I have a new set of hornady dies in which the seating operation leaves a very noticeable ring around the bullets. Is this normal?

What cailber is it in what type style of bullet there can be a couple of reasons that it is doing it.

Sorry, 243win, Nosler 80gr BT.

Send them 3-4 bullets and the seating stem and they will get you a seat (or customize one) for you.

Are you chamfering/deburring the inside of the case mouths?

You can also make you own custome stem using two part epoxy. The claylike type is particularly easy to use for this.

Mine do the same, in most any caliber (as do my RCBS dies). The seating stem is a comprimise contour to match many bullets okay and few really well. As long as it is uniform, and not deep enough to feel with a fingernail, I consider it purely cosmetic and move on. It may (or may not) contribute to crooked bullet seating, but you will have to check your loads, and my rifles have shown little problem with that.

I have the same dies and same caliber, Mine do that also, some bullets are more noticable than others, the 'varmint' ones really do it I suppose because of the thinner jacket. It might help if you screw the die out from the press like another half of a turn and then readjust the seater. If you have the die screwed down too far it seems to crimp the case before inserting the bullet and then you get a really bad compression ring around the tip of the bullet.

Use the correct seating plug.

ricciaroelli,is correct!

is that seating plug an additional purchase? Im just using mine the way they came from the factory and I didnt notice any other plugs in the box.

One that will match the ogive of the bullet in use.

Use the correct seater stem and polish it. Jim

What do you all mean by correct seater stem? I bought dies to suit my cartridge. There are no other seater stems available that I know of. Polishing won't help. It's not a barely noticeable ring, it's cut deep into the jacket. Forget about feeling it with your fingernail, you could feel it with your elbow!

Hmmm, my Hornady dies did the same thing. No amount of adjustment or polishing fixed it. This happened with several different bullets too (partition, Scirroco, Sierra HP).
I got a set of RCBS dies and no problem.

My Hornady dies did the same thing with 3 different bullets. I sold them on e-Bay and bought a set of RCBS.

Hollywood

Review your die adjustment procedures. To get that much force seating a bullet probably means you have the die set too low, causing a crimp to start before the seating is done.

Start with a factory round if possible.

Back out the seating stem so that it will never touch the bullet with the press ram fully extended.

using the factory bullet, raise it in the press unti all the way up.

Screw in the seating die until it just starts to contact the cartridge, then back out 1/4 turn (insuring that the crimp ring is not touching the case)

Lock die with lock ring.

Screw down seating plug until it makes good contact with the bullet, then lock in place.

You die is now adjusted to seat to factory depth without a crimp, and you can begin tweaking as desired.

If this does not get rid of the marking of bullets, your expander may be too small, your bullets too soft (all lead only, all jacketed bullets should be tough enough).

Remember, that if you change the die depth after the above, it also changes the seating depth.