Hornady Dies Pissing Me Off

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  • Reloading 9mm is new to me, as I thought it was foolish to reload ammo I could buy live for $25/1000 more than rolling my own. Fast forward to 2020-2021...
    I am well versed in Lee dies and own a few sets of RCBS. During the current great reloading shortage, I bartered into a brand new set of Hornady 9mm dies. I have not even been able to successfully decap and resize brass without 75-80% of Blazer brass not dropping the primers. This only happens with Blazer Brass and is driving me insane. Nothing about it makes sense. I'm not a reloading expert, but it sure as hell seems that the primers Blazer uses get sucked back into the brass on the press' upstroke.
    What am I missing here???
     
    Last edited:

    boule

    Ultimate Member
    Oct 16, 2008
    1,948
    Galt's Gulch
    Are those the Hornady "zip" spindles? If yes, you probably have a little slippage of the spindle when the primers are a snug fit.

    1) Check spindle depth
    2) make necessary adjustments and put a sharpie mark on spindle
    3) if the primers are not getting out, check mark, afterwards adjust tension
     
    Are those the Hornady "zip" spindles? If yes, you probably have a little slippage of the spindle when the primers are a snug fit.

    1) Check spindle depth
    2) make necessary adjustments and put a sharpie mark on spindle
    3) if the primers are not getting out, check mark, afterwards adjust tension

    I speak English, y Español.
    Hornaday dies are a foreign language to me. Please dumb down what a Hornady spindle is.
    (I honestly appreciate your help, but don't know the component names)
     

    bpm32

    Active Member
    Nov 26, 2010
    675
    The zip spindle is just the long rod sticking out the top of the die, which is tightened down by a nut. It controls the depth of the decapping pin. You use it to lower the decapping pin. It’s made to slip rather than break.

    If the decapping pin is already very low, it could be your spent primer is sticking to the decapping pin, then partially reseating in the primer pocket on the upward stroke. You can usually prevent that from happening by putting a little extra speed on the handle right as the primer pops out.
     

    trickg

    Guns 'n Drums
    MDS Supporter
    Jul 22, 2008
    14,592
    Glen Burnie
    My 9mm dies are Hornady - I have the Titanium Nitride New Dimension dies. I've never had an issue with mine, and lately I've been processing a lot of once-fired military brass, so I'm dealing with primer crimps too.

    To be fair, the only reason I have them is because I caught them on sale somewhere - the price was right, I needed a set, so I snagged them.

    I should probably qualify that the only dies from the set that I use are the sizing die and the bullet seating die. Case mouth flare is taken care of by my Dillon powder die with the 9mm powder funnel, and I use a Lee Factory Crimp Die in every pistol caliber I reload.
     

    4g64loser

    Bad influence
    Jan 18, 2007
    6,381
    maryland
    Second vote for decapping first (I do this to all brass so the wet tumbler cleans the pockets out for me).

    If it is just blazer, sg, I will be happy to trade you other non vista brand headstamps for it. I'm sure I have enough to cover you.

    The primer suck back happens with the universal decap and other brand sizing dies sometimes. Crimped 556 seems to be a particular offender. Some brands of 45 too.
     
    My 9mm dies are Hornady - I have the Titanium Nitride New Dimension dies. I've never had an issue with mine, and lately I've been processing a lot of once-fired military brass, so I'm dealing with primer crimps too.

    To be fair, the only reason I have them is because I caught them on sale somewhere - the price was right, I needed a set, so I snagged them.

    I should probably qualify that the only dies from the set that I use are the sizing die and the bullet seating die. Case mouth flare is taken care of by my Dillon powder die with the 9mm powder funnel, and I use a Lee Factory Crimp Die in every pistol caliber I reload.

    Second vote for decapping first (I do this to all brass so the wet tumbler cleans the pockets out for me).

    If it is just blazer, sg, I will be happy to trade you other non vista brand headstamps for it. I'm sure I have enough to cover you.

    The primer suck back happens with the universal decap and other brand sizing dies sometimes. Crimped 556 seems to be a particular offender. Some brands of 45 too.

    Interestingly enough, I was able to clearly feel the difference with crimped primers on military head stamps and Aguila brass. However, there was zero issues with crimped primers getting sucked back in. This only happened with Blazer brass and it happened a lot.
     

    4g64loser

    Bad influence
    Jan 18, 2007
    6,381
    maryland
    Interestingly enough, I was able to clearly feel the difference with crimped primers on military head stamps and Aguila brass. However, there was zero issues with crimped primers getting sucked back in. This only happened with Blazer brass and it happened a lot.

