Just to clarify, I've just got the die body on the press at the moment. The decapping rod, pin and collet, and anything else I don't know the name for, but is involved in decapping, is out.
Yes, it's hard to believe it's the lube, but I don't know what else it could be. I've sprayed just a little, I've painted a coating of lube on, I've lubed inside the die, I've rubbed some on by hand, I've tried running it in right away, I've let it dry one minute like the can says to do, I've let it dry five minutes.
I have the replacement die body from Hornady, and I doubt both dies are wrong, and this is confirmed by some measurements I took w/ my calipers. I have several different lots of HXP Greek surplus brass as well as Federal brass, which was shot in my friend's Browning BAR, so I don't think it's any particular lot of brass.
I've cleaned the inside of the dies as best as I could w/ patches, it's not easy to get at the inside effectively, but I did use solvent, same stuff I use to clean my bores. I suppose I might still have some rust preventative inside, but that alone can't be why I'm having so much trouble.
I've adjusted the die according to Hornady's instructions, which is to get the ram to the highest point w/o camming over, then screw the die so it's touching. At any rate, the case is getting stuck way before how far the die is screwed in would matter. Some say to have it screwed in even at the cam over point, some say to back it off one turn, and Hornady's instructions say another.
I'm quite baffled at this point.
Cameron