Stinkin' O Rings

[possom813]

I haven't been able to sleep tonight, so I decided to size a few dozen and load up some .30-30.

I'm still relatively new to the RCBS LAM, I've only had it a few months and I certainly like it much better than alox.

However, I'm still learning about it's quirks, I added a stick of carnauba about two weeks ago, give or take, and haven't lubed 200 boolits with the new stick yet, and tonight, it stopped coating the boolits?

So, I pulled it apart, and lo and behold, one O ring was rolled up the 'depressor'(not sure what it's called), and the other one was split and all the lube was on top of the 'depressor'.

So yay, off to the hardware store tomorrow to find extras [smilie=b:

[3006guns]

Sounds like your lube is too hard. You might have to heat the LAM in order to soften it and not "blow rings". A hair dryer blowing on the lube chamber for a few minutes will do the job, then repeat as necessary during lubing operations.

[possom813]

The lube is actually pretty soft, just plain old white label carnauba red.

There's no telling how long these O rings have been in there, I got the LAM used from S&S and it had red lube in it, I ran that out, then added the carnauba and the rings were showing signs of being stretched a bit then.

It had to happen sooner or later. I'll put the new rings on and try it, and if they seem to wear out prematurely, I add some type of warmer to it to see if that helps.

I actually picked up a candle warmer thingy at a garage sale for a dollar, if needed, it shouldn't be too hard to get it attached to the LAM somehow.

[groundsclown]

I use Whites CR also and always needed to heat it. Their BAC however is good to go without heat.

[tomme boy]

You need heat for that lube.

[WILCO]

I haven't been able to sleep tonight, so I decided to size a few dozen and load up some .30-30.

Never work at the reloading bench when you're tired. Your problems only get bigger from there.

[fryboy]

carnuba red is far from a "room temperature" lube , you may be able to force some but at the cost you already noted [shrugz]
as for o-rings .. a very lite coat of oil should be applied before seating the die , i cant recall at the moment which one but there's a couple threads with correct o-rings sizes for both lyman and rcbs dies around here someplace

[357maximum]

I have been using the white colored harder nylon like O-rings for paintball guns in my lyman sizers......have yet to have one fail yet. I bought a bunch of them on closeout from great wall o' china mart several years back......likely have a lifetime supply by the way it is looking. They sure are alot tougher than standard black o-rings.

[possom813]

It's fixed. I took the other good O ring to Oreillys and bought out the last 6 they had that were the same size.

It wasn't the O ring on the die, it was the O ring inside the cylinder on the small 'compressor' piece that has 2 O rings on it.

I tried the heating it today and made a mess. I'm going to finish up these last 50 or so boolits, and then break the thing down and clean it and when it gets mounted back up(on the new bench [smilie=p:) I plan to mount it to a small chunk of 1/4" steel or aluminum(whatever's handy at the time) so I can heat it with the clothes iron.

What I did today was heat it up with a hair dryer, not the best idea I've had, but the lube sure did flow easier :oops:

[DLCTEX]

I find that one warming with a hair dryer usually gets me through a sizing session with Carnuba Red in my reloading room that is kept in the 70's temp range when I'm in there.

[prickett]

I tried the heating it today and made a mess. I'm going to finish up these last 50 or so boolits, and then break the thing down and clean it and when it gets mounted back up(on the new bench [smilie=p:) I plan to mount it to a small chunk of 1/4" steel or aluminum(whatever's handy at the time) so I can heat it with the clothes iron.

I've gone through a couple RCBS O rings as well. I recently started using carnauba red and I agree with all others who say it takes some heat to get it to work well. How much heat is an art form, though. Too much and you have a mess, too little and you pull a muscle.

[Janoosh]

I use a small shop light, the halogen type that get real hot to the touch, to heat my Lyman /RCBS lubrisizors. Once the sizer is warm I adjust the distance the light is away from the sizer to control the temperature. The light also lets me see what im doing.

[myg30]

One of my 450's has a brass expanding ring and no orings, guess its older stlye ? It works good so far. I guess im lucky, my reloading room is 78' most of the time and the BAC seems to flow ok in my 450. Some resistance on the ratchet but no leakage. They seem tacky and if I dump them in a container for use later on they still sticky. Not sure if the motor mica might work on long term storage of these sized n lubed boolits.

Does anybody put them in the refrigerator before loading them or will they shrink and give crimp variations ? I really don't want to have to use a heated hard lube, but is long term storage better with Carnuba red ?

Mike