LNL Progressive setup major blunder

[Dudedog]

OK, got my new bullet feeder (tube type) and powder check die for my LNL progressive.
Got the feeder set up and working, setup the powder check die.

I prime off press so I setup the press as follows
Station 1, Powder measure w/PTX
Station 2. Hornady expander, (PTX does not work well with the bullets I am using)
Station 3. Powder check die
Station 4. Bullet feeder
Station 5. Seat + crimp

After running this way for about 200 rounds I discovered this was a less than ideal setup.

I will tell everybody what is wrong here in a bit, but want to see who is the quickest to point out the error of my ways.

 

[carbine85]

I can tell you step 5 is asking for trouble. Never seat and crimp in the same step. If you want a crimp do it as a separate process.

 

[burrhead]

Expander first.

 

[gojones]

Ok, in what station do you size your cases. I do this is station 1 and powder measure in station 2 with PTX. If you use the expander, you are not going to be able to use the powder check die. Seat and Crimp in one station is actually ok.

 

[burrhead]

Ok, in what station do you size your cases.

The OP is sizing and priming off the press. To the OP, ditch the PTX if you're not going to use it. PTX makes it harder to set up the powder measure.

 

[Dudedog]

Yep, expander first is the answer.
Powder charge of WSF second charge WSF almost overflows,
expander compresses powder charge almost to the volume of one charge
not enough difference on the powder check die to notice.:banghead:

2 - powder check
3 - expand

Caught the one and reconfigured, now scratching head about one I maybe didn't catch (over reliance on new powder check die ),

So
200 rounds to pull for my piece of mind. 99.785% sure I din't mess up any of the others but was having issues with bullet inverting when the press moved so I will get out the puller (hammer type and start pulling)

Sigh


I do a quick tumble on the cases, resize and deprime, then tumble some more.Prime with Lee hand primer.
Started this way with my 3 hole Lee Deluxe turret and decided I like priming off press even when using the LNL.
Store deprimed cases in plastic tubs and keep maybe say 1000 or so primed one (9mm) ready to load.

PS thought I would be clever and order a .357 PTX to help with this issue but it is much shorter than the 9mm one so I need to make an adapter, some kind of tube to get the height right.

Where's a piece of that Wold steel 45 brass when you are looking for one......don't know how many I have tossed 50, 60, 100....

 

[cfullgraf]

I do a quick tumble on the cases, resize and deprime, then tumble some more.Prime with Lee hand primer.
Started this way with my 3 hole Lee Deluxe turret and decided I like priming off press even when using the LNL.

Why not use the L-N-L to size-deprime-mouth expand. Then you can tumble and prime off the press to store for a future loading session.

You can dial in your mouth expander the way you want to.

Then you do not have to worry about expanding the case mouth when you are loading.

Frees up a station when loading.

This is how I load on my L-N-L. I even machined off the mouth expander part on the PTX, or made my own custom PTX tubes. Or, if you put more expansion in the case mouth than the PTX puts in, then don't worry about it.

When loading, nothing in station 1, powder measure in station 2, powder check die in station 3, seat in station 4 and crimp in station 5.

If you add a bullet feeder, move the powder measure to station 1 and the powder check die to station 2.

 

[Dudedog]

Hmmm interesting thought. Thanks.
I do deprime on the LNL, faster and it does not spit primers all over like the Lee "Deluxe" press. (still use and like that Lee press, gotten way more than my moneys worth out of it)

If I deprimed and then expanded then I could use station 5 for the dreaded Lee FCD. (which I happen to like in 9mm)
1 - powder
2 - powder check
3 - bullet feed
4 - seat
5 - crimp

Just added the bullet feeder and powder check (which is why I made the dumb mistake of the expander before the powder check die, didn't seem bad till I tested how it could go wrong by accident)

No issues seating and crimping in one step but I prefer doing it seperately.

 

[egd]

Having just bought a LNL and going through set-up, I find it amazing how many different ways people set it up. The versatility of this press is awesome.

 

[AR-Bossman]

Sizing and decapping in station one only works if you aren't OCD and need clean primer pockets.

I don't mind dirty pockets on pistol stuff, and I can load GANGS of 9mm.

Basically you just pour in cleaned brass and out comes perfect 9mm ammo. It's that simple.

 

[Walkalong]

I also size and prime before loading. I put the expander in station 2, drop powder in station three, seat and sometimes crimp in station 4, and crimp in station 5 when I don't seat/crimp in station 4 and only seat.

Crimping while seating vs crimping in a second step.

http://www.thehighroad.org/showpost.php?p=7699828&postcount=14

 

[mmorris]

Here's one setup arrangement I use:

LNL AP Station Assignments
Load Powder & Bullet - Start with sized & primed brass

Station #/Die/Action
1/RCBS or Lyman “M” die/Expand case
2/Powder Measure w/pistol rotor/Drop powder charge
3/Powder COP die/Confirm powder charge
4/Bullet feeder die/Place bullet into expanded case
5/Taper Crimp Seating die/Seat bullet & taper crimp to remove flare

 

[cfullgraf]

Having just bought a LNL and going through set-up, I find it amazing how many different ways people set it up. The versatility of this press is awesome.

Yup, lots of flexibility with the L-N-L.

Actually, I do similar shuffling of die positions on a Pro2000 and BL550 but it is alot more convenient and easy on the L-N-L with the bushings. I do almost all my resizing and depriming of handgun cartridges on the Hornady even if I load them on one of the other progressives.

 

[Paddy]

If you're going to run brass through the press twice then it's not a 5 station press anymore it's a 10 station so try to do as much as possible on the first run through so the last is a simple setup with not too much drama in the press. I find all the shaking and sticking that I get from the expanders and PTX that it can mess up my powder throws and cause spills.

