I loaded some max loads in my 454 Casull and the bullets started to pull loose under recoil. I had put approximately 5/8th of a turn on my Lee Factory crimp die and applied what looked like a factory crimp on these max load 454's. Anyway, I have just finished loading up another batch and this time I put 1 full turn on the Lee factory crimp die for a "Heavy" crimp as per their directions. With one full turn on the crimp die it actually crimps the case neck into the crimp grove forming what looks like a small neck and small shoulder over the shoulder of the crimping groove. It is hard to explain, but it looks like a miniature shoulder and neck of a rifle case. The factory crimps look like a nice little roll over the shoulder of the crimping groove, with out the "neck" look that mine have.
I have attached a picture so that hopefully you guy's can see what I'm talking about. So is this what a normal "Heavy" crimp should look like for the 454? Thanks.

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If they'll chamber, no sweat! Some of the heavy hitters, as you've found out, need all the crimp you can put on them. As long as they will chamber there should be no problem.

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They chamber fine, they just don't look like a factory crimp. Thanks.

Briankmagby: That's how a heavy crimp looks with the Lee crimp dies. Mine used to look the same way when giving a heavy crimp to .357 Mag rounds (which also like a heavy crimp if you go big load). Like someone else said, if they chamber smoothly, which in a revolver means they drop in and out of the cylinder's chambers easily, they should work. Personally, I went away from the Lee Factory Crimp dies and prefer the Redding crimp dies. I found the Lee dies more mashers than crimpers. They played **** with case life. I find the Redding crimpers do a smoother job while being just as effective.

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Mykal

Thanks Mykal, like I said they chamber fine but they do look weird. I might try the Redding die that you mentioned as I can see that the heavy crimp from the Lee Factory Crimp die will never come completely out when I resize the cases next time. What does the crimp look like when you apply a heavy crimp with the Redding crimp die? How does the factory ammo hold the bullets in place so firmly when they look like the light crimp applied by the Lee factory Crimp Die?

You should not get a bulge, get a Lee factory crimp, your troubles will be over, sometimes you get a little foil,due to a heavy rolled crimp, no bulge on the case neck, really working the brass, Lee 's factory crimp is the most uniformed crimp on the market. I use them on all my cases. Aim small hit small. RAMbo.

If you read his post a little more carefully, youll find that hes already using the Lee FC die...i personally would back off a little bit on the crimp unless you have a large supply of brass. Crimping like that maybe be fine and dandy and it will probably work, but its going to wreak havok with your brass. I wouldnt expect more than a few loadings before those cases would be shot

Unlike a roll crimp, the casemouth is compressed between the jacketed bullet and the crimping shoulder of the die so it has no place to go other than to flow and thin out. This will eventually lead to shortened case life due to casemouth splits. You might try backing off a bit with the heavy crimp to make your cases last longer.

Thanks for the responses everyone. Yes, I am using a Lee Factory Crimp Die; at least I think I am. It is the Lee Crimp Die that came with my Lee Dies in the 4-die set. The instructions say screw the die in until it just touches the loaded bullet, then lower the bullet and turn the die down 1/2 turn for a light crimp, and one full turn for a heavy crimp. The pictures above are of the heavy crimp made by turning the die down one full turn as per the instructions. And like I said earlier, the reason that I did this is because the last full power rounds that I loaded were pulling the bullets under recoil. Those were crimped with about 5/8ths of a turn on the crimp die, half way between 1/2 turn and 3/4 of a turn. So this time I gave them one full turn for what Lee calls a "Heavy" crimp. There isn't any bulge in the case as Rmouleart mentioned, what you see if you look closely at the pictures is the case following the lines of the bullet and then rolling over the shoulder of the bullet crimping groove and down into the groove itself, then the rest of the case (the part that looks like a small neck) being tightly pressed up against the bullet in the bullet crimp groove. So the case is rolled very tightly over the shoulder of the bullets crimping groove then pressed up against the bullet, basically following the lines of the bullet perfectly. Is this to heavy of a crimp, as mentioned above, there is no bulge and the bullets drop into and fall out of the cylinder with no problem at all. Are these bullets safe to shoot like this? I do agree that it is really going to ware out my brass fast. But I don't know what else to do since the recoil of the 454 Casull will pull lighter crimped bullets. What do you 454 guys do and how do your crimps look? And how do the factory 454 Casull crimps hold their bullets when they look like a light Roll Crimp? Thanks again everyone.

