To bell, or not to bell? (for thee?)

[Gen. Remington]

I am asking, if you have been able to load without belling, what your experience has been. This thread is not intended for beginning reloaders, and I doubt it would work with Lee presses. if you will excuse me for saying that (based on my experience).

I am NOT looking for your opinions about it, if you can't do it, or you dont like the sound of this proposal, in this thread, if thats ok with you. Put your loading manuals away 'cause I dont care if they say that YOU need to bell. Please spare me what you have been taught, because I learned it already, myself. This thread is about going beyond the basics. CAN YOU load without belling YOURSELF OR NOT??

Maybe it takes a special combination of equip, application & components, but it can be done, without much problem, I have found. I am using a T-7 turret press with Hornady (sleeve seating) dies. So getting the bullet in straight is absolutely no problem at all. The bullets I am using are plated (Rainers & Berry's) for auto pistols in cals: 9, 38 Super, 40 s&w and 45acp. I have found NO difference in chamfering or not first, either. They will slip right in squarely and evenly, and slide in and out of case gages with room to spare.

The only problem I have had is that the Rainier 151g, 38 Supers have been tight and soft, so they will vary a few thousanths in depth, but, believe it or not, it doesnt change accuracy. Belling didnt really change the fit for these either if you can believe that, which got me started on this seating method.

There could be some advantages in uniformity and more neck tension, it can save a step, and lessen any need for crimping beyond .001. I have only found that 45acp benefit from crimping to size properly, now. I will also just use .001 crimp for lighter bullets with short skirts only. I will never have to worry about a bullet getting setback either.

So, even after all the disagreement I will get for suggesting this, I am finding advantages I doubt you be able to dissuade me on, which I am sure many will try. Take your shot if you have experience whith exactly why it didnt work for you with auto pistol loads. I expect it may not work for other applications, so that wont suprise me.

I just want to know if any of you have ever come to appreciate loading without belling?? Pardon me for challenging any basic ancient beliefs out there. I really just wanted to share that I had found something that can help someone out there. Feel free to tear a POSSIBLE good point into shreads now, thanks.

 

[The Bushmaster]

I bell pistol/revolver cases just enough to start the bullet. It takes a sensitive finger to feel my belling...Rifle I don't bell as most of my bullets are boattail and the ones that are not are chamfered ever so slightly at the base and don't require belling the case mouth. As you (the expert ) know, the less belling that is done the longer the case will last...

My Gen. Remington..We are a little testy today. Aren't we...?

 

[Rockstar]

What an adolescent waste of band width!

 

[HSMITH]

I size cases down where belling is a must. Well, I could band-aid the problems of not belling with a Lee FCD but I prefer to just do it right instead.

 

[Gewehr98]

What is the author of the thread trying to state?

That belling of case mouths is unnecessary?

Jacketed bullets may be fine and dandy without flare. Plated bullets are right on the edge.

I'd invite him to try and load cast or swaged bullets, sans gas checks, into resized handgun or rifle cases without some amount of case mouth flare, then report back on his success.

Then again, I'm a newby to the reloading game compared to the author, I've only been doing it for about 26 years.

 

[Jim Watson]

I don't doubt that it is possible to load pistol ammo without belling the case mouth, I don't bell rifle cases for jacketed bullets. But I am not willing to put the work into loading bulk pistol ammo that I am for target rifle cartridges. I load for pistols on progressive machines and a belled case mouth is both a convenience in setting the bullet and a free step requiring no extra work on my part.

Just as a matter of proportion, I think carefully loading loading copper plated bullets is trying to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. I have not had as good performance from a plated bullet as with either true jacketed or good quality cast, no matter what the equipment and procedure.

 

[Gen. Remington]

I will never understand why I am tempted...

to input on this forum. I should know better. Disagreement is the stock and trade on the internet unless you are praising what everyone else does and says, or their favorite products. "+1, buddypal!"

Keep doing it the way you were taught guys. No need to keep your minds open to anything new. Enjoy doing things the hard way, I dont care!

