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Posted: 7/23/2011 6:12:52 PM EDT
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Just mounted my press for a first time reloader. I'm doing .357 & I have two questions:
1. Do I need to clean the primer holes? 2. When do you clean the brass? Before sizing, or after or both? What I'm doing is cleaning the brass, depriming, cleaning primer holes, tumbling agian, then priming, etc. Seems to me that pistol reloading should be easier, but if not that's ok because in the two hours I spent tonight was a lot of fun! |
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Clean any case before resizing.
If you don't the grit on the case will scratch your sizing die and the die will scratch every case from then on. My method with 357; Tumble clean cases Size and deprime. I use carbide dies, so no lube to clean off. Trim and debur cases. I trim only at the first loading of a batch of cases. Cases the same length are easier to get a consistant crimp. Consistant crimp = better accuracy. Then I clean primer pockets. Many will skip PP cleaning and trimming, but I don't. Prime, drop powder Seat bullet in #3 die Crimp in #4 die If you try to seat and crimp bullets in the same die, you had better trim your cases. 
Most die sets come as a 3 die set. I added a Lee FCD (factory crimp die) for the 4th die. Lee FCD $16 What bullet and powder do you plan to use? Reloading is my most enjoyable hobby. |
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Quoted: Just mounted my press for a first time reloader. I'm doing .357 & I have two questions: 1. Do I need to clean the primer holes? 2. When do you clean the brass? Before sizing, or after or both? What I'm doing is cleaning the brass, depriming, cleaning primer holes, tumbling agian, then priming, etc. Seems to me that pistol reloading should be easier, but if not that's ok because in the two hours I spent tonight was a lot of fun! It is a complete waste of time and effort to clean primer holes. Cleaning your primer pockets won't have any effect at all on primer seating. You always clean the brass before sizing, if you don't the sizing die can be damaged. Unless you lube your brass, cleaning after sizing is a waste of time and effort, most people use carbide pistol dies which don't require lube. There is no need to trim most pistol caliber cases, I've reloaded over 100,000 rounds and never trimmed a pistol caliber case. If and when you get into rifle calibers, then you need to get a brass trimmer. Pistol reloading is easy, don't over complicate it. |
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There you have it OP, some of us bother to clean PP's, others don't.
I don't want primer seating issues especially with unknown range brass that has plenty of build up, so I used to clean PP's. I have recently switched to wet tumbling, that process gets brass spotless, with a clean PP. 
357, 45 ACP, 300 BLK made from 223 brass. |
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Good lookin' brass.
So, if that's previous fired brass, you had to clean, size/deprime, clean again––- right? I haven't bought powder yet. I was just so pumped to get the press mounted (about a six month project), that I just had to start doing something with it. Thanks for the inputs. |
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New reloaders seem to have primer seating problems.
You want the primer .002 to .005 below the head of the case. In a revolver the cylinder will drag on a high primer and may not go off on the first hammer strike. Because the hammer has to finish seating the primer on the first strike. They will normally fire on the second hammer strike. The build up in the PP can cause a new reloader to seat primers high. It's a fine line, you also don't want to crush a primer by seating with too much force. So seat primers below flush, but they shouldn't have any marks on them after seating. If they do, they are crushed. Something to watch for. You will soon get muscle memory for the right amount of pressure when seating primers. An experienced reloader can seat primers in an uncleaned PP, and have them come out just fine. But that's not where you are at. Get some experience seating primers, then skip the cleaning PP's then if you want. Powders, light, mid range, and near max loads, try some Unique, W-231, Power Pistol, AA#7, or True Blue. Full power loads H-110, W-296, AA#9, Blue Dot. 158 gr JHP is a good place to start, a 125 gr JHP will give less recoil. Then there are the cast or swaged lead bullets. Pay attention to which powder you choose, some will require magnum SP primers, others standard SP primers. Your reloading manual will tell you which primer to use with a powder. Make a list for what powder / primers you want to try and which primer to get, will make shopping easier. My recommendation would be, Win or Rem primers, and True Blue. Unique if you want lighter loads. True Blue doesn't get mentioned much here, it's a ball powder that is actually ball shaped and measures very well. Go to Ramshot for reloading data. Alliants site for Unique. |
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There is no build up in the primer pocket, what little residue left behind is extremely brittle and disintegrates at the lightest touch, the only possible thing that might be left in a primer pocket to prevent proper primer seating is media from cleaning with the primer removed and using corn cob or walnut shell media stuck in the primer pocket. I repeat something I have already posted, I have reloaded over 100,000 rounds of pistol ammo, 90%+ was 38 special revolver loads that were used in competition, the primer pockets were never cleaned, no high primers were encountered, and those rounds would group within 2" at 50 yds out of a Ransom Rest. On rare occasion I might encounter some cylinder drag, this was caused by a small build up of unburned powder under the cylinder ejection star, it doesn't take much, easily cleaned out with a toothbrush. All those 38 special loads were using Federal primers. the only time I ever had any high primer problems was using CCI primers, CCI small pistol primers are harder to seat than most other brands and they did cause me some problems with seating, I cured that problem by not buying any more CCI primers. I might add that during the primer shortage I bought a box of 1,000 small rifle primers, they were the only brand I could get at the time, and I didn't have any problems seating small rifle primers in 5.56 brass. |
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Thanks for the great insight,
One other question that's been keeping my up at night, and I can't find the answer in my manuals. If I don't trim to the same case length, won't I have seating issues? I envision the nightmare of having to adjust the die due to different case lengths. I over analyze everything I do, so I thank y'all for your patience. Feel free to tell me to shut up and start throwing powder. 
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As you likely have found out ,no two guys use exactly the same method to reload.
Most folks don't bother to trim pistol brass , it is a non issue with semi auto brass because you are only using taper crimp and the shorter cases don't stretch. My experience is that with milder loads there isn't much issues with trimming but hot loads of 357 and 44mag the brass will grow some and generally you will want firmer crimps and that will also grow the brass some. I tend to try and keep my brass separated into lots, for instance if I find a couple of boxes of 357 at my clubs indoor range I know it was factory once fired brass and I will set it aside as a good batch of brass to whip up some hot loads without the need to trim but I will measure them to check. If I am doing a batch of warm 44 mag loads for my infrequent hunting I would likely use new brass and also check length and or trim to get near perfect crimps The majority of my reloads are mild and I will rarely trim When I do trim I use the LEE brand products, I spin it with a cheep ($15) battery screwdriver. You buy the chuck and the cutter head and then a clamping caseholder and a guide rod for each caliber. The lee setup cuts nice and clean,needs little burr removable and by design will limit how much you trim so you can not overtrim. 38/357 is really the easiest caliber to learn reloading with Have fun! |
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