Sometimes when I'm seating flat based bullets it's a little difficult, initially, to seat the bullet in the mouth of the case. Then I get a little bit of copper shavings from the mouth of the case. I just scrape the copper off from around the mouth. Is this normal? Should I be chamfering... not sure if that's the right word... the inside of the mouth of the case? Thanks.

Yes, the cases should be inside and out side chamferred before reloading. It's not so much an issue with once fired factory brass, but it's imperative with new ufired brass.

quote:

Originally posted by Ckemp:
Should I be chamfering...?

Yep. VLD-type tool is best.
.

I loaded quite a few 243 rounds, and many of them had this copper shaving thing occur. I had already loaded the brass with powder, so after I noticed the first one do this I didn't want to chamfer and cause brass shavings to fall into the shell with the powder. I'm gonna go ahead and shoot these unless someone thinks I shouldn't. There was just a minimal amount of copper coming off the bullets. Thanks.

Wont hurt nothing but maybe accuracy.

Always chamfer new brass, and freshly trimmed brass. The VDL tool suggestion is a good one.

quote:

Originally posted by Ol` Joe:
Wont hurt nothing but maybe accuracy.

Always chamfer new brass, and freshly trimmed brass. The VDL tool suggestion is a good one.

+1

Someone needs to be the voice of caution here.

While I do not think you are going to have trouble, it isn't out of the question either. You should be trimming the cases and you should be deburring the outside of the mouth and chamfering the inside.

If they are new you probably wont get into trouble. BUT If they cases were new and had substantial burr inside and out then you could have some bind issues which can increase pressure. If you have been loading hot loads and you have some stretch you could have problems from the neck intruding into the throat.

Always measure length. Trim when necessary. Deburr and chamfer when new or when you trim. If you don't do this it will bite you big time sooner or later.

They weren't new. They were once shot brass. I measured the length and they weren't close to the max length. I thought chamfering and deburring were only needed with new brass and after trimming. Since they were neither I didn't. If I debur the inside I imagine I wouldn't have the problem of the mouth of the case shaving off a slight bit of the copper jacket. Right? Thanks.

Ckemp, If the brass is from factory ammo you should chamfer. The factory has a habit of not doing this step in manufacturing their ammo in my experiance. You only have to do it when useing new cases, or trimming. it doesn`t have to be done after every fireing.

quote:

Originally posted by Ckemp:
If I debur the inside, I imagine I wouldn't have the problem of the mouth of the case shaving off a slight bit of the copper jacket. Right?

Right.
.

Other than the needful chamfering/deburring, I would suggest this:

http://www.leeprecision.com/cgi/catalog/browse.cgi?1218...tml#CaseExpandingDie

Several years ago, I made with the lathe an almost identical tool, that I always use before seating flat base bullets; with it I VERY slightly flare the mouth of the case; no more collapsed brass, copper shavings or excessive effort to seat bullets. I consider it a must.

When I get a little obsessive I use a larger sized tapered expander to slightly bell the case mouth so the edge is slightly larger than the bullet.
It prevents shaving of jacketed bullets.

Lyman's "M" expanding dies do the best job as they won't over expand the case mouth if your adjustment is a little off or the brass varies a little in length the way that typical flared case mouth expanders can. They also leave a very nice even "ledge" that helps to hold a flat base bullet straight in the case mouth.