Case lube shootout

I did this test 2 years ago on blinged machine gun LC brass, but without your measuring tools........STP was king.....but hate the cleanup after. RCBS water-based was second, but not as convenient as Dillion's spray. Dillon was of course 3rd.....better than anything wax by far....and one shot. Easiest for progressives.....and you have to let it dry.....like one shot. My test was to size until i was sure it was going to stick if I went further! Real scientific. Glad to see the numbers....and why I asked for STP and RCBS to be added to the test. Good info! and no risk of sticking dies!
 
GW Staar said:
Glad to see the numbers....and why I asked for STP and RCBS to be added to the test.
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Figure out a way to send me a little of both and I'll test them with the same components, so the numbers actually mean something. I just tested the ones I had on hand.
 
jmorris said:
Figure out a way to send me a little of both and I'll test them with the same components, so the numbers actually mean something. I just tested the ones I had on hand.
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Understand. I'm surprised you haven't got a lube pad and lube in your no longer used stash.....and I only bought a bottle of STP years ago, when a member here swore by it for really hard sizing jobs. And I opened it only when I had that hard-to-size machinegun brass, blinged with wet pins. I'll leave that up to you since I already know the answer, even if not numbers to back it up. :)
 
jmorris said:
It would probably be the one that requires the least force in use. If you send me a rifle die and brass I will size them unlubed until I rip the rim off and I'll let you know how much force that takes though.
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somewhere I have some old Herter's 38 Special dies I'll never use and some spare brass .. so, this just seem to interesting not to follow up on for fun ... lol
 
FWIW, I like One Shot for a progressive press with carbide dies.
For resizing rifle brass on a single-stage, lanolin and alcohol in a plastic bag works great.
 
westernrover said:
Did you clean the die between tests?
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It wouldn't mean much if I didn't, residual lube from the good ones would have helped out the ones that required more force, making them look better than they are.

Not doing it would have made it go faster though and I probably would have done a larger sample size but I'm not sure the results would mean as much.
 
I'm sure for progressives it's a little different, but I only use a single stage and for years and years, the best lube I've found has been the Unique Case Lube in the white little tub. Don't take much at all, wipes off super easy, and doesn't attack primers or powder. My #2 is the Redding case lube, it's only #2 because it doesn't wipe off as easy, and for me and my loading technique I haven't tried any of the spray or homemade types and I don't plan to anytime soon.
 
Dillion's looks what I am using except my bottle has Cabela's on it which they no longer sell. I will go to Dillion's when I need another bottle. I have never bothered to actually measure effort required but just let my shoulder tell me and the Cabela's has been very easy. I like being able to see when the lanolin is well mixed.

I use STP for certain things because it remains much longer than regular oil. I have never considered using it for case lube because of it's tendency to stay on things.
 
I was in a pinch once and just grabbed a can of Pam out of the kitchen. It worked great. Had to wipe the cases down after use, but it worked really well.
 
jmorris said:
Less than laboratory study but I found it interesting. In an effort for all the cases to be the same, I used new Winchester 30-30 brass and an RCBS FL sizer. The spray lubes were used per their instructions, the others using my fingers and a Q tip.

View attachment 1189072

I used a Lee breech lock press and a Rupala fishing scale to pull the handle, it has a little tab that stays at the max load. I only tested 8 cases, was only going to test 4 but the Dillon one shocked me the first pass, so I did another round of all 4 lubes.

The Imperial took 10 & 8.75 lb to size, 13 & 10.75 to come out of the die and 9 & 7.75 for the expander.

Hornady Unique was 10.7 & 10.3 to size, 9.75 & 8.5 off the body and 9.5 & 8.25 for the expander.

Dillon was 6.5 & 5.5 to size, 5 & 4 off the body and 9 & 7.25 for the expander.

Hornady One Shot was 10 & 8.5 size, 13.25 & 12.25 off the body and 12 & 11.5 off the neck.

One might note that all of the 2nd pass were lower than the first, at some point in there I learned that just holding a smaller amount of force for longer resulted in lower numbers and might be more accurate.

