I have had with .223 rounds.

Paul

 

[Walkalong]

The FCD for bottle necked calibers is a stab crimp. It has four fingers that are pressed straight in against the case mouth at 90 degrees.

7.62X39

 

[satexas]

I've been out of reloading for about 15 years, and just now getting back into it. But back in the day, 80's and 90's, I never crimped my rifle rounds. I was reloading for a couple M1As, an AR, and a HK93. I don't recall ever having a problem. I do, however, remember crimping my .357 and .41 magnums. I was just curious if things have changed.

 

[cfullgraf]

There is a lot of differing opinions on whether rifle rounds need crimping, not counting the few should busting rounds out there. Folks go both ways here.

I'm in the "no crimp" group.

Revolver rounds, particularly the heavy magnum rounds such as 357 Magnum, 41 Magnum, 44 Magnum, et. al. still require crimps to keep the bullet from moving under recoil.

The Lee rifle FCD and Lee handgun FCD are different designs. The most notable difference is the sizing ring in the handgun FCD dies.

 

[Bart B.]

For what it's worth, people winning the big matches and setting records in NRA and CMP matches shooting AR platforms using the .223/5.56 round never ever crimped case mouths onto their bullets.

Being the first person on earth to shoot an M16 across the standard course of fire in the 1971 DCM Excellence in Competition match at the Nationals, I can attest to the conversations several of us on the military teams shooting them. We all knew that many folks would want to crimp case mouths on ammo for it, but we all knew better. None of our ammo had crimped in bullets.

Arsenals used to crimp all .30-06 match ammo. I think it was Col,'s Hatcher or Townsend that convinced them to quit crimping ammo and no longer put the cannelure in that original machine gun round's 173-gr. FMJBT bullet. When they finally did that, the largest test groups got smaller. No more 30 caliber match ammo hand crimped in bullets.

Sierra Bullets caved into customer demand for their 22 caliber 77-gr. HPMK bullet to have a cannelure in it for crimping for use in AR platforms. They repeated their early '50's tests with different amounts of crimps on them as well as no crimps at all. They never crimped another test round testing that bullet for accuracy standards. Good lots of them would shoot 1/4 MOA in their 200 yard test range. Best accuracy with any crimp put 'em into 2/3 MOA at best.

Therefore, I suggest people do what they want to. Follow the trail match winners and record setters blazed or hack your way through the woods and end up some place else.

Judge accuracy by the largest groups shot with any process of bullet seating; they happen when all the variables add up in different directions. The smallest groups are mostly luck as all the variables tend to cancel each other out. Both happen at the same low percentage rate across all groups fired anyway. They all are somewhere between some unit of measurement and zero. If you use the smallest single few-shot group to asses accuracy, any combination of tools and their use, components and their assembly, any given method may well be the one you prefer.

 

[Walkalong]

Judge accuracy by the largest groups shot with any process of bullet seating

This is something we tend to (Like to?) forget. It's one reason things like Benchrest and Highpower are so demanding of the shooter and so tough in general. All shots count, period. No excuses.

 

[Bart B.]

Which 3-, 5- or 10-shot group in this 270-shot composite was the smallest one shot?



Outside ring's 2 MOA, inside's 1 MOA.

I see one that's well under 1/10th MOA. Does that mean it's a one-tenth MOA rifle and ammo?

 

[dh1633pm]

I use one to crimp ammo for semi's, but never for bolt guns.

 

[Rule3]

Has anyone made Popcorn yet?

I have mentioned it before. The LFCD should be a banned topic, Put it under Religion or Politics, Like Taurus and Kel Tec bashing.

Every thread turns out the same.

You either like them or hate them and all the same answers keep popping up..

Not just here but any reloading forum.

 

[murf]

even this forum needs a soap opera every now and again.

murf

 

[Reloadron]

We just had an interesting thread on this subject. To crimp or not to crimp with mixed opinions and reviews. Personally I don't crimp either 223 Remington or 308 Winchester. Below are some 308 images using 168 grain Sierra BTHP bullets.



The pulled bullets in order of the cases:


The crimps went from light to a heavy crimp. The claim is that using the factory crimp die will give better uniformity. I never found that to be true but really can't disprove it. I would have liked to use a collet puller and be able to measure and record the pull tension. There is no question that the crimp does deform my bullets, other than the lightest crimp.

Anyway, I rely strictly on neck tension in my 223 Remington and 308 Winchester hand loading but see what works for you. I have the factory crimp dies but simply don't use them. You may also want to try a few forum searches as the topic has been covered in great detail in the past.

Ron

 

[Reeferman]

Thanks Ron that's the best explanation I've seen.

 

[Reloadron]

Thanks Ron that's the best explanation I've seen.

