On average, I have 16 of 50 (32%) of .40 S&W loads that won't seat in my Glock barrel. I was shooting with my nephew and I had him attempt one of the loads that wouldn't seat in my Glock barrel to see if it would seat in his Beretta. My thought was that perhaps the Glock barrel was slightly smaller in diameter but it wouldn't seat in his barrel either. I'm using RCBS dies and have it adjusted to re-size as much of the length of the brass as possible. There is a small knit line on all of my brass where the re-sizing is obviously ending in the die. So 32% of them won't re-size small enough. I pick up range brass so I don't know if it's fired in my pistol or not. Any suggestions?

Are you crimping the case mouths?

A taper crimp or factory crimp gives me the best result.

I set up the loader and check the first few rounds in a chambering gauge. I always check every round to go through an auto loader before boxing the ammo. You can also take the bbl out of the pistol and check each round thought it.

I do have the RCBS bullet-seating die set to crimp but the problem is the brass is too large in diameter near the base of the brass, not near the bullet. I assume the brass seats up to the knit line mentioned in my initial post. As you suggest, I started sorting by pulling the barrel and dropping the re-sized brass in the barrel. If it won't drop in freely, I set the brass aside. Fortunately, I have a lot of brass but if I continue to lose 32% I won't have much soon. Obviously, this is ridiculously time consuming too. When I first bought the Glock I was shooting at an indoor range that required TMJ's. They sold reloaded TMJ's because I didn't have any other source. I frequently had trouble with those loads too. The action would attempt to close and the bullet would be jammed in the barrel. I bloodied the web between thumb and forefinger more than once attempting to unjam the action. I have a Wolf 9mm conversion barrel, use RCBS dies to reload for the same Glock and have never had a problem. If the .40's had seated in my nephew's Berretta, I would have made the conclusion that Glock makes their barrels tighter than what the RCBS die resizes to.

many possibilities. First will a sized case chamber? Is the bullet seated too far out? Was the case expanded excessively so the taper crimp didn't bring the case back to proper size? Is the bullet too fat? If the base of the case isn't getting properly sized one of the push through sizers can take care of that. If you are expanding excessively that can be adjusted or you can use one of the Lee factory crimp dies that will size the case back to correct diameter if it is too fat. Deeper seating the bullet (be careful of reducing case powder volume too much) is necessary in some cases.

Jerry Liles

Just as a general guess I would first look to the total length of the cartridge as it may be a wee bit too long.

I use, and many poop on Lee dies, a Lee Factory Crimp Die and their sizer punch from the casting dies for the appropriate caliber. Remove the top of the die and insert the punch into the shell holder and run the complete rounds all the way through the die and out the top. This die has a sizing ring inside the body of the die that will smooth out any bumps in the case. There are some good You tube videos on this approach.

Check the length first and then if you want you can order the Lee stuff for around $17 for the die and around $3 for the punch.

Redding makes a dual ring sizing die that supposedly removes the bulge. Lee makes a resizing dies that push the case completely through and out the top of the die this fixes the characteristic bulge you mention. Another option is to use an aftermarket barrel that more fully supports the case, thus eliminating the bulge to begin with.

The situation you describe has been attributed to Glocks fringing out of battery.

there are special dies made for glocks to prevent this from happening. another choice would be to get a real gun, like one made out of steel

Your Glock barrel is not smaller than the Beretta. I have both pistols and find that the Glock chamber has tooo much room for expansion. Barrel out of gun, I always shove a couple of the first reloads into the chamber by hand of my semi's when I set up my dies to check the case and mouth seating, 9's & 40's. I have found that the Glock Chamber has a lot of room causing the cases to buldge I'm thinking that the whole case does not exspand properly. That sucks but my Glock is super accurate never the less, and I do not create a heavy but medium taper crimp I don't want to lose the cartridge down the pipe past the rim. Concerned with the reading of the Glock Kaboom I purchased a Lone wolf replacement that I have found to be chambered tighter BUT the GEN 4 has more support than the Lonewolf does see the photo's. I thought that LWD fixed the Unsupported barrel issue but whats up with that? Check the case length and seat the head right AOL, and check the type of bullet you are loading - tapered head ? FMJ RN ride the ramps well, don’t load too skimpy. And inspect your magazine.

