Hornady LnL AP, 38 sp, primers seat high.

[Advil]

Hi there, first post and a complicated question already.

I'm reloading in quantity for cowboy action and set up a new Hornady LNL AP a week ago. Everything about the press is great, except for the SP primer seating depth.

I've been all over the net, looking for info on a way to actually make the plunger seat deeper. My primers are at best only flush, and the vast majority a tad high. They'll allow a revolver cylinder to spin but barely and too many are just plain "jam up" high. This is not good, slightly below flush is a necessity.

I've added the washer under the plunger to eliminate the divot in the press, and also checked a couple times to make sure it's as tight as can be managed without risking stripping anything.

Certain combos of brass and primers are a little better than others, but today was a battle with Winchester brass and Wolf primers. Speer brass with Wolf was marginally better but I need a solution that will work with all brands of brass. Remington is obviously a smaller primer, but it still is only "better" and will seat flush more often not every time. Not really a fix as I see it.

So, any easy fixes for the LNL AP to improve seating depth? Or should I try my extreme idea of building up the plunger top with JB Weld?

[burfurd]

I would give Hornady a call on their toll free line and ask some questions. They should be able to steer you in the right direction.

burfurd

[oldhickory]

I would say go back over the assembly instructions first and make sure you didn't miss anything, or install something improperly. Here's a link to Hornady's instructional videos, (they're very good). If this fails, call their tech service dept, 1-800-338-3220 They'll be happy to help you out with any problems.

[hcpookie]

Keep JB Weld away from it!

I would look at these items:

1. Using the large primer seater and not the small one? You should have gotten both, check your spare parts to see if you have the big one installed (I think the big one came in mine out of the box)

2. Check the level of the shellplate to ensure it is sitting flush on the bottom. It is real easy to get grit, powder, etc. underneath it and if it is riding too high that could affect seating depth.

3. Check your primer pockets - are they dirty? Could be you are experiencing resistance from a dirty pocket and that would keep you from feeling them seat good.


That's all I can think of right now.

[Mack Heath]

Let me give you a different way to approach a solution to your problem of high primers from your LNL press. FTR, I have two and use this method on the ammo from both.

Get one of the hand priming tools from Lee or RCBS. Maybe Hornady makes one too, but I don't know for fact. When you are done loading, take the loaded ammo and reseat the primers with the hand priming tool. I know it sounds crazy, but it is a super solution to the problem.

I first heard about this over on Brian's Forum. One of the USPSA guys went to the Nationals with all of his gear except for his ammo, which he left on his kitchen table. Rather than forgo shooting, he went to Walmart and bought a bunch of Winchester White Box 9s. He spent the evening before the match reseating all of the primers. Even though his guns were set up for the more sensitive Federals, he didn't have even one failure to fire.

Now, if doing this on live ammo makes you nervous, by all means don't do it. But since I heard about this trick, I haven't had a single failure to fire due to the primer in a match. And I haven't had to struggle with the presses to get that last bit of seating depth.

[truckmsl]

First of all, wolf primers are hard to seat. I was having trouble seating CCI large rifles on my LNL until I added a rather thick shim under the plunger. Now I have absolutely no trouble at all. Try adding a thicker washer or shim - the extra leverage seems to make a huge difference.

[Advil]

Good ideas so far, but it's none of the "Simple" issues. Everything is lined up well enough to work smoothly, the primer carrier hole is centered, and the press does seat with each push, just not nearly enough.

Correct primer parts are intsalled.
Large washer is under the plunger.
Shell plate is squeaky clean, lightly greased, and flush.
Primer pockets may be a little dirty, but hand primer can seat them deep easily.

I suppose there could be a misalignment of the plunger and the primer pocket. Maybe I'll try a piece of tape on the bottom of a shell and see where the plunger marks it and if it's centered well. No idea what to do about it if it is not.

This is frustrating as I really like the rest of the press. We've already loaded 300 38s in short order even with messing with the primer system. Once this works we can start knocking out 500 in an evening.

Reseating the primers after loading is an option, but one major point of the progressive is to not have to use the RCBS hand primer. It's too much when loading for 3 shooters, matches and practice.

A call to Hornady may be in order tomorrow, but somehow I'm doubting they'll have a primer plunger that seats a little deeper.

[doubs43]

I have the same problem with my LnL Hornady progressive press. Using Wolf LP primers for my 45ACP cartridges, I'd get an occasional round that required a second strike to get it to go off. I checked my setup and made sure that all was correctly adjusted. Switching primers didn't help and I finally settled on Mack's suggested solution: I use a Lee hand priming tool to finish seating the primers. Problem solved... not a single misfire since I began using the Lee hand primer tool.

[kfarm]

I had the same problem and it turned out to be that the shell plate assembly was not tight on the ram. There are 2 allen screws, one on each side that were a little loose, I tightened them down and it works fine now. I even glued a dime under mine till I checked the screws. Also I placed a call to Hornady and they sent me new primmer seaters.
Carroll

[Advil]

Now those are two screws I havn't checked yet!!! I'll look at those when I get home.

[Advil]

Everyone, thank you all for the help.

