resize with less effort

[Artsi]

A friend of mine has found a quick and easy way to lube couple hundred cases in 30 seconds.

Take ordinary plastic carrier bag, squirt plain regular gun oil on one side of it (heh,,, inside of course). Smear it around a little bit. Pour maybe like 500pcs of brass at maximum in the bag. Seal bag and externally ram the lot around the bag. 30 secs later pour the lot into your favourite container, ready for reload.
NOTE - you actually need surprisingly small amount of lube. Brass does not need to be dripping oil. It'll be enough if you can just barely make the difference between completely dry and treated brass. That'll be just fine.

Why oil them, you may have the allmighty carbide resizer die.

I've pushed a ton of brass through carbide dies - unlubricated. No big deal, just takes a bit extra effort.
Give this lubie thingy a chance - see if you ever fancy to resize dry anymore.

Besides, in some fired brass that has swollen beyond specs, a material 'transfer' can be detected when resized dry. Oil will help here.


I'd like to use this opportunity to stress the importance of _not_ shooting ammo in any gun that still has some lube residue in it.
What this does is this. As pressure rises in cartridge, it swells a bit. Cartridge will (most times) for mere fraction of a second swell enough to jam itself in chamber. As pressure drops, brass will release it's grip on chamber walls. This will significantly lessen mechanical stresses seen by locking mechanism behind cartridge. Any oil here will not create momentary jamming phenomena, thus all recoil energy is transmitted down the line.
If in doubt - just lube 30-06 rifle case with resizing oil and fire away. Closely examine the case base. You'll see pretty hefty contact with case base and bolt head.


-Artsi

[lugerholsterrepair]

Artsi, I wonder about your recomendation of using regular gun oil. I use some stuff I get in a spray bottle from Midway. It is a very light oil, I don't really know what kind. I suspect a silacon derivitive and it is mixed very liberaly with alcohol ,which makes most of what you spray on evaporate. I suspect that oiling the inside of a bag with regular oil would cause some to get into the case mouths and either affect primers or powder if enough were to get in. Just a thought.

I agree that it makes sizing much easier, even with carbide dies. Dirty tho..tends to get all over your hands when the brass and oil intermix. Nothing's perfect tho...Jerry Burney

[Roadkill]

Gentlemen, I am very new to reloading, probably up to 250 rounds now so please bear with me on this. My RCBS loading book specifically says to lube the inside of the case mouth. They insist this does no harm and is essential to case mouth opening and proper bullet seating.

RK

[Doubs]

[quote]Originally posted by Roadkill:
<strong>Gentlemen, I am very new to reloading, probably up to 250 rounds now so please bear with me on this. My RCBS loading book specifically says to lube the inside of the case mouth. They insist this does no harm and is essential to case mouth opening and proper bullet seating. RK</strong><hr></blockquote>

RK, it should also tell you that ONLY dry lube (powdered graphite) is to be used on the inside of the case. A liquid lube will ruin your powder and/or primers. It is also usually only necessary for bottle neck cartridges. The graphite helps the sizing button that passes through the neck and leaves the inside diameter the correct size to do so with minimal drag and helps prevent over working the brass or stretching the neck.

The only thing that needs to touch the inside of a 9mm case - other than the bullet - is the die used to slightly bell the mouth of the case to ensure the bullet enters without scraping the sides of the bullet. This is an especially important consideration for a cast or lead bullet.

If for some reason a liquid is used to lube the inside of the case mouth, it must be thoroughly removed.... not a fun thing no matter how it's done. The best way to do it is use a dry lube.

[Roadkill]

Once again guys, I'm just following directions:

" The next step, seldom mentioned in reloading books and articles, is very important: lubricating the inside of the case neck. This prevents the case from dragging in the die when the neck is expanded after sizing. Equally important, lubricating the inside of the case neck removes the gritty primer and burned powder residue. After years of experiment, RCBS developed the Case Neck Brush as the best tool for lubricating the insides of case necks. You merely roll the brush lightly across the lube pad. Some reloaders may not like the idea of getting lubricant inside of the case. But when properly done, the amount of lubricant is too samll to have any effect on powder or primer, even when stored for long periods of time. "

RCBS Loading Guide. Fourth Edition, 1976

RK

[Doubs]

[quote]Originally posted by Roadkill:
<strong>Once again guys, I'm just following directions:
" The next step, seldom mentioned in reloading books and articles, is very important: lubricating the inside of the case neck. This prevents the case from dragging in the die when the neck is expanded after sizing. Equally important, lubricating the inside of the case neck removes the gritty primer and burned powder residue."
RCBS Loading Guide. Fourth Edition, 1976
RK</strong><hr></blockquote>

RK, the directions above are for a bottleneck case where the sizing die reduces the neck diameter to less than the proper size for reloading. On the up stroke of the handle, the case is lowered and the sizing button on the depriming shaft passes through the neck, enlarging the inside diameter as it does so.

