My .45 ACP reloads have not been feeding well through a Witness full size .45. Usually failure-to-feed, sometimes failure to extract. No problems at all with factory ammo. I'm using a Dillon Square Deal B w/ their proprietary dies. It seems the sizing die isn't doing a great job. Die marks on the case are not always symmetrical and some finished rounds are kind of "lumpy". Biggest problems are with some Winchester cases from a MAC 10 machine pistol, but not entirely limited to those. Shell plate is stable, dies seem to be in good shape.
Anyway, I've been reading about Lee Factory Crimp Dies on a couple of threads. Liking the sound of a second sizing, I picked one up. I ran my loads through it and noticed the lumpier cases had die marks where the lumps used to be. Took 'em to the range. A vast improvement. I still had a couple failures to feed, but that looks like a mag problem, rounds not fully back in the mag, or maybe OAL just a hair too large. 1% failure rate instead of 10%. Accuracy was consistant.
What am I overlooking? Obviously, I'd like to be loading fully functional ammo on the SDB. If this keeps up I may be loading fully functional ammo on a 550 using dies I own for a single stage press.
Anyway, I've been reading about Lee Factory Crimp Dies on a couple of threads. Liking the sound of a second sizing, I picked one up. I ran my loads through it and noticed the lumpier cases had die marks where the lumps used to be. Took 'em to the range. A vast improvement. I still had a couple failures to feed, but that looks like a mag problem, rounds not fully back in the mag, or maybe OAL just a hair too large. 1% failure rate instead of 10%. Accuracy was consistant.
What am I overlooking? Obviously, I'd like to be loading fully functional ammo on the SDB. If this keeps up I may be loading fully functional ammo on a 550 using dies I own for a single stage press.
