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Thread: When Things Go Wrong

  1. #1
    Boolit Buddy
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    When Things Go Wrong

    Greetings,

    After 25 years of swaging, I finally joined the "I broke a die club".

    Good news is it broke in such a way to show the internal finish and bleed hole.

    Cheers,

    Dave

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  2. #2
    Boolit Master



    Dieselhorses's Avatar
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    How did you do that?
    The unexamined life is not worth living....Socrates
    Pain, is just weakness leaving the body....USMC
    Fast is fine, but accuracy is FINAL!....Wyatt Earp

  3. #3
    Boolit Grand Master Harter66's Avatar
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    That's odd , especially in a straight wall steel die .

    Pain is weakness leaving .......this 5? arthritis is going to just add another Greek to my list below .
    In the time of darkest defeat,our victory may be nearest. Wm. McKinley.

    I was young and stupid then I'm older now. Me 1992 .

    Richard Lee Hart 6/29/39-7/25/18


    Without trial we cannot learn and grow . It is through our stuggles that we become stronger .
    Brother I'm going to be Pythagerus , DiVinci , and Atlas all rolled into one soon .

  4. #4
    Boolit Buddy
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    Greetings,

    I am not, nor do I have the access to, a Material Scientist that can analyze the fracture to determine what caused the fault.

    Personally??? I think it was a crack that developed in the heat treat process. Again, I have no resources to do magnetic particle inspection.

    What was I doing when it failed???

    I was swaging 99 grain 25:1 Lead:Tin slugs into 98 grain HBWC bullets. I heard a "crack" during one press cycle and thought I broke a link pin. Taking the linkage apart all looked well and I continued. The second bullet went "crack" and the die was now visibly damaged. I needed a small strap wrench to remove the two halves.

    The die was machined from O-1 tool steel and tempered to 62 HRC. I might try a piece of A-6 or A-10, if I have any left in the shop. At least a less severe quench.

    My press is the Corbin S Silver model I bought back in the mid '90's.

    Cheers,

    Dave

  5. #5
    Boolit Buddy
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    I broke a couple of corbins years ago. they broke the same way. too much pressure or weak from a lot of use.

  6. #6
    Boolit Buddy M.A.D's Avatar
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    I guess im lucky, I get all my lead from the 22 section of the shooting gallery. Ive heard allot of horror stories of guys swaging alloyed lead and popping dies..

  7. #7
    Boolit Buddy
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    Greetings,

    I also buy salvage 22lr metal. Oddly, it is harder than 25:1 alloy.

    If I mix the salvage metal 50:50 with pure Lead, it swages a bit better.

    The Lead:Tin alloys actually flow better for forming the Hollow Base bullets.

    Cheers,

    Dave

  8. #8
    Boolit Mold
    Join Date
    Jul 2014
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    12
    Quote Originally Posted by fc60 View Post
    Greetings,

    I am not, nor do I have the access to, a Material Scientist that can analyze the fracture to determine what caused the fault.

    Personally??? I think it was a crack that developed in the heat treat process. Again, I have no resources to do magnetic particle inspection.

    What was I doing when it failed???

    I was swaging 99 grain 25:1 Lead:Tin slugs into 98 grain HBWC bullets. I heard a "crack" during one press cycle and thought I broke a link pin. Taking the linkage apart all looked well and I continued. The second bullet went "crack" and the die was now visibly damaged. I needed a small strap wrench to remove the two halves.

    The die was machined from O-1 tool steel and tempered to 62 HRC. I might try a piece of A-6 or A-10, if I have any left in the shop. At least a less severe quench.

    My press is the Corbin S Silver model I bought back in the mid '90's.

    Cheers,

    Dave
    Have any closer up or high res photos? But it does look like it is from heat treat from my experience with tool steels breaking.

    I would try D2 if you have the ability to heat treat that material. It is a bit more forgiving to cracking in the 58-62 HRc range.

  9. #9
    Boolit Buddy
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    Greetings jmcburn,

    Thanks for the alloy suggestion. However, my furnace is old and I limit the temperature to 1600 degrees F.

    I may machine a replacement out of A6 as I have some stock remaining from a previous project.

    I have been using O1 for years and I suspect this die failed the quench.

    As far as high resolution photos, I do not have a suitable camera.

    Many thanks,

    Dave

  10. #10
    Boolit Master
    alfloyd's Avatar
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    Another suggestion would be to NOT knurl the outside of the die. Knurling makes stress spots in the body and helps to make it crack on quenching. Don't ask me how I found that out .

    Lafaun
    Just staying at home and playing with multi-color boolits.

  11. #11
    Boolit Master



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    I've seen the last threads on splitting dies, I'm currently making a core sizing die and was wondering if 2 or 3 bleed holes would be better, although I'm only using pure lead for cores.

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Abbreviations used in Reloading

BP Bronze Point IMR Improved Military Rifle PTD Pointed
BR Bench Rest M Magnum RN Round Nose
BT Boat Tail PL Power-Lokt SP Soft Point
C Compressed Charge PR Primer SPCL Soft Point "Core-Lokt"
HP Hollow Point PSPCL Pointed Soft Point "Core Lokt" C.O.L. Cartridge Overall Length
PSP Pointed Soft Point Spz Spitzer Point SBT Spitzer Boat Tail
LRN Lead Round Nose LWC Lead Wad Cutter LSWC Lead Semi Wad Cutter
GC Gas Check