If you'll note on your pistol dies, absolutely nothing touches the inside of the case mouth during the sizing/depriming stage or when the case is lowered back down.

I don't have the RCBS reloading manual. The closest thing to it that I own is a Speer manual, 1979 edition. (RCBS and Speer are all owned by the same parent company, Blount.) It says the same thing as your manual almost verbatum... in the rifle reloading section. Further back in the manual is the handgun cartridge reloading information. Inside case lubrication isn't mentioned at all for pistol cases. Check and see if your manual has a separate section for handgun reloading.

[Roadkill]

Sir Doubs, you are correct. In the pistol section it says only to brush out the inside of the neck. Once again, I'm new to this. And being from Alabama doesn't help any either. I ought to know better than to try to read and follow directions. I've had enough for tonight. Think I'll go sit out on the porch with my ugly dog. What's a few fleas between friends? Later.

RK

[Artsi]

There is no absolutely way to get oil inside brass with this 'gun oil & plastic bag' treatment. Somebody just please go ahead and try out, you'll see for yourself.
Start sparingly and add more if needed. That way no irreversible damage is done. (Well not irreversible, but very labour intensive at least).

-Artsi

[Hugh]

A trick that I picked up from my 87 year old father-in-law:
Spray cases with "Silicon Lubricant". The carrier will evaporate, leaving a thin silicon coating on the cases which works great for resizing, and does not have to be wiped off. I have noticed no ill effects from firing these coated cases, apparantly it does not keep the brass from "grabbing" the chamber wall when it expands upon firing.
A 10 oz can can be purchased at Wally-World for around $3.

[Heinz]

I suspect that the brass grabbing the chamber walls is not critical in a recoil operated firearm such as the Luger. The barrel is short and as soon as the bullet is out of the barrel the frame is moving back. Unspellable, who really understands this better than me will probably be heard from on the topic.

I would hazard a guess that the chamber walls are slightly oily from normal barrel lubrication. My guess is this is not going to disappear too fast as the chamber walls are not exposed to the majority of the combustion gases.

[Artsi]

In hunting rifles the brass grabbing is more important, and also more apparent than in our pistols.
Brass grabbing would lessen stresses to bolt head assy (sorry, cannot remember the real name for this part). Slide/barrel combo will start to retard simultaneously as bullet starts to accelerate. This is so in our P08's as it is in 1911 type firearm, and all other pistols as well.

A buch of years ago one local IPSC shooter had a 9mm Caspian (it's a widebody 1911). He shot in 'Major' Power Factor-class - (that means shooting 124grain bullet at about 1450fps). Some shooters deliberately loaded their ammo much stronger than this. It was found to generate more gasses and thus compensator was able to make use of this extra pressure/volume. That made shooting even more faster.

This shooter experienced unexplained ejection problems.
Shot fired. No spent case flew outta gun, but slide did rock back and forth as usual. Gently operating the slide by hand (without any extra effort) spent case was extracted from chamber and fell to the ground.

What was going on???

A group of shooters came to a conclusion that pressure within barrel (bullet not yet outta barrel) was so great that it made case to grab chamber very strongly. Extractor was unable to overcome this frictional load, and it's grip on extractor groove slipped.

I personally think that some timing problems may have been present on that gun with that load. If we think about it, it's not normal to see slide combo to come out of battery so much that case extraction is about to start - and still have the bullet travelling in the barrel !
To my experience, a touch heavier slide and accompanying stronger recoil spring would have most likely cured that phenomena.
Heavier slide would have had a negative impact on gun behaviour in recoil (as would heavier recoil spring), thus nullifying gained performance.

Every aspect in a pistol has to be in harmony. Whether we shoot much lighter (or stronger) loads in a pistol, surrounding mechanical bits have to be modified accordingly.


-Artsi