good topic... what you have looks like the crimp on my HEAVY 45 colt loads... i found that with slow powders and heavy bullets i needed a crimp like this to get consistant velocities and accuracy. with lighter bullets and faster powders i can back off a bit til things just roll... i have a lee FC die and a redding profile crimp... both look the same when set to HEAVY... so far i have a half dozen reloads on some of my brass with a heavy crimp and everything is A-OK BUT flaring the mouth to get bullets started is a PITA because you can't get that heavy crimp out of the mouth all of the way when you resize...

danged if you do danged if you don't i guess...

Jamie

Thanks JARoot, I feel better now. I tired pulling one of the bullets and resizing the brass and reloading it again just to confirm my suspicions that when resized, the crimp will not come completely out. I then reseated another bullet though, and did it with out flaring the case so that I will get maximum tension on the bullet. It worked fine. I guess only time will tell how long the brass will last. Thanks again.

I personally like the hornady crimp die that is supplied with all the large caliber handgun 3-die set by the way the 3-die set comes with the extra fourth die at no cost. It dont have no setting on it . It simply keeps crimping harder and harder the more you pull on the handle it takes a little bit of a learning curve but, right were you feel it first breeak over the edge of your brass and you give it just a snug more will hold in a 300 gr. cast lead with 32 grains of H110 and that is somewhere in the neighborhood of 55-57,000 cup. I love that crimp die it works great.Hornady says it is actually a modified tapered roll whatever the modified is but, hey it works.

Stan H.

That looks to be a lot more crimp than needed, and certainly more than I use on my FA .454 with 355 gr. bullets at 1700 fps. Just as important as crimp (and IMO more so) is neck tension. In fact, a super heavy crimp can cause less neck tension if the crimp causes the case to buckle away from the bullet, hence people saying so long as it chambers you are OK. I disagree somewhat. I have screwed up on crimping bullets before and they would still chamber but the darned bullets could be turned in the case with your fingers. You could not pull the bullet out due to the crimp, but the bullets were very loose. I have had this happen with .44 magnum, .454, and .32 NAA. What I strive for is to have the neck expanding button turned down to be at least .003 smaller than bullet diameter, even for cast loads so long as the cast loads are hard cast bullets. I have used an expander that was .005 inch undersized but did not see any real gain with jacketed bullets and pulled lead bullets measurements showed that they had in fact been slightly squashed by too much neck tension. I never would have thought that possible but when you seat a bullet measuring .452 and after pulling it the bullet measures .450, something sure as heck happened. If you buff your expander button to .003 inch smaller than bullet diameter and use a moderate crimp, no more than 1/2 turn on the Lee FCD your bullets will stay put. That is all I use on my .32 NAA, .44s (Mag and special) and the .454 and have never had a cartridge grow in length due to recoil.

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Big Bore, thanks for the info. When you talked about the "neck-expanding button" are you referring to the Sizing Die, or the Expanding Die? I stopped using the Expanding Die (I only use jacketed bullets) in order to create as much neck tension as possible. The inside diameter of my sized cases measure 0.444 at the case mouth, the outside diameter of the sized case is 0.470, is this sized tight enough? When the bullet is seated, you can see the outline of the bullet through the case and the outside diameter of the case once the bullet is seated is 0.474, to me this would seam tight enough to provide good neck tension. The Hornady Reloading Manual shows the spec. for the outside diameter of the 454 case to be 0.478, as mentioned earlier, the outside diameter of my sized cases measures 0.470. What do you guy’s think?

Brian,
if it were me, I would back the crimp off just a little. I shoot heavy loads in my 44 Mag (330 grn) and stiff loaded 405 grn loads in my 45-70. And I have no problems. How much to back it off? I would back it off until the case-shoulder appearance goes away. Thats where mine are and the bullets don't move under recoil at all

Have fun with yer 454!!

Brian

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