Well yet again I am having trouble seating and crimping my bullets. They're RCBS .45ACP dies, 230grn fmj bullets if it matters.
The instructions for the dies say to take a case, run it to the top of the press stroke, and then screw the die body down until it meets slight resistence. This is about 1/4" down or so
. Then place a bullet in the case mouth and run it through to the top of the stroke. Even with the seater die at the lowest it will not seat low enough. Anyway, then it says to crimp the rounds, while the uncrimped cartridge is still in the seater die, unscrew the die several turns (this cannot be done, way too hard to turn). Then screw the seater die several turns until it hits the case mouth, then go 1/8 more down (once you lowered the ram a little). Run through, then check crimp, screw the die body down for more crimp. *This didn't work for me, at all, not even a little.
The Speer manual, which you would think would have the same instructions, are to raise the ram (no case in it) and screw the die body down about 1/4" from the shellholder. Place bullet in case mouth and raise until you feel resistence, which should be the bullet seating (no mention on the position of the seater plug btw). Adjust seater plug to correct for bullet seating depth. Once this is correct, loosen the die body lock ring and raise the ram to its highest point, leaving the cartridge in the shellholder (again, cannot be done), then slowly screw the die into the press until you feel slight resisteance, lower ram, lower die body 1/4 turn, raise ram to crimp. *My trouble with this system, is that the rounds appear to be crimping themselves before I get to the crimping stage. I pulled one and noted a deep indentation of where the bullet was in the case, and I could barely see the case mouth to boot.
-Rant on- What am I doing wrong, are these instructions right and I'm somehow screwing it up, how should I be doing it? I guess the last rounds I loaded last time I either did incorrectly or managed to luck out and find the magical sweet spot (which is now lost). I'm at the point where I want to throw my RCBS dies out the window and buy some Lee dies in the hope they're easier to use, but would rather not waste the 60some bucks I spent on these dies.... 
-Rant off-
The instructions for the dies say to take a case, run it to the top of the press stroke, and then screw the die body down until it meets slight resistence. This is about 1/4" down or so
. Then place a bullet in the case mouth and run it through to the top of the stroke. Even with the seater die at the lowest it will not seat low enough. Anyway, then it says to crimp the rounds, while the uncrimped cartridge is still in the seater die, unscrew the die several turns (this cannot be done, way too hard to turn). Then screw the seater die several turns until it hits the case mouth, then go 1/8 more down (once you lowered the ram a little). Run through, then check crimp, screw the die body down for more crimp. *This didn't work for me, at all, not even a little.The Speer manual, which you would think would have the same instructions, are to raise the ram (no case in it) and screw the die body down about 1/4" from the shellholder. Place bullet in case mouth and raise until you feel resistence, which should be the bullet seating (no mention on the position of the seater plug btw). Adjust seater plug to correct for bullet seating depth. Once this is correct, loosen the die body lock ring and raise the ram to its highest point, leaving the cartridge in the shellholder (again, cannot be done), then slowly screw the die into the press until you feel slight resisteance, lower ram, lower die body 1/4 turn, raise ram to crimp. *My trouble with this system, is that the rounds appear to be crimping themselves before I get to the crimping stage. I pulled one and noted a deep indentation of where the bullet was in the case, and I could barely see the case mouth to boot.
-Rant on- What am I doing wrong, are these instructions right and I'm somehow screwing it up, how should I be doing it? I guess the last rounds I loaded last time I either did incorrectly or managed to luck out and find the magical sweet spot (which is now lost). I'm at the point where I want to throw my RCBS dies out the window and buy some Lee dies in the hope they're easier to use, but would rather not waste the 60some bucks I spent on these dies....
-Rant off-
