Hornady dies?

[Finster101]

Are Hornady Titanium dies any good? I see a .45 ACP set I may buy, but haven't heard anyone using them. Pros or cons? Help me decide thanks :?:

[Slow Elk 45/70]

I have several sets of Hornady Titanium dies and IMHO they are superior to RCBS, Lyman and Lee, but that is me, I have hear a lot of folks concur with this opinion. Good Luck

[Finster101]

I have several sets of Hornady Titanium dies and IMHO they are superior to RCBS, Lyman and Lee, but that is me, I have hear a lot of folks concur with this opinion. Good Luck

Would the titanium be the same as carbide and no case lube reguired?

[blpenn66502]

Correct, work just like carbide with no lube required. In pistol calibers they include both RN and SWC profiles with their seating die and I believe they are still offering free bullets, albeit jacketed, with a purchase of their dies for something like $5 S&H.

[Tom W.]

I have a set in .480/ .475 that work just fine.

And I'd recommend to anyone to change their RCBS or Redding lock rings to the Hornady rings.

[smoked turkey]

I have mostly RCBS dies and like them a lot. I do have several Hornady dies as well and they are also good dies. One negative for me with Hornady is the fact that the decapping rod is held in by friction and I have had on more than one occasion the thing to pull out of the die due to the neck tension being too great as the button is pulled back through the case after full length sizing.
I had a shooting friend comment the other day that he thought Hornady dies and some of their bullets were not USA made. I do notice the absence of "made in USA" on their bullets and dies. What does others know of this?

[MtGun44]

Hornady's currect dies are excellent. They have a floating sleeve to support the boolit as
it is seated, like the expensive 'benchrest' rifle dies from Redding and Forster. All the New
Dimension Hornady dies have this sleeve seater in a more affordable priced die set. The
Titanium Nitride sizing ring is equivalent to the tungsten carbide sizing rings that have been
used for years to eliminate lubing brass.

I have a number of sets of Hornady dies and recommend them highly.

Hornady is in Nebraska, as far as I know they make all their bullets right there, and I
believe they make their dies there, too. They may have some of the parts for their presses
made elsewhere - casting is a specialized manufacturing capability, often outsourced -
but overseas ? I do not know.

Bill

[Shooter6br]

Never had a problem with RCBS or Lee. In fact RCBS has lifetime warranty.They have replaced parts I broke out of being a "dickiedope"no charge

[Guesser]

When Hornady first came out with their "New Dimension" dies, the collet held decapping pin was problematic in some cartridge styles. They redesigned the collet or the pin or both and that eliminated the problem. If you are experiencing this problem; call them, they back their product and will fix it for you. Their customer and product support is right up there at the top of the list.

[dudel]

I have several sets of Hornady Titanium dies and IMHO they are superior to RCBS, Lyman and Lee, but that is me, I have hear a lot of folks concur with this opinion. Good Luck

+1 Most of my dies are now Hornady. They have replaced Lee and RCBS dies. I like the way Hornady mounts the decapping pin (the new method with the zip spindle is even better IMHO). I've use my Hornady 45 ACP for nearly 20 years. it still works great. I do clean the carbide regularly with a bore brush and a patch. Amazing how dirty they get, even with clean brass.

[dudel]

I have a set in .480/ .475 that work just fine.

And I'd recommend to anyone to change their RCBS or Redding lock rings to the Hornady rings.

I actually prefer the Dillon 1" lock rings as they give a bit more space on a tight toolhead. If you are using a single stage press, the Hornady lock rings are great with the Hornady wrench. They won't slip.

[1hole]

"I have several sets of Hornady Titanium dies and IMHO they are superior to RCBS, Lyman and Lee, but that is me, I have hear a lot of folks concur with this opinion."

I greatly prefer Lyman's expander, and Reddding's copy of it, for pistol rounds but I can make any of them work fine.

I think it's clear from all this that large chunks of us prefer different die brands for reasons that seem good to us. The fact that all our brands have followers only prove that we like various features, not any vast superiourity of our choice!

Hornady copied Lee's excellant decapping/expanding rod holder when Lee's patent ran out. Just as with Lee's, some users had a hard time using two wenches at the same time so they couldn't get the holding collet tight enough. Hornady finally added some lightly cut threads to the rod and use a nut to prevent it from pulling out. It works, but I think it says more about the owners than the dies themselves, either brand. So be it...

[462]

I've thought about getting Hornady's New Dimension rifle dies, but question whether the sleeve that the "bullet" enters has a large enough inside diameter so that a larger "boolit" doesn't get stuck or sized down. I have two Lyman Precision Alignment dies that had that problem until I lapped them.

However, Lyman's "M" die may make it all a moot point.

[Heavy lead]

I like the Hornady rifle dies, but I don't use any for boolits, and I'm thinking they are not going to work well either the design is really for a jacketed bullet.

[wallenba]

I have some special purpose Hornady dies, and their workmanship is superior even to RCBS which I think are pretty d&%m good!

[MtGun44]

462,

You may be right about the alignment sleeve - it is designed to be a tight fit on jacketed,
so if you are using oversized boolits (common) they may stick.

Bill

[451whitworth]

I have some special purpose Hornady dies, and their workmanship is superior even to RCBS which I think are pretty d&%m good!
i would have to agree. my RCBS dies from the '70's and '80's are masterpieces of craftmanship compared to any dies they have made in the last 10 years. i bought a set of then current production RCBS dies for the 218 Bee about 5 years ago and was amazed how unfinished they looked. they load fine though. in their defence you can't keep die prices as low as they are for as long as the industry has without some concessions.

[Rat-Man]

I didn't care for the Titanium Nitride pistol dies that I got for 9mm. They seemed to take more effort to resize than my other caliber carbide dies so I replaced them with a RCBS set. The quality of the Hornady dies was fine on the pistol dies I just prefered the RCBS sizer.

I use Hornady New Dimension dies in my rifle calibers and they handle cast bullets 0.001 in over the nominal without any problems and I think that 0.002 in over nominal is about all you would be able to do without lapping the bore of the sleeve.

Just my experience FWIW.

[largom]

I have loading dies made by just about every manufacturer. The Forester and Redding dies are the very best BUT very costly. For the money I believe the Hornady dies are the best deal, especially their seating dies. As stated by others, most seating dies are made for jacketed bullets and can be too tight for oversized cast boolits.

I took a Hornady seating die and made inter-changable sleeves and stems for all of my cast boolits. The sleeves are bored for the largest boolit in that caliber and the seating stems are a very close fit with different stems made for each boolit nose profile. I also used chamber reamers to cut the shoulder/neck portion of the sleeves. This set-up gives me excellent case/boolit alignment with little or no run-out.

The factory sleeves could be honed out for your boolits but then the seating stem would be a loose fit. As such these dies would still seat cast boolits better than other brands. Just my opinion.

Larry

[bigboredad]

I have lee rcbs and hornady and wish I could trade my lee and rcbs dies for hornady. the hornady dies for me are so much nicer to work with luckily I mostly do .45 colt and my dies are in hornady other wise I would be switching to hornady.

[Tom W.]

My Hornady dies for 30/06 load cast without a hitch..And I got a Hornady Neck sizer. It's caliber specific, not cartridge specific, at least for the '06 and my .308.
I did get the RCBS expander to load cast, rather than the Lyman die.