Its just in the back of my mind that somebody, somewhere, not disagreeable enough to need to complain about what I write, might get some benefit from the information. This would be somebody NOT testy enough to need to disagree in public, who could just read it and move on with a little new information. "Somebody said they could reload WELL without bellling!"

Its a "new" concept for many, no wonder people have trouble with it. Did you understand WHY? Well, I tried to tell you, but look again, for the part about a sleeve seater. Guess what, they align bullets for you! Whether the mouth is belled or not, it will go in straight with a good press, in all the calibers I noted!

Of course I expect not many of the readers would have the same set of equipment and application. But you could think about that, if it didnt hurt so much!

 

[The Bushmaster]

Gen Remington,

It might swallow better if you would feed it to us on a more agreeable and pleasenter spoon. To feed it to us as if we were not smart enough to converse on an intellectual plane with you is not the way to instruct a new way to seat bullets. Even though I have been told that I have no tact I, at least, know better then to try to cramb it down another's throat. Would you like to try it again??? Remember...We are not stupid...Just well trained. And, I amagin, even flexable...

The Bushmaster
The One and Only

 

[Ky Larry]

Gen. Rem, who crapped in your corn flakes this morning? Why do you feel the need to be loved by the people on this forum? If you put forward an idea that works for you, why are you upset when some people reject it? I routinely ignore the people who don't like the guns and caliber's I like. I know what works for me and couldn't care less what somebody else thinks. Perhaps you think that rejecting one of you idea's is the same as rejecting you as a person. It isn't.

P.S. I started reloading in 1974 and I'm still learning.

 

[Gen. Remington]

Bushmaster

I appreciate I am not the sweetest guy on the forum. But there are plenty of wolves ready to bite my okole around here for blaspheming against long held beliefs so basic to them.

I would try the nice approach, but my experience with being shot as a messenger doesnt allow it. I am afraid I would get the disagreement whether I sugar coated it or not, which is why I invited it, outright.

As to being smarter, or sounding like I thought I was, I guess that is my defense against those who are not. If any man feels offended by my tone, I apologize for feeling like I had to use it around here.

Ky Larry, I just get disappointed for trying to help someone, and getting crap in my cornflakes. :banghead:

 

[snuffy]

geeze!

I guess my question is "what are you trying to accomplish? What benefit does NOT belling a case have? If you're saying that not belling works the brass less, making it last longer, well I've got some 45 acp brass that you can't read the headstamp it's been fired so many times, it has been belled every time it was loaded. But it was loaded with mild target loads. The strain for magnum crowd wears out their cases whether they bell or not. Stretching with high pressure, then squeezing them back to take a bullet will fatigue the brass quickly.

Your procedure is a solution to a problem that doesn't exist! I guess the die makers put a flaring step on their expanders because it makes them feel good?

I suggest you pull a few of the bullets you seated without flaring, to see if they were all scraped up by the square mouth of the case that was under the size of the bullet. Then seat some with a flare, pull them and compare!

As was stated, you won't get away with it with cast or swaged bullets. Any damage to the driving bands of a cast bullet will destroy accuracy.

As for how long I've been loading, I started with a lee hand tool in 1963, loading 8 MM Mauser.

 

[The Bushmaster]

Well good...You want to try it again???

 

[Gen. Remington]

Bushmaster

No, thank you.

 

[MNgoldenbear]

Arguments that seem to have been going on aside, what IS/ARE the advantage(s)? Bullet pull/neck tension on my straight-wall cases seems to be fairly consistent, assuming I am using single lot cases from a consistent batch (rather than the assorted stuff I often use for "bulk" purposes). I DO flare case mouths, but most of the bearing surface of the bullet is seated below the flare, so I am wondering how the elimination of flaring would significantly affect the tension. Also, are you saying that you do not EXPAND the case at all after sizing, or simply that you do not adjust the expander down far enough to cause the case mouth to flare? If I am not lacking consistency in bullet pull, what is the selling point here?

Note, this is NOT a challenge, this is a question. If the post was a serious attempt at an intellectual discussion, I'd like to hear more about it (as a scientist, shooter, and reloader).

