Neck sizer leaving marks
- Thread starter Metzger
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EddieHarren
Well-Known Member
If this is a bushing type die your bushing is scratched. Replace the bushing. If not a bushing type the die itself is scratched. You might be able polish the scratches out, without opening the neck area up too much. From the looks of the cases there appears to be a lot of carbon on those necks. carbon is one of the hardest substances on the planet and should be removed from case necks, inside and out, before sizing.
g0rd0
Well-Known Member
hopefully your die is just fouled up (from not cleaning your brass before sizing). If you don't have a tumbler borrow or get one then go to your local pet food supply store and get a bag of blue menu crushed walnut kitty litter. Remove the deprimeing pin and place die and brass in then fill with litter run over night then resize and see if the marks come back. The litter will leave a fine brown dust on the brass and die it just wipes right off with a rag.
If this dosnt work then you are into replacing a bushing or a die.
Just a note once a year (in mid winter), I disassemble all of my dies and run them through walnut shell
If this dosnt work then you are into replacing a bushing or a die.
Just a note once a year (in mid winter), I disassemble all of my dies and run them through walnut shell
Lefty7mmstw
Well-Known Member
If the tumble your die thing doesn't work I'd do this.....
Take a sectioned steel rifle cleaning rod and put a brush on it 1 caliber bigger than you are shooting with a bit of 0000 steel wool in the brush. Dab the steel wool and brush in oil and run it up into your die neck ( after gutting the decapping rod out of course) spinning slowly on a drill for a few seconds. Do this and clean your die a few times until the marks go away (I do this with shotgun chokes quite often to get the fouling out). Be careful not to get to froggy or you will start to remove steel from the die and ruin it. Use fine steel wool on your case necks from now on or tumble clean before sizing.
Take a sectioned steel rifle cleaning rod and put a brush on it 1 caliber bigger than you are shooting with a bit of 0000 steel wool in the brush. Dab the steel wool and brush in oil and run it up into your die neck ( after gutting the decapping rod out of course) spinning slowly on a drill for a few seconds. Do this and clean your die a few times until the marks go away (I do this with shotgun chokes quite often to get the fouling out). Be careful not to get to froggy or you will start to remove steel from the die and ruin it. Use fine steel wool on your case necks from now on or tumble clean before sizing.
Metzger
Well-Known Member
I tried cleaning it with hoppes #9, copper cleaner, and a brass brush. Nothing is working.
boomtube
Well-Known Member
Your die isn't scratched, it has brass galling on the steel. (Powder carbon has nothing significant to do with it, if that were true a bore would hardly last a hundred rounds.)
Galling is caused by rubbing two metals together under high pressure without sufficent lubracant. It starts with dry microscopic bits of the softer metal adhering to the harder as firmly as if welded. Once it starts each successive sizing pass adds more metal and the build up accelerates. Casual removal efforts with normal cleaning materials cannot remove the solid bits of brass but a few days soaking in a copper disolving bore cleaner containing ammonia might do it.
What I have done, many times, is to make a neck cleaning "lap" with a proper diameter and short lenth of wood dowel wrapped with a tightly wound bit of a green 3M 'pot scrubber" pad stolen from my wife. Chuck the lap in an electric drill motor, wet the pad with a squit of any light oil and push it into the die for a couple of minutes, remove, clean the die and size a case to see if you've cleared the galling. If not, repeat until you do. (4/0 steel wool will do it too but not as quickly as the 3M pads.) Don't worry about dulling the die's mirror finish, a matt finish holds lubracant better and therefore ******* a recurrance of the galling.
You will NOT materially enlarge the die with this method. Sizers are case hardened and it takes a grinder or sander to change one; a file or hacksaw won't touch it.
When you get it clean, use enough case lube to prevent recurrance or you'll be cleaning it again soon. Or, better yet, get a Lee collet neck die and forget about lubing at all. And you'll probably obtain straighter necks too. lightbulb
Galling is caused by rubbing two metals together under high pressure without sufficent lubracant. It starts with dry microscopic bits of the softer metal adhering to the harder as firmly as if welded. Once it starts each successive sizing pass adds more metal and the build up accelerates. Casual removal efforts with normal cleaning materials cannot remove the solid bits of brass but a few days soaking in a copper disolving bore cleaner containing ammonia might do it.
What I have done, many times, is to make a neck cleaning "lap" with a proper diameter and short lenth of wood dowel wrapped with a tightly wound bit of a green 3M 'pot scrubber" pad stolen from my wife. Chuck the lap in an electric drill motor, wet the pad with a squit of any light oil and push it into the die for a couple of minutes, remove, clean the die and size a case to see if you've cleared the galling. If not, repeat until you do. (4/0 steel wool will do it too but not as quickly as the 3M pads.) Don't worry about dulling the die's mirror finish, a matt finish holds lubracant better and therefore ******* a recurrance of the galling.
You will NOT materially enlarge the die with this method. Sizers are case hardened and it takes a grinder or sander to change one; a file or hacksaw won't touch it.
When you get it clean, use enough case lube to prevent recurrance or you'll be cleaning it again soon. Or, better yet, get a Lee collet neck die and forget about lubing at all. And you'll probably obtain straighter necks too. lightbulb
Metzger
Well-Known Member
On reddings website said to use 400 or 600 grit wet/dry auto Body paper with wd40 or equivalent. I used 1000 grit and copper cleaner and worked GREAT. Easy and fast gun. 
D
Deleted member 46119
Guest
It could be scratched, it could be galling.
Mine produced that finish even after I cleaned it with copper remover. Cleaned and cleaned and cleaned.
I had sized some nickle cases.
I just finished polishing it with 1000grit wet/dry followed by buffing with automitive buffing compound.
Problem solved.
Mine produced that finish even after I cleaned it with copper remover. Cleaned and cleaned and cleaned.
I had sized some nickle cases.
I just finished polishing it with 1000grit wet/dry followed by buffing with automitive buffing compound.
Problem solved.
