Lyman sizer and boolit coating didn't get along together

[ghh3rd]

I cast a few hundred LEE 452-230-RN today (first boolits from this mold) and coated them with Hi-Tek. I seemed to be on a roll with Hi-Tek, two nice thin coats resulted in a nice coating that passed the rub and smash tests.

I realized that my only .452 sizer is the one in in my Lyman 4500 lube sizer. I cleaned out the die and sized the first boolit and it took quite a bit of the coating off. In fact it's strange that it took the same width of coating equally spaced in four places around the boolit. By the way, the pic is one of the only two rejects (rounded edge on bottom) from the entire session. That mold likes it 800 F.



I'll be buying a Lee push through sizer and hoping for the best.

Randy

[Beagle333]

Now that is interesting. I have never tried shoving one down in a Lyman size die.
Didn't somebody here make or offer a longer top punch that will let you pull out the "I" part of the die and shove the boolit all the way through, nose first?

[Grmps]

kind of looks like you tried to push a round peg through a square hole.
The Hi-Tek coating looks to me like you swirled it a little long and got a grainy finish which is not good for adhesion, the bullet also looks like it was scraped by a very rough surface.
Curious about the 800*, I have a Lee 452-230-tc 6 cavity that drops nicely @680*

[TexasGrunt]

Get a NOE. You'll thank me later.

[OS OK]

kind of looks like you tried to push a round peg through a square hole.
The Hi-Tek coating looks to me like you swirled it a little long and got a grainy finish which is not good for adhesion, the bullet also looks like it was scraped by a very rough surface.
Curious about the 800*, I have a Lee 452-230-tc 6 cavity that drops nicely @680*

That's what I saw too...why would that die do that in 4 equidistant places on the cast?

Would you 'mic' that one in the picture across the scrapes and across the areas that didn't touch the die? Tell us what it measures...

I think that cast has more symptoms than the scraping shown there. If the die is round then the cast is not...or vise versa. What does the interior of the die look like?

[ghh3rd]

I'll check measurements and let you know... I did see a thread where someone claimed that the lube holes caused damage, and there are four sets of holes, but they aren't as wide as the damage on my boolit.

[Silverboolit]

This happened to me, also. The lube holes in the die galled up with lead and put the same marks on my .452 boolits. Seems that the Lee sizer is the way to go for PC coating.

[waco]

Did you lube the die after you cleaned it and before you ran the boolit through it?
H&I dies DO NOT like to be ran "dry"
Waco

[murf205]

Did you lube the die after you cleaned it and before you ran the boolit through it?
H&I dies DO NOT like to be ran "dry"
Waco

Amen to that. I had to put a coating of light machine oil(3 IN 1) on my pc'd boolits to get them through my Lyman but in the end I went with a Lee sizer. It (the Lee) came to me @.4515 instead of .452 but a split oak 3/8" dowel with some fine grit paper-250 I believe- brought it to .452 very quickly, indicating a fairly soft metal.

[jimb16]

I use both Lyman and RCBS dies all the time and don't have any problems. I suggest you do a quick polish on the inside of the die. It look like the problem is on the shoulder of the interior sizing section.

[upnorthwis]

The only sizing my PC boolits get is from the taper crimp die. Am shooting the Lee TL-126-RN in a S&W M&P, Smoke's yellow, and use the shake and bake method. My oven has done more batches of PC than food.

[murf205]

The only sizing my PC boolits get is from the taper crimp die. Am shooting the Lee TL-126-RN in a S&W M&P, Smoke's yellow, and use the shake and bake method. My oven has done more batches of PC than food.

You mean people actually cook FOOD in these things????

[ghh3rd]

The finish in that pic looks much rougher than it really is, although I do have a hard time deciding when to shop shaking the boolits. When I coated some in a more shallow square plastic box the change in sound was unmistakable. The container that I have started using is round and about 6" wide, and about 12" tall. It seems much harder to hear when the sound changes, but it is much easier to get good coverage with it.

One thing that I recalled doing with that Lyman sizer when I was cleaning out the Felix lube was using an allen wrench to push lube out of the holes. Perhaps I damaged the holes, although I wasn't rough. I will polish the inside of the die ... not sure the best way to do so though. Next time I'll be sure to use a wooden skewer if I need to clean out the holes.

I bought a Lee .452 push through sizer yesterday. Iit worked fine with these boolits, and I am ready to load.

[Beagle333]

Glad you got a die that works. I don't know how you got damage that wide on the boolit either, but it would appear that a little polishing is in order before using that one again.

[ghh3rd]

Actually I figured out that I pushed that boolit through a few times at different spots so the scrape is wider. When I tried again after posting originally, the scrapes were just about as wide as the lube holes.

[Grmps]

Swirling Hi-Tek coating, go no more than 20 seconds. The bullets should be damp when dumped onto the drying screen. When the sound starts to change you've actually gone too long.
take the die apart and boiling it, getting all the lube out. then if it looks rough, wrap a dowl with 600grit sandpaper, slid through the die and roll it on your leg. Check it often, when it starts looking smooth, switch to 1000 grit until your done. this is also how to enlarge a lee push through dies, instead of visual inspection test the die and when it get close to the desired diameter swith to 1000 grit

[ghh3rd]

I will make a note of the 20 seconds. They may not be perfect, but they are tough!

[ioon44]

If they are not perfect, they are close. Nice looking bullets, that is about what my Candy Apple red look's like.

[TexasGrunt]

Ambient temperature makes a HUGE difference in the time it takes the solvent to evaporate. Here in Texas I have to use a lid on my container. Without a lid the acetone lasts about 10 seconds at the most. With a lid I can get 15 or so seconds.

If I can get 12-15 seconds I'm happy and the bullets look great. I just use the 2 qt paint containers from Home Despot or Lowe's. Just make sure to buy the lids the same place as the containers as they are all not compatible at all.