Check wont seat

[RU shooter]

Hi all,
My gas checks finally came along with my lee sizer(.314) my problem I'm having is when I push the bullet up through the sizer ,the GC crimps on before its up onto the shank the entire way. If I try pushing them through GC first they seat but they dont seem like their on straight and the boolit is being shaved on the bands on one side or the other(not good) I tried flairing the GC and then running them through and that works good, but I dont want to do that for hundreds of boolits! the boolits BTW are .312-.313 dia.

Will the GC being crimped on but not seated entirely kill the accuracy(I'm assuming yes,but I know what happens when you assume) ! what can I do to remedy this problem? I also thought about drilling a divot in the punch so that the nose centers up true to the die,but if I'm off just a tad it aint gonna work. would annealing them soften the GC enough that it would seat before it crimped??? HELP

[imashooter2]

With no resistance from the sizer, you will have to fully seat the checks before you put them on the push rod. I had checks that were difficult to install on the C358-180-RF group buy. I annealed them and they opened enough to make seating much easier. Another trick that could help is to lay the checks out on a block next to the sizer. Push a bullet down on the check till it sticks, then pick up the both of them and tap the assembly on the block using the weight of the bullet to seat the check.

[castalott]

Hi!
Col Harrison made a punch to spread gas checks out enough to seat all the way and then crimp on. In the picture, you can see the tool I made at the left at about the 9 o'clock position, It has a gas check still on it.I just spun a piece of rod in a lathe and attacked it with a file and stone until it was the correct size to spread the checks. Polish it good and most checks will fall off easily. I use a hammer and piece of steel along with the punch. It is an extra step but well worth it.

The rest of that stuff is my home made gas check maker to make aluminum checks.

Dale

[Dale53]

It really depends how far from seating (how small the checks are in relation to the bullet base) as to how you "attack" the problem. Many times, it just requires you to tap the bullet into the gas check with a soft hammer. I have done this many times and it really doesn't take all that much time. I just "tap" a bunch ahead fo time and then size them normally.

If that doesn't work, I believe that I would next try annealing the gas checks. This makes the checks easy to seat and you can probably push them on with your fingers when sizing normally. You can anneal a large quantity of checks at a time. Recently, there have been clear directions on this site as to how to go about annealing.

Dale53

[Bass Ackward]

Besides annealing the checks, place the bullet with check attached up into the die. Raise the ram and tap the bottom of the bullet a couple of times. This allows the bullet to center in the die as well tapping on the check.

[chunkum]

I use an old inertia bullet puller for a "tap" hammer on too-tight checks. Sometimes the "inside sizing" technique with a made-to-size rod as described above is required. I use a Lyman 450 for eveything and the Lyman gas check seater can be a big help in crimping the checks, but if you don't have the check started right, it's still going to shave the base some, and I try to avoid that, tapping the check on if necessary.
Best Regards,
chunkum

[KCSO]

I have a small arbor press that has a set of nose punches and different bases. I use this to seat stubborn checks.

[9.3X62AL]

I haven't tried annealing checks (yet). I do use a flaring punch like those above for checks that aren't a good fit to boolit bases. It's just a fact of life that once in a while the gas check shank size and the gas check's inside diameter aren't on the same page of the book.

I view gas checks as a necessary evil in most rifle loads, and as a largely superfluous and expensive addition to most handgun loads. Their use adds at least one step to the loading process--sometimes a couple more steps. When all that rigamarole gets taken into consideration.......paper patching starts looking like a viable option for high velocity rifle work.

[Leftoverdj]

All good suggestion. Add one.

Depending on what dies you have around, you may be able to use a bullet seater die to seat GCs. Replace the shellholder with the sizer pedestal and run the bullet and GC up into the sizer. Seater should align the bullet and the ram will give you as much force as you want.Shouldn't take much, though.

[mag_01]

boolit bases---Just take a drill chuck up a boolit an trim sharp edge with file works good for me---use a short piece of shrink tubing over boolit so chuck jaws do not touch or change boolit---just tighten enough to spin boolit---square base off and remove sharp edge so boolit Will start------------------Mag

[beagle]

Usually, it's pretty easy to chuck a 10-32 pan head screw in a electric drill and work the head down with a file until it will just spread the opening of the check. This rig replaces the expander button in your M die and used in conjunction with a flat piece of metal as an anvil in your press allows the GC edges to spread enough to go on the shanks.

The GCs should be anealed first or they may spring back.

JUst another variation of what these othere gys are telling you./beagle

[Nueces]

Mag 01 has identified a common problem, sharp gascheck shank bases, which make check seating troublesome. I've used the outside case deburring tool on an RCBS Trim Mate to break this sharp base before seating the checks using the SAECO lube/sizer. One of these cutters on a slow speed surplus gear motor would do as well, or even a simple handle.

The gas check annealing step should probably be standard practice, whaddya think?

Mark

[imashooter2]

The gas check annealing step should probably be standard practice, whaddya think?

Mark

It is for me. I put the checks in a 2 inch close nipple with a piece of white paper and screw the caps on the ends loosely by hand. I toss the assembly in the fireplace when I burn and then just fish the pipe out of the ashes when the fire goes cold. The paper chars and uses up all the oxygen in the pipe and keeps discoloration and scale down.

I would certainly try annealing before I started modifying each check or bullet base individually. I want to take time out of the process, not add more.

[castalott]

A few years back I read that Hornady was to modify their checks so as to slide on better. Never heard any more about it....It amounted to swaging the cups bigger....

[Slowpoke]

Buckshot makes a really nice press mounted check expander, I had him make me three, 22, 30 and 35 cal.

good luck

[BigDaddie]

I had this problem last night when I was seating the checks for the first time. I grabbed a small piece of hardwood, drilled a 6mm hole in it then used the countersinking bit to open the hole up a little.

Push the check on by hand, locate the nose of the boolit in the block of wood and place the gas checked end against the edge or top of the bench and gently push. They seated nice and square and u can 'feel' them home...kinda like priming on a press. The noses of the boolits were not marred in any way. I reckon using a case deburring tool to clean up any imperfections etc at the shank base intersection may be helpful as well but i havent tried this yet.

Any checks I tried to seat on my Lee sizer, jammed up the sizing die (despite lube...although they are pretty hard boolits as well) so I checked em after sizing. I'm not sure if this has an impact on the boolits' performance though as the check would be slightly larger than the sized rings???

[Nueces]

BigDaddie,

Nice job on the wooden tool. Now you know it works, maybe a more permanent one in Delrin, or something? I love it when someone solves a problem like this with the stuff laying around.

If anyone hasn't seen the RCBS case prep tool I mentioned, the nice thing about the outside deburr bit is the lack of a centering post, which makes the usual hand tool (like the Wilson) unusable for boolit bases. The Lee will work, but it's kinda fiddly. The power tool lets me use one hand to grab the boolit, deburr the base and hold to apply the GC. I couldn't find this RCBS bit listed as an accessory, but it's surely available as a spare part.

Mark

[Duckiller]

Stick them on with "Krazy Glue" then run through the lubersizer. Duckiller

[RU shooter]

Thanks for all the great Ideas. I annealed the GC tonight in a old coffee can on the hot plate I let them cook till they turned dark. Are they done enough? or should i heat them till something else happens. anyways the ones I did press onto the shank better but not fully till I give'em a tap with a small tap hammer ,I'm using a heavy duty seater plug from a old Pacific 30-06 die to keep the nose from deforming, If I do it this way it seems satisfactory . an extra step but I guess I'm gonna need to deal with it. Thanks for all the solutions.