I was reading an article today, they were talking about all belted magnum cases , but were focusing on the 458Lott. They were talking about case expansion at the pressure ring just above the belt.The article stated that conventional resizing dies can't properly resize in this area and were stating one should use the Belted Magnum Collet Resizing Die made by Inovative Technologies. Is this something i need to order if i go with the lott ? I was just planning on ordering Hornadys three die set. I used to handload the .338 win. mag and never had any problems with that caliber, but i always did disgard cases after the third time reloaded. How do you guys handload for the belted magnum bigbores . I sure hope you guys dont mind me asking all the questions that i have been asking over the last couple of weeks , but i just dont have the experience with these big bores and everyone hear seems very knowledgable. Thanks Tanoose

I think that the article you read, is another case of the writer got one free. I have never had any problem reloading belted mags with their regular die sets.

Hog Killer

I have yet to have any issue reloading the Lott except the Hornady Dies. They work but I could not adjust the decapping pin low enough to decap ...but that was not a problem as I have an RCBS decapping die...but the expander on the Hornady did not seem as good as my other dies...I went ahead and bought a set of Redding 458 Lott Dies they seem to work better.

You can buy my Hornady Lott dies for $20 shipping included if you want...

It is true that you can't size the brass all the way down to the belt because of the way the sizing dies are made. The bottom of the die just barely misses sitting on top of the belt. Unless you're pushing the envelope, that doesn't seem to hurt that much. I have always figured that with belted rounds, I'll have at least 2-3 full loads and then relegate them to practice rounds only. I've not heard of too many problems with belted rounds unless the chamber is overly generous or sloppy. I have been shooting 375, 458 WM and have reloaded for the 338 WM for others in the past and it seems that belted brass do hold up under judicious reloading as far as brass life.

Serves you right for reading gun rags, which are nothing more than advertisements for the products 'reviewed' therein.

This is a non-issue, as you don't normally re-use cases on the big magnums (with high-pressure loads) like you do a .22-250. I use my .470 Capstick cases about three times, then dump them.

George

George

Gee you're up early or is it I'm up late? Working nights is a certifiable bitch. I guess I'll try to sleep when my eyes start shutting on their own. You still working on that 458 WM project?

sounds like typical writer B.S. to me too. JJS is also right - buy the reddings

quote:

Originally posted by 475Guy:
You still working on that 458 WM project?

No, that's on hold. The guy who was going to build it for me lost interest, and I don't 'need' a .458 to play with right now.

George

It is pretty hard to abuse a straight case like the 458 Win...Those cases seem to last me forever and they don't get overworked simply because they are a straight case...

As to the .470 and most double rifle cases they last forever as they are running at about 30 some odd thousand PSI and its hard to over work brass at those pressures..I neck size only on doubles, based solely on the seating function, they must flop right in the chamber, but just barely....

At 40 cents a piece for Hornady brass, who cares?