George

------------------
Shoot straight, shoot often, but by all means, use enough gun!

I have custom built 6mm Remington with a .269 tight neck. I get along quite nicely reloading for this gun with a standard set of RCBS dies and a Lee Collett die set.

Provided you have turned your necks down to the proper dimensions, the use of regular dies will NOT cause high pressures. It MAY cause a problem with NOT ENOUGH NECK TENSION, but will not cause too much pressure.

I generally use the Lee Collett die for this rifle, but have to resort to the RCBCS full length die when the cases have been loaded a few times just so they fit in the chamber better. This is why Redding makes a "Body" die, so that you can squeeze the body of a case back down on occasion.

My dad also loads for a 22-250 Ackley Improved using a set of standard Lee Collett dies. His gun has a tight neck chamber and he has never had any problems. Actually, he has worn out two or three barrels on a couple of actions with this combination, and has never had a problem.

Again, so long as the necks have been turned to the proper dimensions, what die is used only matters in whether or not you can get enough tension on the bullet.

R Flowers

I have a .243AI with a .270 neck, and I MUST turn necks. No standard .243 die would size the case necks enough to chamber an empty case, let alone a loaded round.

I've never used a collet die, but if I understand the premise correctly, it isn't much different from a bushing die except you cannot change bushings to match your specific chamber neck dimensions.

A friend who posts here swears by them and has the groups to prove it.

George

------------------
Shoot straight, shoot often, but by all means, use enough gun!

quote:

---

Posted by GeorgeS:
I've never used a collet die, but if I understand the premise correctly, it isn't much different from a bushing die except you cannot change bushings to match your specific chamber neck dimensions.

---

Not true. For $5.00 a piece, Lee will custom grind mandrels for their Collet dies. Many folks find that they like a little more neck tension than that provided by the standard mandrel. It's very simple to order replacement mandrels .001 and .002 undersized. Takes about 2-3 weeks for Lee to make them.

The nice thing about this setup is that neck tension is less sensitive to case neck thickness since an "inner" mandrel determines the neck diameter, not an "outer" bushing whose size must be based on neck thicknesses. Unlike bushing dies, it doesn't matter if your necks are .010, .012, .014, or whatever -- they are sized down until they hit that incompressible mandrel. With a bushing die, if one wants .002 of grip (necktension), he has to match the bushing diameter based on the neck thickness diameter.

I'm not arguing bushing dies are ineffective, I just think Lee's Collet die is a bit more forigiving, and $5.00/mandrel is cheaper than $8-9 per bushing, and you can probably get by with only two additional mandrels while you may need several more bushings to cover various neck thickness (unless you neck turn, then you could probably get by with only two bushings or so).

Martindog

George

------------------
Shoot straight, shoot often, but by all means, use enough gun!