Tungsten Carbide (TC) Reloading Dies

[SemperFiGuy]

So----What is the situation on Carbide dies vs. plain ol' everyday high carbon steel dies???

Are they worth the price difference??

Can you really use them to re-size [full length and/or neck only] without using case lube?  (It's so FUN to remove a stuck case from the sizing die.)

Does the extra hard tungsten carbide damage easily??   (Instructions always say to use a few 1000ths space between the bottom of the die and the shell holder.   And at the price, who wants to knock chips of TC off the mouth of the die??)

Since I usually neck-size only, is there any point in TC dies atoll?

Will my five-shot groups all shrink down to a single hole in the target??

Commentary from Knowledgable Individuals is invited.   [Even if you've never even used TC dies.]

[Dan W]

For pistol, carbide dies work great with no lube and last a long time.

For rifle I use a  Redding floating carbide neck sizer button and it has pretty much eliminated the need to lube inside the necks on .223 cases.

Other wise I don't buy  the claims of lube free sizing , but I could see that the requirement for lube on bottle neck rifle cases could be less stringent with a carbide die

[SemperFiGuy]

So-------Dan....

1)  Where do you get this Redding floating carbide neck sizer button??   

     Usual places, like GU, Scheels, etc., or is it a specialty store item (Midway, Brownells, etc.)?

2)  Is a simple installation, like just unscrew the top part of the sizer die, remove the old, insert the new??

3)  And about what do they cost??  (I know...it's gun stuff...so it costs the usual arm+leg.)

I'd like to quit running old brass-bristle brushes down the necks of my .17Rem cases, because it takes excessive fine motor skill micro-movement and hand/eye coordination that seems to have got up and went.

And---one more thing---If I remember from your postings, you are recently into bottleneck cartridge reloading.   Looks like you went right directly to the fancy stuff.

SemperFi

[Dan W]

When I tried to find reloading dies earlier this year, there were none available, so the choice of Redding was  the only one I could make. I do not regret spending the extra money. These are very high quality dies

The carbide floating sizer button was a later purchase, when I wanted to reduce at least some part of the process (lubing inside the neck)

I get most of my reloading stuff from Midway USA , but in your case this Redding upgrade is not available in .17Rem

 http://www.midwayusa.com/viewproduct/?productnumber=367998

[SemperFiGuy]

 [Darnit!!

SFG