 

[BluesBear]

This is exactly why I don't shoot other people homeloads. Way to many buffoons assembling ammunition.

Even though I now only produce ammunition strictly for pleasure instead of for a living I have always strived for the most consistent, accurate ammunition possible.
Yeah I experimented with no mouth expansion 20 years ago. BUt not for long. It sucked back then. The physics haven't changed. It'll still suck now.

Properly resized straightwall cases by the very nature of the process need at least minimal mouth expansion.

Now I readily conceed that the vast majority of handloaders over expand case mouths.

 

[Ky Larry]

Gen. Remington,you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink.
As I understand the original thread, you were offering a solution to the problem of brass case mouyhs becoming work hardened and splitting. You've found a solution to the problem that works for you. Others can try it or not. Thank you for the info. Shoot well and often, Sir.

 

[deadin]

If I remember a class in college, I think it was Psychology 101, there was something called a "preconceived idea". i.e. If you already believe or have your mind made up about something, it will probably happen.
Gen. Remington, your original post came on with the notion that you were going to get trashed. Guess what? The board is only agreeing with your ideas, so what's your complaint?

Dean

 

[stoky]

When loading cast bullets if the case mouth is not belled a little it can shave some lead off the bullet. I think that this was a accuracy deterrent in some .45-70 target loads that I had made. Maybe it depends on the particular cartridge and bullet combo wheather or not you need to bell.

 

[Chuck R.]

There’s a gentleman in CA “Paul Jones” of bullet mold fame that makes a tool that allows you to seat cast bullets without belling your brass.

http://www.pauljonesmoulds.com/deburring_tools.htm

I have one for my 40-70 Winchester, and it does in fact work. Meacham (of High Wall fame) also makes an in-line seater that seats cast bullets in straight-line cases without belling.

I don’t think it’s viable with progressive loading handgun ammo, but with the straight-walled BPCR cases it makes sense because you can save one step in the loading process and you don’t work harden your brass as fast. If you’re not crimping, you can save two steps as you don’t have to close the bell up.

I don’t worry about work hardening my brass. I have a Ken Light annealling machine that does about 300 rounds an hour, so I anneal my match stuff 2-3 times a season.

Chuck

...................................................................................................
There is a Paul and David Jones in Los Angeles making this cutter and some molds. They are no relation to the Paul Jones of the California Saeco Mold Company formerly of San Fernando in Los Angeles who is also the Fitz Pistol Grip Company known as FITZ comoderator of this reloading section and currently located near Vacaville California.

Thanks Paul "Fitz" Jones moderator.

 

[BluesBear]

But did you notice one important feature of Fitz's tool?

"Cutter dimensions correspond to standard expander die sizes by caliber"

So in effect, when using the Jones tool, you are expanding and ever so slightly belling the mouth.

 

[Chuck R.]

Bluesbear,

No, you’re not.

It’s a cutter, it chamfers the inside of the caseneck to a profile that matches the expander diameter.

I used one on 300 pieces of my 40-70 custom-formed brass, it didn’t expand anything. External case neck diameter measurements before and after are the same.

Chuck

 

[donkee]

I was going to jump in, but since I'm too stupid to buy anything other than a substandard LEE cast iron press, I should leave now. I know, I'm an unwashed infidel. :banghead:

 

[Gewehr98]

So do you taper crimp afterwards?

Because you've just removed a goodly amount of metal at the case mouth. I can only imagine how much neck tension disappeared with that metal, since you've now got a funnel-shaped case at the top, even if the O.D. was untouched. Do you have to use that cutter every time you reload and resize the brass?

 

[Fatelvis]

As General Remington stated earlier, (and I agree), using a sleeved seating die lessens the need for belling, due to its ability to hold the bullet and case in almost perfect alignment, but...... I still like to put the slightest bell on the case, just to make sure that nothing gets snagged or shaved.

 

[Gewehr98]

I'd hate like hell to shave these babies on their way into the case...

Especially those 500gr swaged spitzers on the right. Hence my asking.