It was also not quite a full size, I stopped the stroke short to not hit the stop, back side of the handle was .010" short from where it is when the linkage hits its stop.
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UPS brought me my first bottle of Dillon D.C.L earlier this week and I got a chance to try it tonight small case sizing some 308 brass. The Dillon lube is my new champ. Sure beats rubbing Imperial on with my fingers and the sizing effort considerably less. After having a Dillon 550 for a few years one would have thought that I had already tried their lube but had not. Thank you!
 
Just as an experiment I used Chapstick on a few .45 Colt cases and loaded them up. Time will tell if it affects powder or primers if a minute amount got to them. As far as it working as a lube it did fine.
 
geo57 said:
Just as an experiment I used Chapstick on a few .45 Colt cases and loaded them up. Time will tell if it affects powder or primers if a minute amount got to them. As far as it working as a lube it did fine.
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You made me look! The Safety Data Sheet at least gives away one percentage; 40.7% white petrolatum (petroleum jelly, Vaseline). Plus proprietary amounts of various waxes, long chain alcohols, and mineral oil. The mineral oil would not be good if there's enough of it, IDK about the long chain alcohols, but probably not good. The amounts of the liquid things are probably pretty low or Chapstick would be less solid.
 
JohnMc said:
You made me look! The Safety Data Sheet at least gives away one percentage; 40.7% white petrolatum (petroleum jelly, Vaseline). Plus proprietary amounts of various waxes, long chain alcohols, and mineral oil. The mineral oil would not be good if there's enough of it, IDK about the long chain alcohols, but probably not good. The amounts of the liquid things are probably pretty low or Chapstick would be less solid.
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I put just a very small touch dab on the center of the cases from a finger with light film. As far as it being harmful to components, again, time will tell as I did just a cylinder full a few weeks ago and once the weather improves a bit I'll see if there's any negative. I've read of others using Chapstick, lotions, waxes, cooking oils, pure Vaseline, STP Oil Treatment ( which I did discover years ago that it can dud a primer but that was 50 years ago and the formulation now may be different ), Mobile 1 and other petroleum products & rolling them in a pad which to me sounds more prone to problems than a miniscule amount of Chapstick.
 
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That's a good test. I find it interesting that Imperial took so much force as it is one of my favorites, and don't feel a big difference between it and Dillon. It is also more consistent when bumping the shoulder. Maybe it is because I tumble the brass in media with polish before loading.

When doing bulk 223 cases, I use a recipe of vegetable oil, alcohol, and a couple drops of dish soap. It washes off pretty easily in hot soapy water.
 
geo57 said:
I put just a very small touch dab on the center of the cases from a finger with light film. As far as it being harmful to components, again, time will tell as I did just a cylinder full a few weeks ago and once the weather improves a bit I'll see if there's any negative. I've read of others using Chapstick, lotions, waxes, cooking oils, pure Vaseline, STP Oil Treatment ( which I did discover years ago that it can dud a primer but that was 50 years ago and the formulation may be different ), Mobile 1 and other petroleum products & rolling them in a pad which to me sounds more prone to problems than a miniscule amount of Chapstick.
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Yeah, there's probably not enough to worry about. Maybe a newbie who puts too much lube on cases, but even then, it seems like it's mostly solids or semi-solids and won't creep around too much.
I think that if the mineral oil was enough to worry about, Chapstick wouldn't be a stick, it'd be in a squeeze tube. My "not good" comments are about the straight ingredient, in rereading my post, I see that's not clear.
 
For years for 45-70 rifle in steel dies I used Lee Case Lube and it worked fine but I was out, hence the limited test. If it proves to be ok a full tube of Chap will likely last me until my cremation at the rate that it's applied.
 
Blue68f100 said:
It's a very subjective test depending on how much lube is applied. Like with any case lube, if you don't use enough you can stick a case.
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If you are talking about mine for .45 Colt cases they go through a sizing die with a carbide ring so even using no lube has proven to work ok sans any sticking. Applying just a slight film of lube makes the process easier & smoother.
 
Blue68f100 said:
It's a very subjective test depending on how much lube is applied. Like with any case lube, if you don't use enough you can stick a case.
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For the one in the OP it was 100% coverage (thus the q-tips for non spray lubes inside the neck) but not excessive enough, to cause dents or anything like that.
 
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