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Hey all, trying to get into turning some. I bought the Forster HOT100, but need mandrels and pilots i think. Since Im new to the turning business i was wondering if someone could enlighten me on what i need. Do i need both? A mandrel and a pilot? or will one or the other suffice? Thanks! Henry.
Another question, do i need neck sizing bushings for a neck sizing die? recommendations?
Henry, hi. Nice tool. I can't answer your Forester tool specifics, but....
I have the old Forester 'lathe' style tool/neck turner. I never did like the 'round' carbide cutter and even after modifying it to use straight cutters, I gave up. I actually made my own hand held tool which works great. I also tried 'inside' neck reaming with the same tool..... Forester makes some great tools, My hand lathe is still so tight after all these years, I find it hard to believe. BTW, I just realized that it will trim .17 cal brass.... I was trying to 'adapt' some Lee case trimmers to trim my .17 Hornet brass when I realized the Lee designed trimmers won't accomodate .17 cal. Also, Lee doesn't make ANY .17 Cal dies... WTH????
Yes, you will need a caliber specific mandrel. I designed my mandrels so they utilize the primer hole to help keep the case aligned perpendicular to the cutter.
The only thing I don't like about my neck tool, is the in-ability to 'dial in' a different setting. It's done with very fine thread screws, but it's still a pain in the butt.
BTW, although I have a bunch of very accurate rifles, I have never seen evidence that neck turning improves accuracy. I have read every magazine article in the last 40 years, without a definite conclusion.
Some national champion BR shooters not only don't turn the necks of their cases, they don't even weigh the powder charges! BUT, those are some tight chambered rifles, not a production gun.
There is a wealth of info about neck turning, etc on "6mmBR.com"... I do it, because it's fun and that's the bottom line. ha ha
Have fun!!!
ron
turning the inside or outside? If i remember right the 100 is an outside? Forster calls them pilots.
Most of the time neck turning is overrated and you can wreck a lot of brass if you do it wrong. You DO NOT turn the whole neck on normal chambers! Take to much so it looks pretty and your die will no longer be able to tighten the neck to hold a bullet. If it dose manage to hold the bullet the brass will expand a lot and then the die will have to move it more, work hardening your brass faster. You only take the high thick spot. When doing that you may only touch 1/2 or 1/4 of the neck.
Tight chambers are another matter and require bushing dies to finish the job and get the proper bullet tension.
Henry,
I have cut a ton of brass on the same tool that you have bought. It is a good piece, and will last you a long time. The tool uses pilots, and is for outside neck turning. Not to scare you away, but you can do a lot of damage to brass by neck turning. I would only recamend neck turning if you have a custom tight neck chamber, or you are having consintrisity problems. With the great brass out there today, turning is not necassary, many have left tight necks chambers, and stoped turning brass, as the equipement is so good. Dies with neck sizing bushings are only needed when dealing with tight fitted necks, or when the brass thickness is cut too small that a standard die will not properly size the brass. With that said, if you dont have to cut the brass then dont do it.
Some thing your will need for your neck trimmer. you will need to have an expander die, to expand the necks to precisly fit your cutter pilot. Unfortinaly Forster doesn't make an expander die. I modified a sinclair manderal to closly fit the diamiter of my Forster pilot. Forster recamends changing out the diameter of the expander in the sizing die to fit the piliot. When cutting the brass use a good lube on the pilot, and the outside. I like Shooters Choice FP10 oil. Some use STP, wax, and other things but I find thet FP10 works the best. Make your cuts in two passes. for example you want your brass to measure .0085 make the first cut take the brass down to .009 then the second cut to take it to the desired finished size.
wow, thanks fellas! what am i going to do!? haha just doesnt seem quite worth my time if its not going to improve my accuracy. no, i dont have a tight necked chamber, but reading about neck thickness and uniform tightness has me a believer in better accuracy. So if i do choose to try it, do i need only a Mandrel or do i need a Pilot too? I see some of you guys use either or both. Thanks so much for sharing your knowledge! I appreciate it!
Henry.
The only time I ever turn necks is when I make custom brass. Like forming 250 savage cases out of 308s and need to turn the necks down to factory specs. I also have the forester tool and it works great, especially chucked up in a drill with a lee trimmer case holder.
Measure your brass first, you may find that the brass made today is fairly consistant and there is no need to turn it. (Espeicaly good brass like Lapua, Norma, and Nosler.) As stated before YOUR trimmer uses piliots.