 

[Dudedog]

In the future I think I will go ahead and deprime/rezize then expand, then prime off press. I actually like my Lee expander better so I could use it in that setup.

Yes it means two passes through the press, but I like the nice shiny brass even if it does not shoot any better.
The deprime/resize pass is really quick for me just feed case and pull, nothing to worry about checking....now if I just had a case feeder...
I would say the bullet feed die and the tubes was money well spent, the powered feeder would be nice but it $$$ more.

I really like to prime off press so I don't have to deal with the primers while loading.
The setups mentioned have given me food for thought, for some reason I just never thought of expanding before dropping the powder.

Hope everybody got a little chuckle out of my blunder and if anybody else sees this they don't do the same thing.

The initial setup seemed reasonable when I started........never thought about the expander compressing the charge because am used to using my Lee which is hollow or the PTX.


Oh by the way my pulling process is
insert loaded round
whack

Maybe whack again
empty puller
insert new round
repeat

Step 3 is very important to the process, it lets me reflect on why I am pulling.....

 

[THEWELSHM]

Watch all Highboy YouTube videos on the LNL set up.

My o2

Thewelshm

 

[ljnowell]

I can tell you step 5 is asking for trouble. Never seat and crimp in the same step. If you want a crimp do it as a separate process.

Hogwash, people have been seating and crimping for around 100 years in the same step. It works just fine.

 

[AR-Bossman]

Hogwash, people have been seating and crimping for around 100 years in the same step. It works just fine.

It's not hogwash. I've seen more people have problems with trying to do both steps together than just about any other die setup/loading process.

At an absolute minimum, separating the steps gives you full control over both operations and makes life ALOT simpler.

 

[ljnowell]

It's not hogwash. I've seen more people have problems with trying to do both steps together than just about any other die setup/loading process.

At an absolute minimum, separating the steps gives you full control over both operations and makes life ALOT simpler.

It's very easy to set up a seat/crimp die to do both. It's as simple as reading the directions. "Never" is a strong word that really doesn't apply here. It may be easier to set them up separately but that can have negatives with it such as taking another spot on a tool head that could be devoted to bullet feeder, powder cop, etc.

 

[ColtPythonElite]

I have been seating and crimping in one step for 25 years with no problems.

 

[noylj]

I think you would be at least as fast using the press as designed:
Size/ deprime
Prime
Expand/Flare/Charge
RCBS Lock-Out die
Seat
Crimp.
It would make more sense to me if you seated and crimped in one step if you must use a bullet feeder.
I have no issues priming on the press.
I do deprime as part of case inspection/sorting prior to cleaning, though.

 

[SC_Dave]

I do the entire process on my LnL from size/deprime to finished cartridge with consistent results and I have a bullet feeder die. Shouldn't be any reason to have to do it on separate presses. I will say it took some time a patience to get everything dialed in but once I did I was good to go.
SCD

 

[snuffy]

Hogwash, people have been seating and crimping for around 100 years in the same step. It works just fine.

SOMETIMES That statement is correct sometimes. Like when seating and crimping a cast boolit with a nice deep crimping groove, or a jacketed bullet with a good deep cannelure. It is NOT correct when seating AND crimping a smooth sided plated bullet, the plating or copper jacket of a non-cannelured jacketed will get scraped by the case mouth as the bullet is crimped.

Ya see you have to understand just how the seating die works. The bullet continues to be seated deeper as the crimp is applied. If there's no where for the case mouth to move into,,-- IE no crimp groove, it will scrape the side of the bullet, piling up copper or lead in front of the case mouth.

Ideally a reloader has the crimp timed to just begin to happen just as the case mouth passes the bottom of the crimp groove/cannelure so it does NOT do the above scraping. This is of course depending on case length being the same. Now I know most don't trim handgun brass. Especially the semi-autos. But for seating and crimping in one step/die, all cases should be trimmed or at least measured to be the same over all case length.

As for me, I do my mass handgun loading on my dillon 650. With it's 5 stations, I can seat in station #4, crimp in station #5. I use the excellent Redding profile crimper for all handgun ammo I load on that machine.

 

[ljnowell]

SOMETIMES That statement is correct sometimes. Like when seating and crimping a cast boolit with a nice deep crimping groove, or a jacketed bullet with a good deep cannelure. It is NOT correct when seating AND crimping a smooth sided plated bullet, the plating or copper jacket of a non-cannelured jacketed will get scraped by the case mouth as the bullet is crimped.



Ya see you have to understand just how the seating die works. The bullet continues to be seated deeper as the crimp is applied. If there's no where for the case mouth to move into,,-- IE no crimp groove, it will scrape the side of the bullet, piling up copper or lead in front of the case mouth.



Ideally a reloader has the crimp timed to just begin to happen just as the case mouth passes the bottom of the crimp groove/cannelure so it does NOT do the above scraping. This is of course depending on case length being the same. Now I know most don't trim handgun brass. Especially the semi-autos. But for seating and crimping in one step/die, all cases should be trimmed or at least measured to be the same over all case length.



As for me, I do my mass handgun loading on my dillon 650. With it's 5 stations, I can seat in station #4, crimp in station #5. I use the excellent Redding profile crimper for all handgun ammo I load on that machine.

It works fine on plated and jacketed bullets also. It's about having things set right.

 

[Wireman]

I don't follow your order of operations. The first step in the process is your resizer/decapper, then prime, then expand, (or as Hornady allows expanding and charging in the same operation). then seating and Finally crimping.

Obviously most seating dies have the crimp function but it is nearly impossible to seat and crimp anything other than a FMJ bullet in one operation. Lead, and plated bullets have to be separately crimped because they are soft. How can you push a soft bullet into a case while the case is simultaneously being squeezed? Hard to do. Lots of torn cases and mashed bullets.

WM