You're welcome. People can make up their own mind I figure. Some crimp and some don't.

Ron

 

[Slamfire]

It is a sad fact that so many are susceptible to Corporate Advertizing. There is real validity to the idea that our culture is a creation of advertizing bureaus, and the idea that crimping improves accuracy is, of course, a creation of corporate advertizing.











Of course deforming the bullet makes it less accurate. This is something that should be obvious: no one can improve the concentricity, center of gravity of a bullet, with a crimp die.

The book “Ultimate in Rifle Accuracy” by Glenn Newick , has one short chapter on the bullet. It is an interesting read on the history of accurate bullets. Accuracy improvement has been directly related to improvements of uniform jacket thicknesses and uniform leadcore distribution. He mentions that a bullet making die manufacturer making a core seater with has less than 25 millionths of an inch runnout. Today’s match bullets are the best ever in the history of shooting sports and there is nothing the hobbyist reloader with a press can do to improve them. Crimping will deform the jacket, will deform the soft lead core, shifting the mass of the core in an irregular manner, shifting the center of gravity of the bullet. Once the center of gravity is outside the axis of rotation the bullet’s flight path will be erratic.


Want to ruin your accuracy, start by crimping your bullet




Follow the Lee Factory Crimp die instructions to the letter, and your match bullet will look like this:





Lighter crimps will leave indentations on the bullet jacket but rest assured that the damage to the core is greater as the springback of copper and lead are different. Lead does not springback very well at all. When you deform the core of a bullet with a crimp die you are randomly shifting the center of gravity of the bullet out of the axis of rotation. This will cause inaccuracy as the bullet will wobble in flight. The further the shooter is from the target, the more this wobble will evidence itself.

There are plenty of people who believe in Lee's advertizing claims and thus "see" improvements in their group sizes. Humans are extremely susceptible to suggestion and peer pressure. If the group or an authority figure claim some cause and effect phenomena, 99 out of 100 people will "see" the phenomena. Others actually go out and test, and when you examine their test results, it becomes obvious that they are not shooting to the capability of the bullet, and their groups are nothing more than random patterns, into which, they "see" order. This is the Texas Sharpshooter effect.

 

[savanahsdad]

I load for a 308win H&R handie rifle, that little single shot never did better than 1.5 MOA with factory or handloads , I tried everything from Remington bulk bullets to Berger's and that's just fine for a hunting rig but I didn't give up , I tried the Lee factory crimp die , just a very light crimp , and that gun will now shoot 1 MOA all day , keep in mind that gun has a long lead , bullets are almost falling out before they touch the rifling , when using the lee FCD I load them to max length and let them have their long jump , and I gain a 1/2MOA , happy happy ,
so I tried this with one of my 270's and a 25-06 , both bolt guns and both have short jumps , and both are sub 1MOA , well they were ! both guns shot 1.5 MOA at best , after crimping them

So as to the question "to crimp or not to crimp" try it and see , if I listened to all the nay Sayers my 308win would still be a 1.5MOA gun ,

and after seeing all those deformed bullets above , I'm glad I didn't read the instructions. I have an old Pacific with lots of cam-over , I run the ram up with a round in it and turn the die down to it , lower ram and give another 1/8 turn , just enough to see the four jaw marks on the case ,

 

[steve4102]

From Sierra.

Neck Tension

When we stop to consider the vigorous (read, downright violent) chambering cycle a loaded round endures in a Service Rifle, it becomes pretty clear it suffers abuse that would never happen in a bolt-action. This is simply the nature of the beast. It needs to be dealt with since there is no way around it.

There are two distinctly different forces that need to be considered: those that force the bullet deeper into the case, and those that pull it out of the case. When the round is stripped from the magazine and launched up the feed ramp, any resistance encountered by the bullet risks having it set back deeper into the case. Due to the abrupt stop the cartridge makes when the shoulder slams to a halt against the chamber, inertia dictates that the bullet will continue to move forward. This is exactly the same principle a kinetic bullet puller operates on, and it works within a chamber as well. Some years ago, we decided to examine this phenomenon more closely. During tests here at Sierra’s range, we chambered a variety of factory Match ammunition in an AR-15 rifle. This ammunition was from one of the most popular brands in use today, loaded with Sierra’s 69 grain MatchKing bullet. To conduct the test, we chambered individual rounds by inserting them into the magazines and manually releasing the bolt. We then repeated the tests by loading two rounds into the magazine, chambering and firing the first, and then extracting and measuring the second round. This eliminated any potential variation caused by the difference between a bolt that had been released from an open position (first round in the magazine) and those subsequent rounds that were chambered by the normal semi-automatic operation of the rifle. Measuring the rounds before chambering and then re-measuring after they were carefully extracted resulted in an average increase of three thousandths (0.003") of forward bullet movement. Some individual rounds showed up to seven thousandths (0.007") movement. Please bear in mind that these results were with factory ammunition, normally having a higher bullet pull than handloaded ammunition.