    Odd. It happens to me during decap operation sometimes but I don't remember it happening much with vista branded headstamps (blazer, cci, speer, fc). I recall winchester being an offender sometimes in nine but I seem to get it more frequently with 556 and 45.
     

    trickg

    Guns 'n Drums
    MDS Supporter
    Jul 22, 2008
    14,592
    Glen Burnie
    Dillon dies now have the spring loaded decapper that basically flings the primer off of the decapping rod. Kind of an interesting thing, but I'm not positive if it's absolutely necessary.
     

    lazarus

    Ultimate Member
    Jun 23, 2015
    13,678
    I haven't seen that with my Hornady 9mm resizing die. Just make sure the decapping pin is reasonable far down and make sure that the nut holding the capping pin in place is tightened down pretty good.

    Every once in awhile I'll get a primer that won't come out, but it is across dies and calibers and usually is some primer where the cup just wants to bend like taffy before it'll pop out. I've had them distort a good 1/4" before popping loose between the cup distorting and also starting to come out of the pocket.

    So most of my dies I set down 5/16". Of course with rifle dies that is harder to do with the neck expander, don't want to slam that down in to the webbing of the case.

    Also yeah, I got Hornady 9mm dies back last March when I saw everything drying up. Same with components. Damned if I was going to reload 9mm and maybe save 1-2CPR. I wasn't wasting my time on that. But now that I can save like 50cpr...

    And I realized I really, really, really enjoy reloading. More so with my Lee Classic turret press. I don't want a progressive, but this is a nice balance of feeling like I am reloading ammo, rather than just pumping a handle as fast as I can. And still manage to get maybe 150-200 rounds of pistol ammo loaded up when I am in a groove.

    Once lee turrets are available again at a vaguely reasonable price, I can leave all my dies setup and swapping calibers to reload will be really fast. Just some quick testing to make sure it is still all good, maybe a minor tweak if I need to. Then start cranking out rounds. An hour of work and I can have all of the ammo for a range trip done (I usually shoot about 100-200 rounds on a trip, depending on exactly what guns I am taking with me). Since I go about once a month, an hour of a month and I've reloaded all I need for my shooting that month.

    Anyway, unless 9mm ends up getting really stupid cheap or commercial ammo ends up being cheaper than I can even reload 9mm for, I'll probably keep reloading 9mm once the pandemic is done. Or at least sometimes I'll sit down for a couple of hours to crank out a few hundred rounds. I enjoy it enough, it is nice to do in its own right.
     

    alucard0822

    For great Justice
    Oct 29, 2007
    17,643
    PA
    My 9mm dies are Hornady - I have the Titanium Nitride New Dimension dies. I've never had an issue with mine, and lately I've been processing a lot of once-fired military brass, so I'm dealing with primer crimps too.

    To be fair, the only reason I have them is because I caught them on sale somewhere - the price was right, I needed a set, so I snagged them.

    I should probably qualify that the only dies from the set that I use are the sizing die and the bullet seating die. Case mouth flare is taken care of by my Dillon powder die with the 9mm powder funnel, and I use a Lee Factory Crimp Die in every pistol caliber I reload.

    This. I had Lee 9mm dies and ended up having to crank the stem lock constantly, kept backing out with crimped primers. The hornady has a threaded rod, so when adjusted, it with either push the primer out, or stop the press trying if you hit a beradan primed case(has replaceable pins if it breaks). I use a little lube on the brass being the 9mm cases are tapered, helps load much smoother/faster, then tumble the loaded ammo for a couple minutes to clean it off.
     
    Problem solved.
    I prefer hand priming, as I can feel if something is amiss and can inspect every case upon priming. I don't mind the extra time due to peace of mind. That being said, this is how I load bulk ammo on my Lee ABLP...
    Fill hoppers with spent brass... Decap/resize (running a progressive with only one die in place)... clean brass... Hand prime... refill hoppers and run as a progressive press with already prepped and primed brass.
    .
    Thanks to MDS suggestions, I made a simple modification and it ran like a charm--- I used my Lee universal decapping die first and added the Hornady resizing die to the second stage. The other stages remained empty. The Hornady die is now only sizing, as the Lee die is doing the decapping.
    FWIW- the Lee die had zero issues with the Blazer brass' primers
     

    trickg

    Guns 'n Drums
    MDS Supporter
    Jul 22, 2008
    14,592
    Glen Burnie
    Problem solved.
    I prefer hand priming, as I can feel if something is amiss and can inspect every case upon priming. I don't mind the extra time due to peace of mind. That being said, this is how I load bulk ammo on my Lee ABLP...
    Fill hoppers with spent brass... Decap/resize (running a progressive with only one die in place)... clean brass... Hand prime... refill hoppers and run as a progressive press with already prepped and primed brass.
    .
    Thanks to MDS suggestions, I made a simple modification and it ran like a charm--- I used my Lee universal decapping die first and added the Hornady resizing die to the second stage. The other stages remained empty. The Hornady die is now only sizing, as the Lee die is doing the decapping.
    FWIW- the Lee die had zero issues with the Blazer brass' primers
    How do you like the ABLP? I have a Dillon RL550C, but I don't think that the Lee ABLP was available at the time, or I'd have looked into it - I have absolutely nothing against Lee gear at all - I loaded a lot of really good ammo on my Challenger press before getting the Dillon.

