45acp dies

[onelight]

I have Hornady , RCBS and Lee for 45acp they all work.

[Winger Ed.]

As old as the cartridge is, all the die makers have had plenty of time to get it all figured out.

There may be some tweeky little differences, but nobody makes bad ones.

[ioon44]

I have been using Hornady .45 ACP dies for cast bullets sized .452" with my Dillon 550 works great no problems.

[Tazman1602]

Are there any brands of dies that are better for loading cast boolits in 45acp? Any to avoid altogether? I’m piecing together a Polymer 80 in 45acp and dies are on my shopping list.

I have great luck with Dillon does as all my machines are Dillon. RCBS carbide dies work well also!

Art

[cowboy4evr]

I use LEE dies for revolvers , semi auto's and rifles . NO problems for me , and yes I use the LEE fcd on 357 sig and 44-40 . Regards Paul

[45-70 Chevroner]

I'm with you. I load thousands of rounds of 9mm and 45 ACP every year. I've never seen the use for the Lee FCD. The crimp die that comes with the Dillon die does the job just fine. After all, you're really not crimping so much as just removing the flare.

The Lee Carbide Factory Crimp Die is a crutch used by reloaders to cover up their mistakes due to poor reloading practices. That's my opinion and I'm sticking to it.

I'm going to get slammed for disagreeing with this, but your statement about poor reloading practices is a load (pun intended) of crap. I have been using Lee FCD'S since they came out and it wasn't to cover up anything. If you don't like FCD's just say so with out criticizing others for using them.

[justindad]

Burnt Fingers & 45-70 Chevroner - you could both be correct. There may be a proper use for the FCDs, and there may other ways to use them that compensate for improper practices elsewhere.
*
For me, it allows me to crimp while the bullet is stationary without needing to continuously reset the seating die. Perhaps it would be better to have two seating dies instead, but I have not experienced any issues telling me that this is necessary. I measure the OD of the case neck right at the mouth, and everything’s working good for me.

[45-70 Chevroner]

I have 18 sets of dies, RCBS, Lyman, lee, and 1 set of Hornady . The Hornady dies are for 45 ACP, my son just recently bought a 1911 style 45 and the Hornady dies were the only one available. The problem with the Hornady it does not come with a crimp die, I adjusted the seater die to set the tapper crimp until I finally gave up and called Hornady and they said that set of dies does not come with a crimp function and I would have to buy a separate die, that cost something like $20.00 plus shipping. I ordered a Lee FCD for a lot less and some other stuff from Midway so I could get free shipping. The FCD works just fine. I've never had any problems with any of the different brands of dies including Lee. They all work as expected. I will say this though, I will never buy another set of Hornady dies.

[onelight]

I have 18 sets of dies, RCBS, Lyman, lee, and 1 set of redding. The Redding dies are for 45 ACP, my son just recently bought a 1911 style 45 and the Redding dies were the only one available. The problem with the Redding was it does not come with a crimp die, I adjusted the seater die to set the tapper crimp until I finally gave up and called Redding and they said that set of dies does not come with a crimp function and I would have to buy a separate die, that cost something like $20.00 plus shipping. I ordered a Lee FCD for a lot less and some other stuff from Midway so I could get free shipping. The FCD works just fine. I've never had any problems with any of the different brands of dies including Lee. They all work as expected. I will say this though, I will never buy another set of Redding dies.

That is strange why would they not make it to crimp ? If you don't want crimp it's an easy adjustment to not crimp. I have not run into that. Nice to know about it.

[45-70 Chevroner]

That is strange why would they not make it to crimp ? If you don't want crimp it's an easy adjustment to not crimp. I have not run into that. Nice to know about it.

onelight.
Sorry, looks like I made a Chang in my post after you read it, the weren't Redding dies they were Hornady dies.

[bigwagon]

I use a separate crimp die for most of my pistol loads, both for autos and revolvers. I find I get much more consistent ammo this way. In most cases I've acquired a separate seater die to use solely for the crimp stage, but some brands are better than others. I was quite pleased recently when I found I was able to use a spare Lee 45 Colt seater die to put a crimp on 45 Schofield rounds I was loading. I tried to use my RCBS die to do it, but the die body is too long to reach the rim on the shorter Schofield case. I also use a Lee FCD for 45acp lead loads to uniform the overall width. I suppose this could be avoided in some cases by using a custom sized expander, but with mixed brand range pickup brass being all over the place dimensionally, the FCD makes sure everything will chamber. I guess some people might call this a "crutch" but frankly, it's not worth putting much more effort into cheap blasting ammo.

[Burnt Fingers]

All my brass is unsorted range brass.

I load nothing but my cast .452 boolits.

The Dillon Crimp die does everything I need it to do...and doesn't size my boolits down. My failure rate for ammo that won't fit my EGW gauge is around 0.1-0.2%

Yep, 1-2 rounds in a thousand.

Also note, I'm talking about the Carbide Factory Crimp die. It's a crutch.

[bigwagon]

Crutch for what? It has nothing to do with reloading technique if your dies are under or oversizing the brass.

[onelight]

onelight.
Sorry, looks like I made a Chang in my post after you read it, the weren't Redding dies they were Hornady dies.

Thanks for the update.

[45-70 Chevroner]

All my brass is unsorted range brass.

I load nothing but my cast .452 boolits.

The Dillon Crimp die does everything I need it to do...and doesn't size my boolits down. My failure rate for ammo that won't fit my EGW gauge is around 0.1-0.2%

Yep, 1-2 rounds in a thousand.

Also note, I'm talking about the Carbide Factory Crimp die. It's a crutch.

Just keep sticking too it and a lot of us will keep using the FCD. If I needed a crutch I probably would have blown my self up sometime within the last 55 years or so. For the life of me I don't see where you get that we are covering up bad reloading habits by using the Lee FCD. Just admit it you don't like Lee stuff.

[onelight]

Here is a link to a poll from this forum on use of the Lee factory crimp die .
It's no more of a crutch than a gas check or powder coat is or any number of other items we use, it's another tool in the tool box that we have a choice to use.
https://castboolits.gunloads.com/sho...d-Cast-Bullets.

[jim147]

I have a few Lee FCD's. When properly adjusted all they do is put a crimp on. Not sure what some people do to crush things down. Maybe they should ask how to adjust them.

[Burnt Fingers]

Here is a link to a poll from this forum on use of the Lee factory crimp die .
It's no more of a crutch than a gas check or powder coat is or any number of other items we use, it's another tool in the tool box that we have a choice to use.
https://castboolits.gunloads.com/sho...d-Cast-Bullets.

That tells me that just over a third of us have seen the light.

[DocSavage]

I use Dillon,Redding and RCBS dies but to make things a bit easier I load cast bullets with a bevel base that way I don't have to expand the case mouth that much.

[Martin Luber]

Gary Percle has it right. How many folks complain of leading and poor grouping when using soft swaged boolets? Plenty . Why? Most 45 dies and the ALL IMPORTANT expander plug are designed for j word bullets. Idiots complain of loose bullets with reloads. The commercial lead boolet market is small! So the main die suppliers gear for commercial products. Their die and plug are too small for lead but holds jwords tight. With soft lead You can use any sizer if the expander plug is big enough, and long enough, to allow the boolet to hand start 1/16" and then seat to full bearing length without getting swaged down in diameter. Myself, for 45acp, l use a Hornady 454 casull carbide sizer to avoid excess sizedown combined with an oversized expander. The really old 45 Colt dies did this too. My RCBS seater is bored out to 0.375 so it only touches the shoulder of the boolet and seats straight. Good luck