I'm loading for 35 Rem. and having a problem with the bullet seating deeper in the case when I push the nose against the table edge or loading them in the mag. tube of the M336.

Here's where we're at right now. I'm using Lee dies with their factory crimp. Rem. brass and Hornady .358 200gr. RN. The brass is full length resized. Cartridge O.A.L. after seating the bullet and crimping is 2.515. Cartridges run through the rifle end up with an O.A.L. of 2.480-895.

This is the measurements I have right now:

Bullets at base.358
Brass O.A.L. 1.910-915
Inside case mouth of full length sized brass measures .357

No matter how much crimp I've put into the case, the tension is not enough to hold the bullet in place. I'm starting to think the case neck is not sized down enough to get the proper tension. If any of you have an answer for what's going on, please share it with me.

Looks like insufficient interference fit for the bullet.

BTW, how are you measuring that inside diameter?

When the case is coming down out of the die during the sizing procedure, does the expander ball drag in the neck at all, just a little, or a whole lot?

What is the diameter of the expander ball?

MM,

I'm measuring the case mouth with dial calipers. It's been about a month since I sized them, I don't remember how they felt sizing them.

I'll check the expander ball in a little while and post it.

The "back side" jaws of the calipers will slightly underreport the size of a round hole. If they're showing .357" it's actually a bit larger than that, which is not what you want in this situation.

I've never had to measure sized case necks trouble shooting a loading problem. What is the standard or desired measurement supposed to be?

How many times has the brass been reloaded?

I'd like to see the hole in the neck about three thou under bullet diameter.

I like 0.003" of neck tension for hunting rounds. 4 thou is fine too as long it it doesn't mess up my runout.

I like to measure the OD of the sized case and then again after I seat the bullet. The difference is your neck tension.

Sounds like the expander ball/stem may be oversized. Take it out of the die and size a case. See if the case neck is now smaller diameter.

That's one possibility and why I asked the questions I did. It could be that the neck part of the die isn't tight enough for the thickness of brass being used. I've run into that myself.

I pulled the expander and measured it several times. I'm getting .357. Seems like it's oversized.

I bought this as once fired brass, but can't guarantee it.

Chuck it in a drill and squeeze some abrasive paper on the fat part.

I reread your response and went back out to measure. The outside neck diameter of 10 cases was .380. The outside diameter of 10 cases with seated bullets was .381.

Could you post a good picture of the crimp ?

you just answered your own question.. you either need to adjust your crimp die down a little more to make stronger contact, or just take the spindle out of your F/L die, use a Q tip to lube where the neck junction will contact it, and do a rolling crimp on it..

Properly annealed brass should have roughly .003" spring back after the ball passes through the neck...so if your expander ball is .357, if your brass hardness is in the ball park, your sized neck should measure roughly .354 or .355, about perfect for a .358 jacketed bullet. I would annesal one or two and see what happens when you seat a bullet.

The Lee dies don't have a roll crimp capability. The factory crimp die is putting a heavy crimp to the case mouth already. A much heavier crimp than I've ever used before.

I'm away from home right now. I will get back to work on it in a couple of days. Thanks for your help thus far.

Size your brass without the expander ball then seat a bullet and give it a try.

Buy a taper crimp die.

I've run into this before. As mathman said, take out the decapping stem and reduce the diameter of the expanding ball. You can easily accomplish this by gently chucking the threaded part in a drill motor and holding some fine sandpaper against the expanding part. For 35 caliber it should be no larger than .355.

Seafire:

anything on the 6mm arc?

Update;

I removed the spindle and reduced the expander ball to .354. Figured I had it whipped. Did a couple of dummy rounds and everything looked good. When I started putting some loads together another problem cropped up. Now I've got crooked necks/bullets. Maybe I took off to much.

At this point, that set of dies are headed for the trash can. I'm going to buy a set of Redding or RCbS dies and start over. Thanks to everyone for offering solutions.