Oh Boy Duex !!!

[Bret4207]

He got me at the post office this time. CH Swage-o-matic with 30 and 44 (I think) dies and an ancient Lyman #45 sizer. Clean living is paying off guys!

[Bret4207]

Make that 30, 357 and 44 dies. Need an ejetor stem for the 30 but the rest is there. Anyone have instructions or a supply source for this stuff? Does Corbins or RCE stuff fit?

[Bent Ramrod]

Bret,

I'm kind of guessing here, as I've never used a Swag-O-Matic press myself. However, I've read some of the rather gushy literature on the subject of half-jacket bullet swaging when they first became popular, and I once owned a Herter's 9-Ton Half-Jacket Swaging Press that as far as I could see worked on the same principle.

Screw the top punch (in its holder) into the top of the press. The adjustment of this punch up or down in the holder controls the size (length) of the bullet. The shape of the inner cavity of the punch determines the nose style of the bullet. (Most of the ones I've seen were semiwadcutter.) Check and make sure none of these punches are bent, dinged or swollen; just a little out of concentric and they'll score the dies. (If you bought that lathe, you ought to be able to make replacements using the damaged originals as models.)

The die and a bottom punch for ejection is dropped into the ram and held there with a knurled collar which works like the collar around a Lyman 450 bullet sizing die. When the ram is pulled back down, the ejector pin should come up to the top of the die, ejecting the bullet.

Caveats: The Swag-O-Matic frame is cast aluminum, so cut your wire or cast your pure lead slugs very close to finished weight so only a little bit has to bleed out. The article in the first Handloader's Digest said the Swag-O-Matic was very reliable (the author was Kent Bellah, an expert swager), unlike the Herter's cast-iron copy, which broke its frame after 15 or so bullets. Still, It does no good to apply enormous pressures for no reason. You probably won't be able to anyway; the lever pulls up instead of pushing down and has only the simple linkage rather than the RCBS compound linkage. You'll probably lift your reloading bench off the floor if you pull up too hard.

Also, the Swag-O-Matic die body bleeds out the side. This is a great advantage if you are swaging cores to size, as the bled-off tit gets sheared off when the core is ejected, but in a jacketed bullet die it is a real design flaw. It limits you to jackets that don't extend above the bleed hole, i.e., half-jackets. You will always have a band of unlubricated lead above the jacket, which promotes leading. C-H offered a cannelure tool (Corbin's has one, too) that cut a lube/crimp groove anywhere along the bullet the operator wanted; something like this would help a bunch.

The half-jacket cups were offered by Speer, Lachmiller, Bahler, Lakeville Arms and Herter's. You can sometimes find a box or two of them at gun shows, generally for cheap. Corbin might still make some; you'd have to ask. They will not be cheap; if you're incensed at gas check prices, make sure you're seated before you check bullet jacket prices. Do some depth measurements on your dies so you don't get them made too tall.

The half-jacket pistol bullet was kind of a flash in the pan, as for most people they couldn't be driven at the blistering velocities that were advertised without leading. The die sets made for this kind of swaging had low price as their major virtue; check the diameters and see what you have. I used my Herter's .22 half-jacket bullets for my .22 Jet revolver in my feckless (and micrometerless) youth because they printed nice circular holes in targets and "blew up stuff real neat," so it was a while before I found out the extra "whap" I was hearing over the already earsplitting noise of the Jet was probably due to the .226+" bullet slamming into the forcing cone and sizing down to .222" behind maybe 30,000 lbs of pressure. I didn't get any leading though, either in the Jet or the .22 Hornet I had at the time, so the loads must have been pretty moderate. I stopped using the Herter's 9-Ton press because it depended on a hardened washer that I kept breaking and having to replace. It was a knockoff of the Mity Mite, a much stouter piece of work, with better leverage than the Swag-O-Matic copy was.

I like to mess with old equipment of this type pour le sport, to expand my manufacturing knowledge and get into the flavor of the old days, but the sad fact is that with jackets being as expensive as bulk jacketed bullets and the half-jacket problem posed by this technology, the stuff isn't all that practical. But, who needs practical anyway? It is fun, so let us know how they shoot.

[Bent Ramrod]

Oh, forgot to add that you need some swaging lube. Lanolin is supposed to work, but Corbin's swage lube is always what I've used, with entire satisfaction. Put a few drops on a piece of cotton sock and knead the jackets in the cloth. Only a little lube is needed.

[felix]

Corbin's lube is/was 50-50 lanolin and mineral oil. ... felix

[Swagerman]

Hey, Bret4207! How about some pictures of that thing-a-bob from C-H yester year...love to see one. :)

Jim

[Bret4207]

One of these days I'll take some pics when I can pry the digital away from the kids. I need pics of this stuff, the gun shed, my ugly guns, all sorts of stuff. Matter of time.

I used to shoot scads of half jacket 146 gr hp swc's, Speers I think, in my M-19. Loved them! Then the reality of family life hit and I turned to cast almost exclusively. I never had a leading problem and I pushed them hard, between 14-1500 fps with a big dose of 2400 IIRC. That gun is still as tight as a drum.

My intentions are to use the Swage-o-matic more for noe forming and "bumping" than anything else. I'll keep and eye open for jackets and dies thoguh. Might need them some day.

CH4D doesn't carry dies like mine anymore, but they, Corbin and RDE do carry enough stuff to make things interesting. I really would like to try making 22 jackets from RF brass. Maybe gas checks too.

Thanks for the help guys.

[woody1]

Bret, I'm coming a little late to this thread but have been gone. I have in my "stuff" 3 boxes of 250 each of Speer 38 cal. half jackets, a box of 250 Speer 30 cal half jackets and a box marked "650 pcs. copper jackets for swaging bullets .22 cal, 650 x .705" The 22's are about .223-4 dia. and .705 long. I have no use for them. I think they came to me in a deal I made for part of an old gunsmith's shop. If you want 'em I'm sure we can come up with an amicable swap. Let me know and they'll be in the mail. Regards, Woody