    I just knew that I wanted the 4th station - the Lee Loadmaster had enough "stuff" with it that I didn't want to have to implement a bunch of tweaks to get it to run smoothly, and the Pro 1000 is only 3 stations. I'd likely have tried it if it had been available.
     

    mtlcafan79

    Ultimate Member
    Sep 11, 2008
    1,279
    PG
    My RCBS die used to do this occasionally. Primer flicker spring depriming rod fixed that. If doing universal decapping FW Arms has a depriming die with this feature that will convert your berdan primed cases when you miss one. Might Armory dies have spring loaded pins too.
     
    How do you like the ABLP? I have a Dillon RL550C, but I don't think that the Lee ABLP was available at the time, or I'd have looked into it - I have absolutely nothing against Lee gear at all - I loaded a lot of really good ammo on my Challenger press before getting the Dillon.

    I just knew that I wanted the 4th station - the Lee Loadmaster had enough "stuff" with it that I didn't want to have to implement a bunch of tweaks to get it to run smoothly, and the Pro 1000 is only 3 stations. I'd likely have tried it if it had been available.

    For the price it is great. The lower dollar factor comes with some setbacks:
    1- Changing calibers is a PITA. Everything has to be manually set and the shell plate has to be changed. It does not allow for pre positioned dies to be on a turret (other Lees) or on a plate (Dillon), etc. Every die must be removed and replaced. Tuning the flare/powder drop die is the most time consuming. Lock rings lessen the struggle, but it is still time consuming. When I switch calibers, I load everything I have in that caliber before swapping to another. In the case of 9mm, I will load until I'm out of primers (~2500rds)
    2- Lee's on press priming system is garbage. I prefer to hand prime, so it doesn't matter to me- but worthy of pointing out.
    3- The new ones have an inverted "soda bottle" powder hopper, and fellow Lee fanboys aren't happy about it. I have the original type where the lid is simply removed and more powder is added.

    In a nutshell, I highly recommend it for single caliber, high volume loading. Assuming I'm starting with primed pistol brass, I can comfortably crank out 400-500rds per hour. This includes .357 Sig, as the press' settings are very repeatable once tuned. Not too shabby for a $200 press.
     

    trickg

    Guns 'n Drums
    MDS Supporter
    Jul 22, 2008
    14,592
    Glen Burnie
    For the price it is great. The lower dollar factor comes with some setbacks:
    1- Changing calibers is a PITA. Everything has to be manually set and the shell plate has to be changed. It does not allow for pre positioned dies to be on a turret (other Lees) or on a plate (Dillon), etc. Every die must be removed and replaced. Tuning the flare/powder drop die is the most time consuming. Lock rings lessen the struggle, but it is still time consuming. When I switch calibers, I load everything I have in that caliber before swapping to another. In the case of 9mm, I will load until I'm out of primers (~2500rds)
    2- Lee's on press priming system is garbage. I prefer to hand prime, so it doesn't matter to me- but worthy of pointing out.
    3- The new ones have an inverted "soda bottle" powder hopper, and fellow Lee fanboys aren't happy about it. I have the original type where the lid is simply removed and more powder is added.

    In a nutshell, I highly recommend it for single caliber, high volume loading. Assuming I'm starting with primed pistol brass, I can comfortably crank out 400-500rds per hour. This includes .357 Sig, as the press' settings are very repeatable once tuned. Not too shabby for a $200 press.
    I've watched a few vids and it seemed like it could be a solid press.

    The one thing I like about the Dillon, especially since I've added a couple of accessories that allow the powder hopper to quick disconnect, is that it's pretty simple to switch over calibers due to the tool-heads. If I'm not changing bullet types/sizes for that caliber from the last loading, swapping in the whole tool-head makes it pretty simple. It's slightly more time consuming if I'm going from small to large primers, but otherwise I just recalibrate the powder measure and I'm off to the races.

    I paid dearly for it though - not including dies I've currently got well over a grand invested in the press, the stand, the roller handle, and the tool heads and caliber conversions. I'll have to use it for a bit before it "pays for itself." (Although to be fair, I did crank out 200 9mm freedom seeds last night - that should count for something.)
     

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