Hi, I need dies for a 30-06 Ackley improved
and for a 450 ackley.

Any one have a sugestion where the best place to have them made. ?

Hornady made my custom 450-400 dies (after you got me started with the loan of your dies! Thanks again). Lonnie Hummell was who I worked with. Hope they still do it, I got a quality product. Sent them fired cases, took about 6 weeks. Bob

And Lonnie likes this sort of challenge!
He did my 550 Gibbs dies.

Rich

I've used CH4D, nice work, reasonable price.

http://www.ch4d.com/

ch4d has them.. 109.57 for the 450 ackley.. 78.25 for the 06 ackley..

How about the smith that chambered your rig?
He knows what your chamber looks like. knows what the reamer looks like. He would be my first choice.

muck

Huntington Die Specialties.

quote:

Originally posted by bobc:
Hornady made my custom 450-400 dies ...
Lonnie Hummell was who I worked with. Hope they still do it, I got a quality product. Sent them fired cases, took about 6 weeks. Bob

+1

Hornady made 8x64S and 9.3x62 dies for me. I have been very satisfied. The custom dimensions allow me to size without an expander producing literally zero runout...

- mike

Thanks for the replies.

bobc says,

quote:

Sent them fired cases...

What if you have an idea but no cases? Are there companies that can manufacture a reamer (or a set of them) to form the wildcat from 300RUM brass? I want to form 300RUM down to the length of a .30-06 case with a 30° shoulder on it. I bought a set of Butch's forming dies, but the largest one is too small to do the job.

I found a place that has thousands of drill bushings in stock ( www.drill-bushings.com ), but the sizes I need have to be made one-off. I need five at about eighty bucks a piece. I decided on five to slowly squeeze the case down to such a size that I can then use Butch's to get to the proper neck diameter.

Another strategy is to have five reamers made, then ream five ready-to-ream dies from Newlon Precision ( http://newlonprecision.com/ ), the last one being the result I seek. I have no idea how much a reamer costs. I like the reamer method because the walls of the case are supported entirely as the case is gently formed in the die, going a long way to preclude crushing the case...

quote:

Originally posted by homebrewer:
bobc says,

quote:

Sent them fired cases...

What if you have an idea but no cases? Are there companies that can manufacture a reamer (or a set of them) to form the wildcat from 300RUM brass?

I'm not quite sure what you are asking here, but so far as I know any of the better reamer makers such as Dave Manson, JGS, ForGreen, Clymer, PTG, etc., can on request (and for extra bucks) make you reamer sets which include a finish reamer for the chamber and a special reamer for making your own sizing die using one of the commercially available die bodies such as the Bald Eagle. I make my own die bodies so have never tried a Bald Eagle, but they look fine.

If you want custom sizing dies, I would use either Huntington Die Specialties or CH-4D. I have used both over the years and both made dies done exactly to the dimensions I wanted.

My firstset from Huntington (actually still RCBS at that time) just happened to be in .450 Ackley Magnum and they worked as smoothly as greased owl poop.

Canuck says,

quote:

I'm not quite sure what you are asking here...

I'm asking who will make me three, four or five reamers to then ream three, four or five forming dies so I can gently reform a 300RUM case to the length of a .30-06 case, the wildcat having its lower shoulder in the same location as a .30-06, but with a 30-degree shoulder. I have no cases, of course, because the wildcat exists only in my fertile imagination at this time...

Any of the standard reamer makers will probably do that for you. Understandably they may want to charge you "custom reamer" prices though...which retail generally means $150 or more per reamer for solid pilot reamers. "Floating pilot" reamers are more costly than that.

If I may make a suggestion, why don't you call one of them, such as Dave Manson or Dave Kiff and tell him what you have in mind. Then he can very likely tell you how many reamers it will take. You can probably just PM Dave Manson with the general concept/need, as he posts here regularly

Then, before you decide how you want to go, why don't you call Huntingtons Die Specialties and ask them what they would charge to make a complete set of case-forming dies? I suspect that may be less money, as they may be able to make them by a combination of boring and using existing reamers they already have, without needing special reamers. (I would also call C-H/4D and ask the same question. Sometimes they are the least expensive folks around for custom wildcat dies.)

Good luck.