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Well I managed to bust the .223 pin so I'm looking for a replacement. It is a full length EZ X expanding/decapping die part number SE2172

I know you can get them from Midway but the but thought I'd try here first

Just buy yourself a Lee universal decaping die. You don't need the .223 expander.

Dave is right now is your chance to get rid of that abomination expander ball.

However you can just get the de-capping pin to replace the expander rather than the de-capping die saves you a bit and you can de-cap and resize at the same time without ruining your brass with that damned expander ball.

dromia wrote:Dave is right now is your chance to get rid of that abomination expander ball.

However you can just get the de-capping pin to replace the expander rather than the de-capping die saves you a bit and you can de-cap and resize at the same time without ruining your brass with that damned expander ball.

so how does the expander pin ruin the brass and can I replace that pin with a universal one. I have the complete die set (4 dies) so have a neck sizer to use once the brass has been full sized and fired

Rob

Expander balls go into the case when you FL resize and the case neck is sized over the ball, when you remove the case from the die the expander ball is pulled through the neck to expand it to accept the bullet, this dragging does all sorts of damage to the case neck and reduces case life. It can also pull the neck unevenly and cause concentricity problems.

I bin all expander plugs from FL resizing dies.

You can get universal de-capping rods for Lee dies to replace the expander pins, they are the same ones that go in their universal de-capping dies.

Thanks Dromia will get one ordered from Kranks, can also order bullets and pay one postage :)

Why did I not think of that.

one point, if you use Lee trimmer the barrel of the trimmer may not fit through the neck if you haven't used an expander rod when full length sizing, based on my experience of a few minutes ago.

Seems like a foreign language to us...

kennyc wrote:one point, if you use Lee trimmer the barrel of the trimmer may not fit through the neck if you haven't used an expander rod when full length sizing, based on my experience of a few minutes ago.

Just spent the last hour and came to the same conclusion as you, I now have over 50 cases (out of 100) not sized because the gauge wont fit. So I have to replace it if I want the case neck sized correctly