Forester seater issue

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Cody Richardson

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Feb 5, 2020
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91
Location
New Albany, Indiana
Has anyone ever had a forester (or any brand) cause significant deformation to meplats? I have a 300 wsm forester benchrest ultra micrometer seater than is mushrooming the meplats of 200.20x bergers. I've tried raising the die in the press, raising the seater stem in the die, all with the same result. Never had a problem with forester dies before.
I've attached a pic of what is occurring, not sure if a honed seater stem would fix the issue.
 

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Your tip is hitting the top of the seater stem.
I've had this issue with Forster, Redding and custom Whidden dies, 2 options, drill a 1/8" hole on a lathe into the stem, or buy/make a custom stem. I tried polishing them, didn't work, so I made some by altering the existing one's Redding, didn't work, so I ended up buying the VLD stems needed.
Contact Forster, they can supply stems, but I will add, Forster stems are thinner on the leading edge and WILL deform if you put ANY type of pressure on them. I have flared enough to know their limitations.

Cheers.
 
MagnumManiac said:
Your tip is hitting the top of the seater stem.
I've had this issue with Forster, Redding and custom Whidden dies, 2 options, drill a 1/8" hole on a lathe into the stem, or buy/make a custom stem. I tried polishing them, didn't work, so I made some by altering the existing one's Redding, didn't work, so I ended up buying the VLD stems needed.
Contact Forster, they can supply stems, but I will add, Forster stems are thinner on the leading edge and WILL deform if you put ANY type of pressure on them. I have flared enough to know their limitations.

Cheers.
Click to expand...
That was my fear. Was hoping it's was a stem that just didn't pass qc.
 
As MM above said the hole in the seater stem needs to be deeper. You just need clearance so not a precision operation. I would just drill it out a bit until it clears the bullet tip. I also take a Dremel and Cratex wheel shaped like a bullet and polish the seating stem.
 
Easy fix...just smash the meplat back a touch before loading....won't ever see that again......lol....
I screwed up on some 53gr plastic tips..
Kinked the shoulder of the case....that sucked too......
 
I fill mine with a tiny bit of devcon then push a bullet up in it to make a custom seater, pull it out after a few minutes of hardening and let it sit out. After it fully dries and hardens, I take a spare bullet that's damaged, chuck it up in a drill and coat it with lapping compound to smooth out all out. Then I just spin the bullet in the drop, use the boattail to touch up the edges and make sure I can use other bullets then VLDs in it.

I've done that to any Forster I shoot long pointy bullets in. What works for me may not work for you! Good luck

SHM
 
MagnumManiac said:
Forster stems are thinner on the leading edge and WILL deform if you put ANY type of pressure on them.
Click to expand...

This is very true. Forest has changed the design of the stems to be thicker and alleviate this to some extent. If you have an older die, it may have one of the thinner stems.
Also make sure the stem hasn't cracked. mine have cracked. It will have a small hairline crack that is hard to detect. Use your fingernail to feel it or a magnifying glass. If the stem seems to stick to the bullet after seating it, the stem might be cracked.

Like MM said, call Forster, they will fix you up.
 
The apparent non-response to this problem from reloading companies seems unbelievable to me.
If I had a reloading company, I would just walk over to my stem machining and quietly fix it for good -around 20yrs ago.
 

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