Well, I guess I'm the exception. I turn (at least a cleanup) on everything I shoot except for 223 plinkers in an AR. I've used a forster tool before, but now I use K&M turner and their matching expand-iron. Henry, you can get an expander pretty cheap SInclair international, but I really like the K&M - the attachment of the mandrel to the base is a better design than the ones that use a set screw on the shaft of the expander, and the taper along the shaft is at a better angle for smoother expanding.
I usually start the process on once-fired brass, and run it into the sizing die withe the expander ball removed. That way the case will be about as concentric as you can make it before you expand the neck, and the neck/shoulder junction will be at the desired location on the case. Then I lube the neck with Imperial wax and expand it. Then I turn it. You need a pretty close fit between the ID of the case and the turning pilot. If it's too loose, you can turn a little off of the expander mandrel by chucking it in a drill and rotating against oiled 400 grit wet/dry emory paper. Once you have a good fit, polish the shaft with Flitz s and it will minimize rusting and make the tool function better.
I usually set the turner "loose" and then gradually tighten it until it "cleans up" about 75-80% of the neck circumference. Try a few test cases and you'll see what I mean. On some cases/calibers, I turn to a specific diameter to eliminate almost all case neck variability. It can have an effect on concentricity, which in turn improves accuracy, but you may get more mileage out of other practices first. You may need to buy a tubing mircometer to see how "bad" you cases are to start with - but be warned, once you start measuring them, it's hard to ignore the variability you see expressed in the measurements.
I do it because it's something I can do to control variability, and the more I shoot the more attention I pay to the case necks. Having the necks uniform is worth the effort for me.
ELkbane
In memory of all those who can't turn their necks............................
http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o...ibracewide.jpg
That's called run out humor...................
i just started neck turning becuase i am forming 6.5 creedmoor from 308 brass and have to thin the necks back to spec.i do lioke the fact that now my brass measure .0145 all the way around not usre about your set up but 2 things that helped me was a case thickness guage and a set of feeler guages from the auto parts store. i measred a fired case to get a reading of my chamber so i can keep within .002-.003 clearance on a loaded round.
forgot my neck step is to change that caliber to a bushing die so i dont over work the cases
I have .308 universal BR cases I plan to form to Creedmoor. Will you share how you did yours, lal357?Quote:
Originally Posted by lal357
i tried diferent approaches but the best so far is i used a redding body die in 6.5 cm then trimmed to 6.5cm thength then ran them thru a f/l cm sizing die checked to make sure they would chamber i in my rifle(had to run them through the body die again).then expanded the necks with a sinclairs expander . i measured a fired case to get a basis on my rifles chamber ,loaded up a dummy round to see what a loaded round measured and found that to get a .002-.003 clearance (loaded round ) i needed the cases to be .0145 thick measured with a insize digital thickness guage .i set my neck turner with a set of feeler guages from the auto parts store and did a few test runs i cut slightly into the shoulder to get any doughnuts out then run them thru the case trimmer again to make sure they are to correct legnth.
i still need to fire form to my chamber i'm going to use a min. charge and work up a load since these are lake city lr brass i'm using and are thicker then hornady's brass. i'm getting ready try it out on some 308 lapua bass next then see what the difference there is in fps between hornady,lc,and lapua in the end all i'm looking for is a better case life i was only getting 2-3 reloading out of hornday brass and thats not exceptable to me being i'm on 20-25 with my lapua brass (i use a bushing neck die and only f/l when needed i also anneal every 4-5 firings ).
hope this helps i know there are more on here that might have a better way to do things than me i'm still new to neck turning myself there is alot of talk over at 6.5 creedmoor.com they have helped me out alot in this .
Thanks so much everybody! I didnt ever expect to see this thread grow like it has! Awesome! I enjoyed reading all of your replys and am trying to soak them in! haha, I finally received my mandrels for my Forster HOT100 (sorry elkbane!) if i woulda known before hand you probably could have changed my mind! I havent quite made the time to turn any yet, but it will come along. Its going to sound like i dont know what im doing here but this is all new to me. and i might not have any business buying a tool that i dont know how to use but who doesnt want more accuracy!? or at least variable control! So, how do you know how much to take off the neck? I like the idea of the automotive gauges, but i imagine a the other measuring tool is more accurate. If i were to just jump in and try it i would take the neck down until it was uniform all the way around. but you would try to make sure each one looses the same amount of brass right? all for now,
Thanks everybody!
Henry.
test fired my first 50 sunday so far everything looks good worked up starting load and went up from there no pressure sighns yet and found 2 good grouping charges now to work in and out from the lands to try and tighten them up more.