To counteract this tendency, the semi-auto shooter is left with basically two options: applying a crimp or increasing neck tension.

Below is An accuracy test done by those that know how to use the Lee Factory Crimp die correctly and not smash the hell out of the bullet, as in the pictures posted above. Any fool can misuse a tool and break stuff, it's take a little smarts and finesse to do things correctly.

http://www.accuratereloading.com/crimping.html

Note in the above test when the LFCD was used correctly. all three rifles and all three cartridges showed improved accuracy.

Nine times out of nine, those than preach the evils of the LFCD have never tried and have no clue how it work or how well it works. Take their opinions with as big a grain of salt you can find.

Me, I use the LFCD on all my Semi-Auto ammunition. Not only does it secure the bullet. it improves accuracy.

Not a 308, bot 30 cal. Browning BAR 300 WSM, three (3) rounds, 180gr Nosler Partition, 100 yards crimped with the Lee Factory Crimp die.

 

[FROGO207]

My take is that if you want to spend the money and get a special die and try it out just do so. I have done just that for several firearms. So far trying the FCD on rifle ammo has not helped my accuracy any that I could detect. However using the FCD for my 30-30 is working out nicely though. I like the fact that not having to trim the 30-30 brass each time for a consistent crimp is a bonus. It does not work with Hornaday brass cut short to use the LVR bullet however.

Pretty much all factory ammo is of necessity crimped to assure constant ignition/start pressure under all conditions in any firearm. They are not concerned so much with accuracy it seems or they would use a type of glue to hold the bullet in like some military ammo is instead of a crimp that distorts the bullet as is shown above.

 

[Walkalong]

Let's stay on topic and stick to the FCD for rifles as asked about by the OP. It's tricky enough just talking about one at a time.

 

[rsrocket1]

The FCD for rifle has it's place. When loading lead bullets, you have to flare the case mouth on a sized neck. I try to use a minimal flare, but the flare still needs to be closed for the round to chamber smoothly. I use the FCD to close the mouth, but there's no adjustment to "simply close the flare" so I have to do it by touch. Not ideal but it works.

No need to flare the mouth (and consequently no need to crimp) boat tailed bullets. Even bullets with cannelures don't need crimping unless like the military, you intend to ship these and bang them around for years before use.

 

[steve4102]

Lee factory Crimp die accuracy test.

100 yards
Colt AR-15 (stock)
55gr Midsouth bullet (No Cannelure).
10 rounds each target.

Note that the rounds crimped with the LFCD are indeed more accurate.



This was accomplished by using using the LFCD correctly and not smashing the hell out of the bullet as in the photos posted above.

Yes, the Lee factory Crimp die is Adjustable and there is no need to smash the hell out of a bullet unless one is either "incompetent" or trying make a point. Either way, there is no need to blame the tool for Operator error, or intentional deceit as in the Speer Propaganda posted above.

 

[mdi]

I'm with Rule 3 on this issue. Maybe not banned (I hate any thought of censorship) but directed to the Religion, Politics, or Highly Opinionated section. I have a Lee FCD in .223 and 30-06. If a crimp is needed (and I haven't found a decisive reason why) I'll use the FCD for rifle cartridges. IMO, the Lee FCD for handgun calibers is of no use...

I've noticed nearly every thread where this comes up someone confuses the two FCDs.

 

[JamieC]

Yup, guns kill people, forks make people fat, etc. I pulled a couple of 223 rounds apart when I first started reloading 223, I had seen the Lee FCD 'argument' a few times, wanted to see for myself. Following the instructions, with a light crimp, (insert loaded round into the FCD, screw the thumbscrew in until it just touches, back round out of die, 1/4 turn more, done). I saw no marks on the bullets when I pulled 'em apart. Using 1/2 to 1 full turn more, yeah, you can 're-shape' the bullet a bit. Maybe down the road a bit, I'll load up some rounds, 1/2 crimped, 1/2 no crimp, see if I can see a difference accuracy wise. Yep, 'nother excuse to load and go shooting!

 

[Hondo 60]

if you've read this thread, you'll find a heated discussion about crimping.
some are emphatically for crimping & some are emphatically against it.

I personally, do crimp my 223s.
I have a book "The AR-15" by Patrick Sweeney.

He did a test with & without crimping.
The crimped ammo was more accurate & had a higher velocity than the uncrimped.

Just my 2¢ worth. YMMV