226 Star die

[Brad]

I will try to get photos up later.
I finally got around to making a .226 Stsr die for freebullet. It ended up being .227 but he is OK with that.
I did find that I have a small carbide inserted boring bar that will bore a hole that small. I drill to .219 or so then bored the rest. I use the same bar to cut the infeed taper at 5°. The taper is probably .250 long or so, it will easily accept a Hornady check.
I drill a single lube hole clear thru using a .060 bit. I decided a single pair of holes was likely enough, a 22 bullet doesn't hold much lube.
The hardest part was the final polish to size. No using a split rod on this one. I need to get some new barrels for my 7/32 Acrolap to use. This would also work well to remove the burr left by drilling the lube holes.
A caliber specific punch was easy to make. I like about .003 wiggle room so I made the punch .224. Sure is nice to know the settings on the lathe to cut 1/2-27 threads!

I will be interested to see how it works for freebullet. It wasn't as bad to make as I expected.

Yes fiver, I know you want one too.

 

[Brad]

The hole in the end of the punch is where the center was to let me cut the part without chatter. It also works well to make sure the check is seated flat on the base because it pushed around the edges of the check, not in the center.

 

[Gary]

Nicely done. What stamping setup are you using?

 

[Brad]

https://www.mscdirect.com/product/details/00201467

This not the exact set I got but it is close. Mine were purchased a couple years back from ENCO. Not always easy to get perfectly in line but they work well for my purposes.

 

[freebullet]

Just got done working. Couldn't be more excited to try it out. Guna get cleaned up & some dinner. Then race fiver to Brad's, good thing I have a head start.

 

[freebullet]

Good news guys. I beat fiver over to Brad's place.

I'm very impressed with Brad's machining abilities. The die looks great & I'm excited to try it out.

My wife & I had a nice evening getting to know Brad & his lovely wife. Sorry we kept you up so late. Time flies...

Thank you, again for...well, everything.

Fiver,

Just teasing, he's bound to only get better. That means eventually you'll likely get one as good or better.

 

[fiver]

I was in Pocatello yesterday so you got an extra 75 miles on top of the normal 2 state trip.

226 is good in the semi's [and about as big as you want to go]
227 will be a tighter fit in the ball seat area of the bolt guns,
it will just scuff seat in the 22-250 and 220 swift type rifles if you have a drive band exposed.

 

[freebullet]

226 is good in the semi's [and about as big as you want to go]
227 will be a tighter fit in the ball seat area of the bolt guns,
it will just scuff seat in the 22-250 and 220 swift type rifles if you have a drive band exposed.

Thanks for the tips... have a Lee 225 that I've used to get by. It didn't work very well, figure I'll lap that one to 226. This one Brad made for me means I should be able to cover them all better.

So I finally had a few minutes to cast yesterday & Doh! Melted the wrong ingots. Not to let the melt & short time go to waste I rolled on with it.

The die works real nice. Gives .227 on a first pass & gets them down to .2265 if given a second pass. Ran some copper chore boy strands through to break it in. By the time I do a few hundred should be broke in nice.

I had almost forgot how much fun checking 22's are, but it went pretty smooth with Josh's al checks.



I'm not even culling them. Just going to fire'em off at 50 for now.

 

[fiver]

I got a bunch of ww alloy bullets made up from the original HM-2 test run mold.
I originally done up a batch of 40 lbs to torture test the mold.
it's the only one in existence since Jared broke the cherry on the second mold and we had to order a new one, and then I had him change the alignment pin design.
but I'm probably just gonna throw some 2400 or some 4100 under them in either the 220 or the 22-250 and get some trigger time in with them.
I can live with a few random flyers.