Trimming/Prepping .223

[HJ857]

For the kind of loading you plan on doing, primer pocket and flash hole uniforming is not needed. I agree that wet tumbling will take care of cleaning the primer pocket well enough.

I would say that a case gauge is a very valuable asset. Get one that checks for shoulder position (after sizing), length and importantly the diameter of the case, particularly at the base. There are a number of these on the market but not all will check all three dimensions, so you have to be a bit careful. The JP Rifles gauge is really nice. When I started out loading I had a number of rounds that would not chamber and which stuck severely, and extraction of those live rounds was not fun. When I started religiously using that case gauge, and discarding cases that did not pass the gauge, this problem went away completely.

https://jprifles.com/buy.php?item=JPCG-223

This is a video of my sizing setup. Just for illustration. RCBS Trim Pro with a three way cutter. I unscrewed the hand crank handle and then just chucked it in a 1/2" drill. Below that is the RCBS primer pocket swager. It's probably not the cheapest way you can go, but it's really fast. Trimmed, chamfered, deburred, crimp swaged.

https://imgur.com/UsaYYM8

 

[Soonerpesek]

Try the Lyman Case Trim Express....uses "collets" to hold the case while being pressed into the cutter.
I have one and it works very well on a large variety of cases...fairly inexpensive for something that makes the job much easier.
$130.00 or so, if I recall correctly.

 

[rdinga]

My routine for processing 223 is as follows.

Tumble brass
Lube with Dillon spray lube
Deprime and resize on single stage. I set the dies to size for the tightest chamber AR I own.
Tumble to remove lube
Trim on giruad trimmer
swage/ cut primer pockets

Then I feed the processed brass to the 550. I case gauge all loaded rounds.