Home Forums Reloading Big Game Rifles Anyone use a leecollet neck die w/o the mandrel?

Sorted through a bunch of 20 year old ammo from my young and dumb days and found a batch marked "hot". Not sure where I got the data but todays sources confirm my note.

So could I be so lucky as to think I could pull the bullets and leave the powder inside and use a lee collect die w/o mandrel to carefully reset neck tension and seat lighter bullets right back in?

If i could it would be so simple it might be fun!

I just ordered a few sets of these dies because of all the good things I've read about the collet neck-size system and the potential for improved accuracy. I have them in my possession but I haven't had occasion to use them yet. I was checking them out, though, and it looks to me like the retaining cap could be drilled through so that the mandrel could be allowed to rise through the cap and float. That might work for what you'd like to do. If you had an extra cap you could drill, you could use it when circumstances like this arise and have another cap to put on the die so that you could still deprime.

No. The collet squeezes the neck against the mandrel. Without the mandrel the collet will size the neck down WAY too far. What you could do is break the decapping pin off, pull the bullet, dump the powder out in a pan, resize the neck, pour powder back in, seat lighter bullet.

Did I miss something? If you just pull the bullet to seat another what is the need, reason to resize the necks??
Cheers

+1

If you pull the bullets the neck brass will springback approx. .002" below caliber, perfect for reseating a bullet without sizing.

You are pulling with a collet type bullet puller, right?

Gonna reseat a 70 grainer where a 90 grain was. This is brass that's been fired a few times so I'm thinking neck tension will need a reset. I see no reason it won't work...just gotta move the die in small increments to set the neck w/o the mandrel. I've sorta done some thing like this before...I moved the die in small increments to close the case mouth to bullet diameter to make a "slip fit" for checking seating to the lands.
I think it will work fine.
Got a collet on order...should take about 1/2 hour to recover 30 rounds.

kraky, several times fired brass will be more work hardened and have more springback than new or annealed brass. Pull a bullet and measure the OD of the neck, compare it to a loaded OD and you will see that you will have plenty of bullet grip.

Seating a bullet is just like running an expander down the neck and you will have very consistent ID dimensions. You might say seating a bullet and then pulling it is an excellent way to size necks

We'll see what we got when I pull them...I like a min of. 002" grip.
I don't think it will take more than a couple of min's to get the die set if i need it.

Some time back I tried to pull bullets and then just seat different bullets. Some of the necks didn't have enough grip after the bullet was pulled. The brass was much shot and not annealed. I think my approach (it's been a while, so memory is faded) was to use a neck die without the decapping pin.

That has been my experience as well. The bullets seated the second time around just felt like there was almost no neck tension at all.

I did a test. Picked loads from several different calibers out of my boxes. From lower right: 280AI, 338RUM, 6.5 rem mag, 375 Ruger, 30-06



280AI twice fired
338RUM once fired
6.5 rem mag three times fired
375 Ruger three times fired
30-06 once fired



pulled the bullets and measured ID's

280AI ID was .282"



338RUM ID was .336"



6.5 rem mag was .262"



375 Ruger was .373"



30-06 ID was .306"

[img]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v663/bwestfall/GRIP%20TEST/06PULLED_zps8bfd205d.jpg[/img]

some of the pins were a little tighter than others which could mean that the ID was a very little bit tighter

YMMV but let's see some evidence please

OK....all you smart alecs....and you too Woods!
The puller collect arrived this morning. Pulled Down about 60 various round and checked neck tension. All have. 002-.0025!
I've already reseated most of them...all slid in w/plenty of....and consistant feeling tension!
Last batch will be some 87 vmax w/4831 vrs superformance for accuracy. Gonna try a few seat depth variations too.
I'll have to save my mythical collect die experiment for another time!

Glad it worked out for you.

Didn't have to reinvent the bushing neck sizer after all! LOL

These are for my friends deer rifle so I don't dare take any chances. He saved me brass with 3 different head stamps so I think I will take
no chances and just resize them and scrap the primers.
Thanks whelennut

Lead a horse to water

^ exactly; been there, done that, ain't purdy