Unable to crimp 38-40 cases after trimming them to trim to length

[mrappe]

I have been loading 38-40 for 22 years using a Redding FL die set. I was shooting an original Winchester 1873 with a 24" barrel in that caliber up  until a 1  1/2 years ago when I bought a Uberti 73 from Taylors with a 20" barrel in 38-40. I found that when I when I loaded 10 rnds (the max that we ever load for a stage) into it some of the bullets would get pushed back into the case. This never happened with my older gun which had a longer mag and an old spring so I realized that the rnds needed a firmer crimp  and finally started seating the bullets with the Redding die and crimping them with a Lee Factory Crimp Die. This was working and I bought some new Starline brass and measured it. It was way longer than the max length so I trimmed it to the recommended length of 1.295" and loaded it but I saw that the crimp was not enough either with the Lee die or the Redding built in roll crimp. Under pressure the bullets could get pushed into the case. I measured my old brass and found that it was around 1.32"  to 1.34" in length and over the published max length of  1.305". I have not measured or trimmed the cases in a long time and did not have any problems chambrering them in either gun. The problem seems to be that when I trimmed the new cases to the published spec I cannot get a good crimp on them due to the length of the brass even if I set the dies down to where they touch the shell holder at its peak. Someone said at my club that I should shorten the die but I don't have a lathe to do that so I am trying if all of the brands of the dies are going to have  the same problem. It seems like the dies would be made so that you could roll crimp even when the brass is trimmed to the trim to length.

thanks,

Mike

[Cholla Hill Tirador]

I once shortened an RCBS .357 die by chucking it in a drill press, laying a flat grinding wheel on the table (which I had leveled) and lowering the spinning die onto the wheel. Crude, but it worked. A simpler way that won't alter your die would be to take some off the top of the shellholder, wouldn't take much.

 CHT

[greyhawk]

I once shortened an RCBS .357 die by chucking it in a drill press, laying a flat grinding wheel on the table (which I had leveled) and lowering the spinning die onto the wheel. Crude, but it worked. A simpler way that won't alter your die would be to take some off the top of the shellholder, wouldn't take much.

 CHT

Spin it and grind it will work - does not have to be precise - plenty of meat on the bottom of most dies - if ya take a bit too much off  wont do serious harm just means you be careful setting the die height.

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[Baltimore Ed]

If you've got a disc sander with a table and 90 degree guide that slides in the table groove just hold it against the guide and remove some steel. Use a fine grit disc. Keep it rolling and tight to the guide and you get a nice clean flat. Don't let it get too hot of course. Easy way to shorten a die.

[Coffinmaker]

What Greyhawk said.

More than one way to skin a ....... die.  You can also do the dirty deed with an angle grinder.  Just take yer time.  And now you know to just adjust yer brass to what you have that already works. 

[Grumpy Granville]

Guess I'll be the lone wolf that suggests seeking out a small machine shop in your area to modify the die properly..talk to the owner and offer to buy him lunch or a cold beer.  It's literally a 10 minute mod on a lathe at most.  Know what you want before you arrive.  I would suggest the removal of .100 from the bottom of the die.

[greyhawk]

What Greyhawk said.

More than one way to skin a ....... die.  You can also do the dirty deed with an angle grinder.  Just take yer time.  And now you know to just adjust yer brass to what you have that already works. 

Last bit is the lesson here (didnt wanna say that for fear of bein seen as not nice )

[mrappe]

Well I found out what caused this. I was looking at my dial calipers and noticed that when completely closed the dial was showing 0.04 which meant that I measured my new brass a being too long and consequently trimmed it too short. It was too short to reach the crimp inside the die. My calipers are old and cheap so I could not reset it so I just bought a new digital one and remeasured everything. I am not sure when the old one got off but from now I will always check the zero. Now I am stuck with 100 rnds of new too short brass that I cannot use. Lesson Learned and I am glad that I had not trimmed my older brass yet because when I measured it with the new calipers it is setting at the right length even though some of them have been reloaded for more than 20 years.

Thanks,
Mike

[cpt dan blodgett]

It may help to have a shell holder the same make as the sizing die.  You could also see if youj can fit a piece of paper under the case in the shell holder shimming it up a bit before you toss the brass

[Baltimore Ed]

If you've got another shell holder grind a couple of thou off the top to get the case a little deeper into the die. But you will set back the shoulder a bit. As weird as dash caliber chambers are it might not matter? And you get more use out of your brass.