Lyman 310 - 380 ACP - need help

[Pressman]

Maybe this will help, 310 instructions from the Ideal Handbook #42, 1960.
Ken

[nitro-express]

I'm not a user of the 310, more a collector and dabbler. I've assembled sets for different calibers from my collection of odd dies. And when I look at the pictures, I can see that the KF-23 is too long to work with your expanding plug. The expanding plug will have to stick out the bottom by a fair amount to work.

I'll have to search for my info, but the KF- dies came in several lengths. BTW, AFAIK, KF dies were the work of Lysle Kilbourn, hence stamped with the K. Unfortunately in my collection I only have KF-20 and KF-23's, and both of those are too long for a standard length expanding stem to work for the 380.

If I were to take a WAG, I'd say for the 380, Lyman probably used a stem similar to the one on the 45 ACP, and it would have been fully threaded to let it sit deeper in the die and still have the lock ring work.



The 45 Auto is the top die, notice the die body has a knurled top, to make it slightly longer in the threads than the KF-23 (the lower 357 expander).

[sambeaux]

The manual page was helpful, but did not resolve my problem. The explanation above is VERY helpful. I've contacted the 310 shop regarding either the correct expander die or a longer expander plug. Thank you so much for that, I was losing hope.