Lets discuss the topic of Roll Crimping lots to here need to get it all in one place.

[Ranch Dog]

Then back to the press to seat the wad and apply 40-50 lbs of pressure on it.

While I wait for some instructions on the crimp die setup from MEC, I've been working with the other side of the press. The instructions I do have with the Slugger say not to use more than 20 lbs with any wad or sabot. That mirrors the instructions in my Deluxe Lee Loader Kit which states 18 to 20 lbs. Funny thing about the MEC is that the scale on the force indicator starts at 30, but the indicator must move a bit to get there. I'm using clear hulls and what I saw at 30 lbs is that the STI does start to compress, enough to notice with the eye or by comparison with another uncompressed hull in a clear hull. So I have applied only enough pressure to start to move the force indicator.

The Slugger instructions favor the skived hulls over non-skived. I will be in a meeting most of the day; I hope I can get in a call to MEC about the setup of the crimp dies. I had hoped to shoot tomorrow as my hogs are still waiting.

[Petander]

[Hogtamer]

Randy, I think one of the main factors with roll crimping is thickness of the hull wall. Hulls vary from .027 to .030 though the information is hard to find. Skivved hull allow for an easier tight fold crimp but I think that thinning on the end is detrimental to a good rool crimp. I notice paper hulls are .035 wall thickness and are the easiest of all to roll. These old winchester hulls have been rolled and fired at least twice with my hot Zinc slug load and show no signs of wear. The cheap cheddite and federals all look like the right pic of RD's BPI roll crimped load in a previous post and are of the thin wall skivved variety. I use the Precision reloading tool on all, so the only obvious difference is the thickness of the hull walls.

[Hogtamer]

Randy, I think one of the main factors with roll crimping is thickness of the hull wall. Hulls vary from .027 to .030 though the information is hard to find. Skivved hull allow for an easier tight fold crimp but I think that thinning on the end is detrimental to a good rool crimp. I notice paper hulls are .035 wall thickness and are the easiest of all to roll. These old winchester hulls have been rolled and fired at least twice with my hot Zinc slug load and show no signs of wear. The cheap cheddite and federals all look like the right pic of RD's BPI roll crimped load in a previous post and are of the thin wall skivved variety. I use the Precision reloading tool on all, so the only obvious difference is the thickness of the hull walls.

[copdills]

good looking crimp Longbow

[Cap'n Morgan]

On bench press drills, the depth of the crimp can often be adjusted. I never use collapsible wads and just crimp until I feel resistance, but if non-solid wads are used, the depth of the crimp (or total length) is very important as deeper seating of the payload will increase pressure - sometimes dramatically so with the faster burning powders.

[W.R.Buchanan]

MY Pacific DL266's wad pressure gauge starts at 30 but it takes almost no effort to go to 40 or 50. I have used mostly Claybuster WAA12 clones, and the stroke is set for them. I have to watch the pressure gauge to make sure I don't collapse on longer wad/payloads. Squished one and had to take it apart and waste the hull. No biggie but better if you don't do it in the first place.

All of the rotary Crimp tools I am seeing are built the same way with the exception of how many bumps they have. The BPI I have has 1, I heard they have a new one that has 2, Capt Morgans has 3, I have seen 4 somewhere, the Lyman and Longbows have 6 and most of the crank styles have none. So I guess the jury is out on that feature.

The MEC Slugger has 3 progressive dies and no rotation. I would expect that Federal and Winchester have dies like that incorporated into the Slug Loading Machine, as I don't see the need for rotating the tool if you can get good crimps out of not rotation the tool. If they do it in a progressive manner then it is just 2-3 more stations on the machine and since it is a progressive machine every stroke produces a loaded round.

Morgan's pics tell alot of the story. the BPI Roller uses a Roll Pin as the bump. It is strait thus the flat top edge on my crimps. Longbow had the good sense to make his pins with a radius cut into them and his tool rolls a radius on the hull. This way seems like it would also be a much smoother running operation than having to go around square corners.

See I told you there was alot to know here.

Randy

[gpidaho]

Randy: I think it would be good to take Scott up on his offer to hook you up with a Lyman tool. The one he sent me was a big improvement over the one pin model sold buy BPI. As I've said I also picked up the two pin model, BPI's improved version, and it too is a step up but I'm really liking the Lyman six pin version. Now, just to slow the spin rate way down. Gp

[trapper9260]

May I ask how much of the I call the tail of the hull to be crimp do you keep to roll it to the lenght you want.Like you want a 2 3/4" hull what should you have the total lenght ?