http://i289.photobucket.com/al...oxnard_pic/LWD_1.jpg
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http://i289.photobucket.com/al...oxnard_pic/LWD-2.jpg

quote:

Originally posted by vinnyg:
Your Glock barrel is not smaller than the Beretta. I have both pistols and find that the Glock chamber has tooo much room for expansion. Barrel out of gun, I always shove a couple of the first reloads into the chamber by hand of my semi's when I set up my dies to check the case and mouth seating, 9's & 40's. I have found that the Glock Chamber has a lot of room causing the cases to buldge I'm thinking that the whole case does not exspand properly. That sucks but my Glock is super accurate never the less, and I do not create a heavy but medium taper crimp I don't want to lose the cartridge down the pipe past the rim. Concerned with the reading of the Glock Kaboom I purchased a Lone wolf replacement that I have found to be chambered tighter BUT the GEN 4 has more support than the Lonewolf does see the photo's. I thought that LWD fixed the Unsupported barrel issue but whats up with that? Check the case length and seat the head right AOL, and check the type of bullet you are loading - tapered head ? FMJ RN ride the ramps well, don’t load too skimpy. And inspect your magazine.

http://i289.photobucket.com/al...oxnard_pic/LWD_1.jpg
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http://i289.photobucket.com/al...oxnard_pic/LWD-2.jpg

Interesting photos there on LWD barrels.

I've had two LWD barrels and would never buy anything from them again. Customer service is worse than terrible.

They advertise that their barrels will work with factory ammo !!!!! That's a shocker, why do they think buy their barrels? It's to shoot lead reloads. Their chambers are very tight and even after it was sent back to them, neither barrel functioned reliably.

I'm a big fan of KKM barrels and now have two of those to replace the LWD crap.

If I bought a Gen 4 Glock I would see first if the barrel will handle lead reloads before buying an after market replacement barrel. If the reloads work without leading up the barrel maybe you don't need an after market barrel, unless you want one.

vinny's point is well taken. The chambers of the Gen 3 and 4 guns are tighter than the Gen 1 and 2 Glocks. My Gen 3 is tighter than my CZ, and better supported. I would first look at the seating, as someone suggested. Try a couple thousandths less length to see if it helps. If the brass is range pickup, then you could be using some from Gen 1 or 2 Glocks and the bulge is bad. Get the Lee stuff and go from there.

I also have factory and Lone Wolf barrels, in different Glocks. The only thing I do to make the LWD barrels run like a top was to replace the factory weak recoil spring that should be done every so often anyway. I do it in all mine every 5-6K rounds of +p and 10K for reloads (9mm). Never had an issue, I just replaced it as a normal course of action. Same with my 1911, although the 1911 requires it more often.

get you a push through bulge buster they were invented for glocked brass.
watch that bulge, it weakens the brass right there and shortens case life a ton.

So, is it still a problem? As Jerry asked, does a resized case chamber? If it does try a couple more, no flare on the case mouth just sized. Then make a couple of dummies up (no powder or primers) with those cases, without a crimp. If they chamber adjust your crimp and try again. I prefer to crimp after seating that way the bullet is not still going in when the crimp starts. Are you loading single stage, progressive, seperate crimp stage?

If I remember RCBS seats and crimps at the same time. This isn't a show stopper, just get the dies set up right.

Something I just thought of, are you mixing cases? Is it all brands or the same brand of brass that doesn't chamber? It could be that one brand or even certain bathces ar elonger than others and the crimp is causing the case to bulge behind the crimp.

Let us know how this works out. If the fix wasn't here your results will lead us to an answer.

Thanks to all of you for your pointers. I brought the crimp down a little tighter and 20 rounds cycled without any problems. Someone mentioned the RCBS dies seat and crimp in the same operation; that is true and makes it a little complicated as I was using Rainier TMJ's with a very light copper plating. The crimp restricts the bullet from seating. I ended up ruining some projectiles before finding a seating depth/crimp combination that worked. If necessary, I will look into the Lee pass-through dies, I like that idea since it will smooth out the knit line. Thanks again.

quote:

will look into the Lee pass-through dies

I brought one as I was having the same trouble they work well. I pushed some where around 5000 rounds through mine so far.

I do every 40S@W round now as I can't be sure what ones will not chamber.