If you look at a factory new round the shoulder is way back. When fire the shoulder will move to the shoulder in the chamber and may not fit in any chamber that has the shoulder in a different spot. To get the shoulder pushed back it may be necessary to grind a bit off the reloading die so it will move the shoulder back. I say grind because a file will not go through the case hardened surface of a die. This is best done with a lathe and a tool post grinder. You only want to take enough off to allow the cartridge to fit the gun. The case hardness may only be a few thou thick.
A few posts later you said "When setting the shoulder back, don't go any more than needed. If the brass gets worked to much in the shoulder it will soon fail."
Sincerely, and with due respect: "a bit" and "too much" is a bit non committal IMHO. I've loaded for rifle and I've needed to have the case sized more, ie move the shoulder back more than the shellholder and die would allow. I prefer to have a custom shellholder, but I have shortened dies. With a bottlenecked rifle cartridge, other than the 44-40 & 38-40, the theory or established standard is to have around 0.003" shoulder setback, the ideal. If you have any more than 0.012" you will have issues. 0.007" is still OK. Setting it for 0.001" or 0.002" is a bit too tight, not much room for error/tolerance.
If you load on a progressive that has a shellplate, setting a die at touching plus 1/4 turn, not really a good thing, so, shortening the die is pretty much the only option.
So: on a 44-40 case, I don't think that I'd want to adjust for a shoulder setback of only 0.003". After all, without the die and shellholder being able to have the option of zero clearance, that could lead to issues. I checked my ammunition and I'm setting the shoulder back 0.045". I have a Redding die, and this is the setback that occurs with 0.125" clearance between the die and the shellplate platform on my Dillon 550. I've not completed any case life evaluation yet, but my guess is that I'm not going to see any. I've used a hammer and mandrel to straighten out the odd folded neck on an errant 44-40 case and that brass is very malleable.
I've seen some factory ammo with the shoulder 0.080" back from touching the shoulder of the chamber, and some ammunition and most new brass comes without a shoulder at all. Some ammo has a full circumference stab crimp under the base of the bullet. Upon firing, it's all good.
It's my opinion, that the 44-40 has it's own rules, somewhat reminiscent of my time spent with the 38-55 in a Winchester 94. As such, I'm not sure that sizing fired brass back down to new brass specs would lead to any issues. Without a sizing die with that ability, I can't test that theory.
Does anyone have any experience with "excessive" shoulder setback initiating undue brass failure?
Nitro (aka Big Boston)
Addendum: WRT shellplates, they work on a different set of standards than the common ram mounted shellholder. The industry standard for shellholder is that they add 0.125" (1/8 inch) to the chamber length of the die. There are 2 parts to a 7/8 FL die, the die itself and the shellholder is that other part. That is the reason the Redding shellholder sets work with any brand of FL die. My progressive is a Dillon, and the shellplates for it are not 0.125" thick (the distance between the bottom of the plate and the surface that the die can touch. I measured three, two were around 0.121" and the third was at 0.151". My 44-40 plate measures 0.109". I'm not too impressed with the "Precision" part of Dillon. My point being, setting the die to "touch" is not a precise setting. IMNSHO running a progressive press requires a bit more reloading knowledge than is required to run a single stage press. "Monkey running a spaceship" came to mind, and I apologise to any monkeys that take exception to my comment, it was not meant as an insult. Monkeys are intelligent, but only a few have ever operated a spaceship.
Nitroexpress (aka Big Boston)
Update: It occurred to me that I did have a way to set the shoulder back a bit more. I took the decapping pin out of my LEE FL die and used it like a LEE loader. IOW I pressed the case into the die to the hilt, rim solid against the die. This will push the shoulder back at least 0.060" more than using a standard shellholder. I measured, the shoulder was pushed back 0.076" on a freshly fired cartridge. Thus began the test. I used 5 cases from a box of factory ammunition. They had been fired and reloaded twice. I trimmed the cases after sizing, three needed trimming. I then reloaded them as normal, fired the ammunition and repeated. If a case needed trimming I noted it, if the trimming cutter touched less than half the circumference of the mouth, it was called a touch.
1: trim = 3, touch = 0
2: trim = 0, touch = 3
3: trim = 0, touch = 1
4: trim = 0, touch = 3
5: trim = 0, touch = 1
6: trim = 1, touch = 0
7: trim = 0, touch = 2
8: trim = 0, touch = 2
9: trim = 0, touch = 2
10: just reload as normal after firing.
The picture is of the same five cases loaded after 10 test oversizings and firing. I certainly wouldn't have any hesitation in taking 0.060 off the bottom of my LEE die. I didn't see any evidence of any abnormal case stretching. I didn't see any indication of case fatigue.