Custom fit bottom punch for sizer die

[Patrick L]

I thought I read somewhere that the cure for excess lube mess when sizing bevel base bullets is to get a bottom punch that is cupped so that it fits the base of the bullet, thereby eliminating the hollow space the lube flows into. I recently sized a bunch of Lee .45 SWC bullets and forgot what a mess that is. Alternately putting pressure on and off the lube reservoir gets old real fast too.

Where do you get these punches ? Or do you have to fabricate your own ?

[arkypete]

Patrick
I had thought about doing the same thing, except having the bottom punch to fit the shank of a GC'd bullet.
I size most all of my handgun bullets on a Star sizer and don't use bevel based bullets, it's not much of an issue for me.
Jim

[454PB]

I made some center punches as you describe, and they really made no difference in lube leakage. The culprit is usually a poorly fit nose punch. If the nose punch "grabs" the nose, it raises it slightly off of the center punch on the up stroke allowing lube to flow under the base. The solution is to use a nose punch that fits loosely enough to prevent this problem.

[dragonrider]

I have altered the bottom punch on one die and it worked for me, can't say it's a cure for all.

[Buckshot]

..............Try putting a GC on the ejector pin (cup up) to keep excess lube off the BB. Yup, the GC WILL come out with a boolit every now and then. If you don't hold your mouth right, it may even come out with the slug EVERY time :-) but I've not had that happen.

454PB thinking outside the box! Ya know I never thought of that :-). I only have a couple BB designs and never really had problems with lube under the boolits' base though. It was just there at the curve on the outside edge.

................Buckshot

[Patrick L]

454PB, I'm not so sure I agree with your analysis. The lube isn't under the bullet, it flows into the hollow formed between the bevel of the bullet, the sides of the sizing die, and the flat top of the bottom punch.

Dragonrider, how did you alter the punch ?

[dragonrider]

On my lathe, picture the bottom of the bullet in reverse. I try to post a pic of it later today

[dragonrider]

I tried reapeatedly to get a good photo of this size die but I'm an not photographer and my cameral does not get got close ups, I think it's me. Anyway this is the best I got.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/0603/PaulGauthier/size%20die%20alteration/sizediealteration012.jpg
you can see two inner circles the smaller of the two is a releife cut only the next larger one is the angle I cut into the pin that matches the angle on the boolit. It helped a lot but I think I can do better with a differnt angle. When i get to it I will also try for better photos