Whoops

[OldBearHair]

As I was happily depriming, full sizing a few 30-30 brass with a RCBS die, all of a sudden I saw a case that had not been deprimed. Whoa, stopped everything , searched and found another one non-deprimed. Found the decapping pin/nut missing. It was probably in that second one. Well I began to look everywhere on the bench and on the floor. Couldn't find it. A few days later as I was inspecting all the brass, there it was in the case and I thought it was some kind of nut. Got a long 8/32 screw and turned it into the "nut" as far as it would go, stuck it in the press and ran it up all the way up without a die installed. The screw protruded about 1/2 inch. Put a plate with a "v" under the screw head and pulled it out of the case. Yep there was the lost broken decapping neck expanding nut without the pin . It does pay to check every case visually with a strong light.
The fired primer was the best clue. There was no way to deprime that one. Didn't find the broken pin.

[georgerkahn]

I always smile and breath a sigh of relief when "stuff" like this occurs. So happy you were 95% observant, and 5% lucky :). I always decap my brass before further processing, as wet pin tumbling seems to clean all the crud from primer pockets, and, on occasion there'll be a pin stuck at an angle in said pocket. Something I added to my "check" list. However, just a few months ago I had gotten to the actual loading stage with some bottleneck rifle brass, and noted powder in one case seemed higher than it should have been -- almost to rim. This freaked me out re what might had happened -- as well as, say, the half-dozen or so cases charged before that one. I dumped powder into tray, and its weight was right on. Huh??? Then looking inside case I saw a birds-nest of stainless steel pins which managed to be stuck at cases' bottom. Hard tapping in bench did not free it -- it took arduous dental-pick wiggling. It truly is amazing, to me, the "stuff" that happens... In both our cases more than we had planned on might have exited the barrel upon firing. My case, too, was .30WCF.
geo

[jcren]

Had a case of 45 colt that looked too full, but had decapped and primed just fine. Dumped it and found a 40 brass stuck with media inside! The decap pin had passed through both cases.

[TNsailorman]

One of the reasons I prefer to decap with a Lee primer punch and case holder like the one that comes in the Lee Loaders instead of using a die on the press. I did something similar years ago and learned a lesson. The way I decap now is fool proof, well mostly anyway. my experience, james

[lefty o]

i think if you load enough youll lose a pin or expander ball inside a case. ive used a tubing cutter to cut cases open to get it back.

[RogerDat]

If you do anything long enough and often enough Murphy (or Mrs. Murphy) will catch up with you for sure. Trick is to notice it because your paying attention. Other useful skill is healing well for when you forget to pay attention.