Smooth and accurate !
Redding competition bullet seater for 6PPC is all what I can except from bullet seater. It's made perfectly and it's beautiful. Also it works perfectly :) With micrometer adjustable it's unbeliavable easy to set OAL perfectly. Easy to make different OAL, just small turn from the knob and you have .001 shorter or .002 longer cartridge. I have made over 500 6PPC cartridges with this without any problems.
Home Run!
The Redding Comp. seater is worth every penny paid.Very accurate. Concentricity is Very good. .0005 to .0015 much better than any other die I have used. I bought it for my Savage LRPV in .22-250 1/9 twist. loading 68gr. bullets, accuracy is hovering around 1/4" at 100m for a 3 shot group. I have been replacing all my dies with redding dies. They have a lifelong customer.
Redding Quality 1105 as we know it
Simple to use. Comes with Instructions. Very good quality as we know from Redding. Lifetime Warranty. (in writing) Not cheap but very worth it.
Come on Redding, NO crimp in this die
I love Redding products.But these dies have a crimping ring. That is OK on a standard seating die but wasted on a precision seating die. One must back off the case from the crimp ring leaving the case in a "wobble" when one would prefer maximum centricity of the case, shot of bumping the die. Also one must trim case length more often. Come on Redding, NO crimp in competition seater dies!
Hits and Misses
I recently purchased the Redding 223 Competition Bullet Seating die as a means of achieving more consistent Cartridge to Base to Ogive / Jump to Lands measurements for the three bullets I use on a regular basis - Sierra Match King, Berger VLD Target and Hornady V-Max. At the range at least weekly. While my standard Lee Precision bullet seating die was giving very good run-out results, I was having variances of 1-2 thousandths of an inch in my CBTO. However; with a bit of adjustment and a sorting of bullets afterwards, I was able to prepare cartridges in batches of five. I was hoping the more expensive Redding die would remove some of this error and reduce the post-seating adjustments. To date, this has not been the case the results are only marginally better. At present, there appears to be just enough variation in the ogive measurement of some half of the match bullets to offset any increased accuracy of the fine Redding product. Is the return on investment of the more expensive Redding die over the almost as good Lee die worthwhile? Not sure yet. It may be the case that the extra money for the Redding die may be offset by the variations in the bullet ogives. I may start sorting my bullets by ogive to control this variable. More work than the hoped for less. Finally comment, the lock ring and set screw on the Redding die is very poor. I am using a Lee lock ring and may order a Hornady lock ring.
Poor design for 55 grain bullets
I use this for Nosler Balistic Tip 55 gr bullets in Lapua brass in a RCBS RS 3 press. It is easy to set up and the mirometer adjustment works well. However, the seater makes a sharp dent in the bullet with new brass and it does not seat the same depth for each cartridge. Also, the diameter of the seater dent is much smaller than the rifle bore which makes for a larger variation in bullet jump due to ojive variation between bullets. The seater works much better with resized brass and low neck tension.
Redding Competition Seater Dies will not work with compressed loads
I bought the Redding Competition Seater Die for my 300 WSM. Only to find that the die will not work with compressed loads, which are the most accurate loads out of my rifle. Brownells website doesn't mention that the die will not work with compressed loads.
So if your loads are compressed loads, avoid this die.