[toallmy]

I'm loving this thread , keep going gentlemen . I thought I was the only person in the world that liked to roll crimp a hull .

[toallmy]

Around a half inch of the hull goes in a standard fold crimp so a 2 3/4 hull is around 2 1/4 loaded . If you want to load the same stack height of components with a roll crimp you need to remove around a 1/4 inch of the 2 3/4 hull so the load will fit nicely , and usually that takes care of the the thinner part of the hull . But honestly you just use some scrap hulls to get the feel of the amount to trim off .

[trapper9260]

Around a half inch of the hull goes in a standard fold crimp so a 2 3/4 hull is around 2 1/4 loaded . If you want to load the same stack height of components with a roll crimp you need to remove around a 1/4 inch of the 2 3/4 hull so the load will fit nicely , and usually that takes care of the the thinner part of the hull . But honestly you just use some scrap hulls to get the feel of the amount to trim off .

Thank you that will help alot I was not sure but that is about what I was doing is take off about 1/4" of the hull.For what you stated help alot on this for the different ga's I load for.

[toallmy]

Thank you that will help alot I was not sure but that is about what I was doing is take off about 1/4" of the hull.For what you stated help alot on this for the different ga's I load for.

What are you making shorter a 10 gage ?

[W.R.Buchanan]

Randy: I think it would be good to take Scott up on his offer to hook you up with a Lyman tool. The one he sent me was a big improvement over the one pin model sold buy BPI. As I've said I also picked up the two pin model, BPI's improved version, and it too is a step up but I'm really liking the Lyman six pin version. Now, just to slow the spin rate way down. Gp

Already did. Thanks.

I also want to know how well the Crank Type Roll Crimpers work. Has anyone got one that can talk about it. Seems like they should work as they were the normal way of crimping shot shells for along time.

[gpidaho]

Yes Randy, I have the Russian roll crimpers. (Told you I was a gadget lover) The hand crank style. I really like it, it makes a very good looking crimp. One thing I don't care for is that to me, it should be mounted vertical to keep the shot from spilling when loading shot and not slugs or round balls. This can be done but it feels awkward to me and the clamp doesn't lock the tool down tight enough to suit me. Still in all, I believe it to be well worth the asking price. Gp

[W.R.Buchanan]

GP: I thought the same thing about the horizontal mounting. I figured someone would clamp it to something a vertical and get around that. I guess it is easier to crank like that.

But you say it makes a decent crimp so it starts to become more obvious that between one of these tools and a MEC Slugger that rotation speed or none at all, are interchangeable.

I will try slower speeds on the mill and see what happens.

Randy

[Ranch Dog]

...then to seat the STI Slug/Sabot combo I used a wad guide ( A MEC I think)I had in my Lee Loader Kit with my little Sinclair Arbor Press to shove the whole mess thru the mouth of the hull. No way was it going in without a wad guide. I had to use a .40 S&W case as a spacer to get the slug past the the fingers on the wad guide.

I have found the BPI Spin Doc useful for ironing out both the star and roll crimps, but only in conjuction with the Lee Load-All sizing ring. I came up with using the sizing ring as it was laying on the bench next to me, without it the Doc, didn't do a thing. I actually think the Spin Doc could be heated with a light flame from a propane torch and be just as effective.

I hold the top of the sizing ring slightly above the mouth of the hull and bring the Spin Doc down into the hull.





Roll crimps from the Lightfields are ironed completely out.

[longbow]

On the number of pins... when I switched to the Federal field hulls and had trouble with roll crimps I took 3 pins out of my roll crimper leaving 3 pins in. Made no difference I could tell.

I checked hull thickness and concluded I needed a bit more internal clearance so turned the inner piece down a little then put all 6 pins back and had good roll crimps again.

My gut feeling is 3 pins minimum because 3 points make a plane... keeps the roll crimper sitting square on the mouth of the hull.

Just my thought.

Longbow

[tomme boy]

Since no one has answered the ? I asked earlier I will attempt to ask it another way.

How does the roll crimp effect the load pressures after the hull has been loaded a couple times? Have you seen the pressures stay the same or have they dropped or raised? Or did accuracy suffer from loading the hulls more than say 2 times?

[elvas]

For a crimp like this:
http://www.gameandfishmag.com/editor...hotgun/245179#
You have to get a crimper like this:
http://www.siarm.com/product_info.ph...roducts_id=306