OK, Sorry I have to rant a bit about the hornady die set right now,
I don't see much need for the expander die honestly, and compared to their other sets, some of these dies could have been designed a bit better.
There are a total of SIX stations for loading up this cartridge for me at this point.
Due to the sheer number of steps, I had to move over to the progressive for loading.
1 Decap/resize (Priming is dependent on your press but for most, comes after decapping/ initial sizing.
2 Expanding (light)
3 Powder,
4 Seating,
5 Roll crimp (light),*edit STAB CRIMP
6 stab crimp.*edit TAPER CRIMP
for me, I don't like to work the brass too much and I just forego the expander step (because my press has only 5 stations)
I am able to seat the projectiles without this step, without much force,
but am I causing bullet distortion by not using this step?
Does anyone else skip the Expanding?
I can see myself half awake into the wee hours of the morning doing it all on a single stage and this is usually where all the mistakes tend to occur. /end rant
On that note, I will try to get back with some 4227 vs 296 w/ 300 xtp mag data from my 20"