Ian
Notorious member
Something like that. Most of you know how much of a Forster Benchrest seating die fan I am, and how much I prefer case-actuated charging dies. So have wanted to combine the concept of a charging die, neck expanding/bellmouth die, and the sliding-sleeve alignment system into one die for some time now, so today was the day.
In an effort to save time and energy I started out with a basic Lee rifle charging die body (the long one) and did my engineering based on that. First caliber is .30-30 because I already have a chambering reamer.
After figuring out the travel dimension of the Lee powder measures and the depth of the powder-thru spuds, I turned, drilled, and reamed a sliding sleeve with a shoulder at the top to guide the case. I bored the neck part of the sleeve to .345" to allow the belled mouth to pass back through.
I still have to make the actual PTE spud to work with this setup, but that takes a few hours and will have to wait.
Here's where I am now:
In an effort to save time and energy I started out with a basic Lee rifle charging die body (the long one) and did my engineering based on that. First caliber is .30-30 because I already have a chambering reamer.
After figuring out the travel dimension of the Lee powder measures and the depth of the powder-thru spuds, I turned, drilled, and reamed a sliding sleeve with a shoulder at the top to guide the case. I bored the neck part of the sleeve to .345" to allow the belled mouth to pass back through.
I still have to make the actual PTE spud to work with this setup, but that takes a few hours and will have to wait.
Here's where I am now: