Lee Carbide Die scratched 38 Special

[afish4570]

First experience with a carbide die getting scratched. Tried to clean it up with a small piece of real fine emery cloth in cordless drill......no success. Any other options? Not sure what could have caused this. Some nickle 38 shells are in the mix....all have been washed and tumbled as is my usual procedure. What is hard enough to scratch? afish4570

[dudel]

Just take out the decapping rod, and clean it with a patch and suitable bore brush. You're not likely to scratch the carbide. If you get some grit between the carbide and the brass, the brass is going to get the damage before the carbide.

I suspect the die got past Lee quality control with the scratch. I'd send it back to Lee. They will make good on it.

[Wayne Smith]

If the carbide ring itself is scratched 99% chance it came from Lee that way. Send it back.

[Guesser]

+1 on all said above. My experience is that carbide will shatter before it gets a scratch. Call Lee, email Lee.

[afish4570]

+1 on all said above. My experience is that carbide will shatter before it gets a scratch. Call Lee, email Lee.

Die has been is use for years, now scratching cases despite my trying to cleanup....I will try alittle JB Bore Comp. on an Kroil saturated patch and a 1000 rpm elec. drill instead of the slower cordless drill.... I suspect nickle cases are the cause. Despite being washed and tumbled.afish4570

[HATCH]

I have scratched a few carbide sizers from dirty brass. You can get flitz metal polish and just polish the inside.
I suspect you got a piece of sand on a piece of brass and it scratched the die.

[jimofaz]

Agree with other responders advising to sending it back to LEE. Failing that, I have diamond past lapping compounds of various micron particle size specifically for use with carbide, along with adjustable bronze cylindrical laps that I could help you out with. Easier for both of us if LEE does a warranty replacement! BTW - there are a multitude of carbide grades from which LEE could have chosen. Given the thinness of the insert ring and the amount of die steel support surrounding it, I believe LEE would NOT have chosen the harder variety like the very hard close grain CD650 grade often used for low cut clearance tool & die pierce punches. This grade would be less likely to scratch, but would shatter in a heartbeat if excessive radial expansion pressure were applied. It is possible that a single tiny piece of silica sand on one case could have caused the scratch in your LEE carbide die, especially if a 'softer' (relatively speaking now!) grade of carbide was used.

[mdi]

Be careful with the higher speed drill. Easy to heat up the carbide ring from a faster polishing and crack it...

[afish4570]

Be careful with the higher speed drill. Easy to heat up the carbide ring from a faster polishing and crack it...

Just took a piece of coat hangar wire, twisted it to form a loop and put a piece of emery cloth in loop to tightly fit in die. Drill was a 3/8 with fixed speed and RPM's not marked on drill. Die got warm to touch and I set it outside to cool off slowly (45 degrees to day). Reassembled and ran 20 shells thru and it seems ok...... If it happens again I will change my tumbling media and run the batch thru again for 15 mins.,reclean & polish die and try again......Thanks for the input. The cases were lightly lubed with spray Hornady Case lube.afish4570

[bangerjim]

About the only thing that will scratch carbide is diamond. If a low grade carbide, you might be able to inflict a scratch on it if you reeeeeeely try. Highly unlikely under standard conditions.

I have never scratched carbide anything and I use 100% carbide cuting tools in all my metal and wood working machines. And all LEE dies. I sharpen them with a diamond imprenated steel wheel. You can barely touch carbide with emory cloth....it is silicon carbide itself!

A green stone on a grinder will "sharpen" ( actually ruin completely) carbide lathe tools! Only diamonds will cut it right.

If you "fixed" your scratch with only emory cloth and a drill, it must have been a very teeny weeny scratch! Or you definitely changed the size of your die considerably with your home-made reamer on your drill.

I would have contacted Lee as I suspect it came scratched from the factory.

banger-j

[country gent]

Since you seem to have "fixed it now you need to check the sized cases in your firearms to insure they are sized enough to function correctly. If nickel plating on brass is peeling the edge could possibly scratch ( or trimmed brass that isnt deburred properly) Carbide is very hard and is hard to scratch. Diamond lapping compound will polish it but also requires some patience. Removing to much material will be an issue. A small chip in the radious of the opening will scratch also and is more likely.

[EDG]

Your die probably has a bit of dirty brass galled (cold welded) to it. For carbide to work at its best at least keep the brass clean and free of dust and dirt. It hurts nothing to use a tiny bit of lube on one case in 20.
Highjacked from Wiki
Tungsten carbide is approximately two times stiffer than steel, with a Young's modulus of approximately 550 GPa,^[6] and is much denser than steel or titanium. It is comparable with corundum (α-Al₂O₃), sapphire and ruby in hardness and can only be polished and finished with abrasives of superior hardness such as cubic boron nitride and diamond, in the form of powder, wheels, and compounds.

To polish out that galled on brass soak it in Hoppes for a day or two and then polish if the Hoppes left anything
Otherwise a guy with a lathe can polish it out in about 30 seconds. However you don't actually polish tungsten carbide unless you use a diamond abrasive. The polishing just knocks off the stuff stuck to the carbide.

Die has been is use for years, now scratching cases despite my trying to cleanup....I will try alittle JB Bore Comp. on an Kroil saturated patch and a 1000 rpm elec. drill instead of the slower cordless drill.... I suspect nickle cases are the cause. Despite being washed and tumbled.afish4570

[fredj338]

If the carbide ring itself is scratched 99% chance it came from Lee that way. Send it back.

^^THIS^^ You aren't going to fix a carbide burr on a die w/o the right polishing gear. It's just Lee QC, Send it back.

[leeggen]

I beleive EDG is probably correct as to the scratch(galled nickel). Worked with carbide for many years and it is normally a galled metal stuck to carbide rather than a scratch. Only you can se it so as long as you have fixed it then problem solved.
CD

[MtGun44]

Another vote for no scratch on die, but a piece of brass galled to it
that needed to be polished off. You cannot scratch carbide with brass
or a piece of sand, but stuff can get microwelded to it. You polished
off whatever was sticking to the carbide and are good to go.

[afish4570]

Another vote for no scratch on die, but a piece of brass galled to it
that needed to be polished off. You cannot scratch carbide with brass
or a piece of sand, but stuff can get microwelded to it. You polished
off whatever was sticking to the carbide and are good to go.

Being that carbide is so difficult to scratch, I must have gotten a piece of nickle imbedded onto the carbide. When a chucked a piece of copper Chore Girl in drill wrapped around an old brush I saw the copper color So far so good. Thanks for the responses. afish4570

[jcwit]

A scratch will likely not produce a scratch. A scratch is a depression in a surface, how can a depression create a depression?????

[bedbugbilly]

Can't add anything other than it isn't the nickel casings doing it. I use a Lee die on all my 38s - both brass and nickel - and the nickel has never been nor caused any problems. I'm the "red headed step child" as I like the nickel as much as I do the brass.

If you feel your die is no longer any good - either call Lee or order a new one from Titan who is a sponsor here. A lot of folks don't clean their dies as often as they should. With brass that may not be cleaned, it's pretty easy to pick up dirt, etc. that could accumulate and scratch the casings. I have heard of carbide rings breaking but never "galling".

Good luck - call Lee and see what they have to say.

[Bullwolf]

I actually had something similar happen while sizing 38 Special nickel plated cases.

The cases were not tumbled, but had been cleaned with a hot water Lemishine/Dishsoap wash prior to sizing with my RCBS 38/357 carbide sizing die.

This set of dies has previously sized MANY un-lubed brass and nickel plated cases with no problems whatsoever.

I dunno if this was related or not, but I had some Lemon Pledge over spray on the nickel plated cases while cleaning off the wooden top of my load bench.

Figured the Pledge wouldn't hurt anything, and might even make things easier. Unfortunately while sizing the nickel plated cases, you could feel something wrong (galling) while the dies left scratches in the nickel plated cases. The dies would leave vertical (up and down) scratch marks all the way around the cases on any brass or nickel plated cases that I sized after.

I thought I had scratched and ruined the hard carbide sizing ring in the dies. I know carbide is stupidly hard, and generally takes something like diamond compound to lap out.

Now figuring I had nothing to lose, as RCBS would likely replace the die for me... I chucked a split dowel into the drill press, and used some JB bore paste on a paper towel to clean up the carbide ring. After that I did a final clean and polish with a dab of Flitz metal polish on a paper towel.

Presto, no more nickel imbedded in the carbide sizing die, and my RCBS dies once again size cases just fine - without leaving scratches in them.

So my dies were likely never scratched at all, and likely just had some nickel plating stuck or imbedded in them.

Maybe my experience will help shed some light on your issue as well.



- Bullwolf