We put several hours tonight into really nailing this down. The solution has nothing to do with Hornady. The press works flawlessly. It's the combinations of components. Let me try to summarise quickly so others who go progressive can avoid going through this:

1) First and foremost! If you have been loading single stage or turret and using a hand primer such as the RCBS, it always "works" because it flattens every primer dome until they're below flush. You could call this a solution... it does work after all and we've loaded over ten thousand without a failure to fire.
2) I put blue tape over a primer hole on a case and pushed the handle forward. The primer plunger went perfectly into the pocket about halfway in, pushing the tape with it. It was so well centered it didn't even cut the tape! Centering and depth of the plunger are definately not a problem.
3) Since the press doesn't develop the kind of torque the hand primer does, you have to literally grab the back of the press for support and push the handle very hard to apply enough force to even begin to flatten the primer like the hand tool will do with almost no effort at all.
4) becuase of this you suddenly discover that different brands of cases have dramatically different primer pocket DEPTHS, and it has almost nothing to do with how clean the primer pockets are.

We proved this by seating both Wolf (a little larger) and Remington (a little smaller) primers in several different brand cases some with the pockets wire brush cleaned and some not. In each case, the Wolf may have been just a touch harder to seat, but was still pretty much the same height as the Remington.

Results:
Winchester brass has short pockets. This was the brass I've been working with the last few days and what got me frustrated enough to post here about. To make these work really well, we are going to have to hand seat (IE crush the primers of) a lot of them to be really confident in their function. This is interesting, because we have used these Winchesters over and over until now... now suddenly with the progressive we discover a reason to not like them quite as much.

Speer was acceptable. With a good push they're all either level or a tiny hair below level like we want.

RP was excellent. They virtually all came out a little below flush. Very good.

Federal was also excellent. Results nearly as good as RP.

I'm not going to check the dozen other foreign brands in my random bins. I think this proves to me that if we are loading progressive to stick to known brass.

I can see why you could get very, very frustrated at a press if you have been using a hand primer for years. You don't think about the depth of the primer pockets at all.

Amazing what you learn about reloading. Just when you think you know something...

[August]

First off, get some Federal primers.

Next, any time your press starts to produce high primers, tighten the shell plate.

That's all there is to it. Really!!!!

[hcpookie]

Glad to see you were able to work it out!

[jeff423]

I've owned a couple of Dillons and have a 650 now. I only load pistol cartridges. Of the pistol cartridges I load .38 spec. the most. Usually 1,000 at a time.
I get all my brass from the range floor and I use any primers I can get. Currently I have Federal, CCI, Wolff and Winchester.
My point is that I mix and match multiple components. (except S&B) I have had a few failures seating primers, but always it is a case of a buggered primer pocket or some residue that was left over. I have never had a seating depth problem that caused a misfire.
My belief is that if you are having consistent primer depth problems you have a press problem - not a component problem


Jeff

[Lloyd Smale]

ive got three of these press. two ez ejects and one older one. the older one acts the same as yours. Ive swapped priming mechinisms from the others on to it and it still does it. I havent figured a cure yet but like Jeff said im not about to start varying components to put a bandaid on it.

[fourarmed]

Go back and read what August said.

[doubs43]

Go back and read what August said.

What August said obviously works on his press but I've done it all - tighten plate, use a shim under the primer seating punch, etc. - and I still have high primers.

BTW, when I initially set up my press, the powder measure only went through about 75% of it's full travel. It consistently dropped the right charge but I figured that wasn't the way it was designed to work so I called Hornady's technical staff and their advice was to leave it like it was! I still didn't think it was right so I began moving the clamps and soon I had full travel..... just as it should be. Obviously the technical staff individual I spoke to wasn't up to speed on the L-n-L press. Also, the written instructions are less than helpful in that regard.

[Lloyd Smale]

the powder measure needs to be adjusted for every different lenght of case. I believe thats covered in the owners manual for the measure.
What August said obviously works on his press but I've done it all - tighten plate, use a shim under the primer seating punch, etc. - and I still have high primers.

BTW, when I initially set up my press, the powder measure only went through about 75% of it's full travel. It consistently dropped the right charge but I figured that wasn't the way it was designed to work so I called Hornady's technical staff and their advice was to leave it like it was! I still didn't think it was right so I began moving the clamps and soon I had full travel..... just as it should be. Obviously the technical staff individual I spoke to wasn't up to speed on the L-n-L press. Also, the written instructions are less than helpful in that regard.

[doubs43]

the powder measure needs to be adjusted for every different lenght of case. I believe thats covered in the owners manual for the measure.

I went back through the various instruction manuals that came with the L-n-L press. I did find one that made an attempt to explain the powder measure initial setup but it's a very poor attempt. No mention of case length or having to adjust for each different case. They could improve their manual a lot.

Another issue I ran into is the tendency of the powder measure to twist slowly CCW as it works until the locking collar unlocks completely. I solved that by bending a paper clip to hook over the top of the seating die and to the arm where the lower end of the return spring connects.

Don't get me wrong; I like my L-n-L press and it turns out excellent cartridges quickly. It's much faster than my RCBS 4x4 that I've used for many, many years. But, it's not perfect and requires a bit of attention to get the best from it.

[Lloyd Smale]

ive had mine come loose a few times too.

[sdelam]

Hornady will send you a shim for the powder measure if you call and ask, I use white thread tape.