Lube & Sizing Die problem

[Silver Hand]

Good afternoon gentlemen.
I am working on load for my old WCF 25/35 Mod. 94. The mould is a Lyman 257/312 g.c. And has dropped some very nice boolits for me. The problem is something I have never run into before.
When using a Lyman sizer die .257 the lube pushes through the die under the previously per seated and correctly sized gas check and hydraulic pressure pushes the Boolit up and fills the base below the gas check with 3/16’’ +- of lube. Nothing in the lube grooves? I did get it set to lube just the bottom lube groove but cannot achieve lubricating the second groove. [I have lubed many different styles of Boolits in my life time].
One thing I did notice is the lube sizing die has Fourteen holes. I have never seen that before in my other dies. This die was not new when I obtained it and the hole count is one of my concerns. The interior of the die is perfect as is the interior ram and face of it.
My bet is someone did a nice job machining to many additional holes at ninety degrees between the original four each side that I am use to seeing on an older Ideal or Lyman Die. Not sure
Thanks Silver Hand

[C.F.Plinker]

My Lyman dies also have the 14 hole arrangement. You might try going down a little further with the boolit since you are only getting the bottom groove lubed. Some other things that might help are to hold pressure on the operating handle while you tighten down the ratchet just a little and maybe add a little heat to the sizer so the lube flows a little easier.

[largom]

+1 with C.F.Plinker but I would not use heat unless necessary. Lower your boolit in the die until you fill the grooves desired. If then you get lube on the boolit nose you can the top holes of the die with birdshot pressed into the holes.

Larry

[Silver Hand]

Yes Before I posted I tied all of that. Hi - Low and in between and have heated the surface of the lube & sizer body slightly with no difference in results. I actually used a brass drift and another Boolit at times to really lower it. I do not have the correct top punch for this boolit and wondered if that might have applied to this Boolit when lube and sizing. Something is astray here.

Plenty of bird shot around. I will take another crack at it again soon.
Thanks to each of you C.F. Plinker and largom
I will post up the results some time later this evening if I get to it today.
Silver Hand

[462]

Two possibilities:
1. The top punch's diameter may be too large and not allowing the boolit to enter the die to the correct depth, i.e. using a top punch designed for a .44 caliber boolits with a .358" die.
2. Too much pressure.

[Silver Hand]

Two possibilities:
1. The top punch's diameter may be too large and not allowing the boolit to enter the die to the correct depth, i.e. using a top punch designed for a .44 caliber boolits with a .358" die.
2. Too much pressure.

This was one of my thoughts also. I will keep you posted.

[Silver Hand]

Two possibilities:
1. The top punch's diameter may be too large and not allowing the boolit to enter the die to the correct depth, i.e. using a top punch designed for a .44 caliber boolits with a .358" die.
2. Too much pressure.

462 I think you have correctly resolved this issue. I won't have the .312 top punch for a wile but plan on calling for one soon. I spent about another two hours again with this die this evening. My findings mostly relevant to what things should be feeling like and mousing around seem to indicate the top punch is the problem.
Cleaned up a bunch of shot in the barn the mice got into [they like the old cloth bags I guess] so the day turned out OK after all.

Thanks Silver Hand

[captain-03]

1. The top punch's diameter may be too large and not allowing the boolit to enter the die to the correct depth, i.e. using a top punch designed for a .44 caliber boolits with a .358" die.

My money is on this one!!

[leftiye]

Lube waay too soft, pressure therefore proportionately too high. It's lube pressure pushing the lube under the boolit when the boolit no longer grips the bore of the die. Especially when that much lube is being pushed out.

[Silver Hand]

My Lyman dies also have the 14 hole arrangement. You might try going down a little further with the boolit since you are only getting the bottom groove lubed. Some other things that might help are to hold pressure on the operating handle while you tighten down the ratchet just a little and maybe add a little heat to the sizer so the lube flows a little easier.

Thanks for letting me know about your die with 14 holes. Getting that out of the way helped a lot.

[Silver Hand]

Lube waay too soft, pressure therefore proportionately too high. It's lube pressure pushing the lube under the boolit when the boolit no longer grips the bore of the die. Especially when that much lube is being pushed out.

As a matter of fact the lube was changed recently for the sole purpose of ridding my self of some RCBS green. I use this soft lube for large slow pistol boolits.
Wile working out the problems, Original this was my first concern. It is part of the problem! You are correct in that.
The thing I was missing wile trying to use brass tools and the wrong top punch was the boolit seats at or below the top of the sizer die [old eyes].
I found that last night using another cast slug of the same size on top of the original Flat nose Boolit seated in the die. I could press the boolit seated in the die about 1/8'' further down into the die, wile fine tuning the die. I do still have lube under the gas check from time to time, Not as bad as it was in the beginning. Finally the feel is right and I did get a few Boolits that had the normal dab on the check. Almost like a tick with no gobs on the base when removed but clean.
The top four holes are open the remaining ten holes below are full of bird shot to slow the flow.
I will change back to a hard Lube when I have the correct top punch and remove the shot from the die.


I just realized tonight what was wrong with the RCBS lube. In the above post it flowed like warm butter. Therefor my rant.
Tonight I was using the same 450 Lyman Lube sizer for some 9mm 124 gr boolits dropped from an rcbs 09 124 mould. I realized something - I had cleaned and lubricated this Lube sizer [I have two] a wile back with some CLP Brake Free. Several drops made it into the sizer and down into the lube, turning the lube into a sticky mess. So little was needed for those .25 cal. Boolits my problem became compounded the more time went by.
I would like to apologize for my statement regarding the RCBS Green lube. It worked fine this evening for four hundred boolits.