Falling out of love with my Forster Coax Press due to shellholder.

Falling out of love with my Forster Coax Press due to shellholder.
So I am resizing some 30 Carbine brass. I use a RCBS carbide sizing die so I do not use case lube.


I am doing this on my Forster Coax press and every now and then a case sticks.


When the case sticks I want to grab the case rim with the shell holder but with the Forster press you cannot easily do that because the jaws automatically shut when the ram is at the top of the stroke. The jaws have to be open to let the case head in of course. Even if you pry the shell holder jaws open at the top of the stroke and put the case head in the shell holder it just slips out again when you try to pull the case out.
But if you put the stuck case and die in a press that uses a normal shell holder it pulls out the stuck shell just fine.


So I got the shell holder adapter for my Forster Coax press.


That allows you to use regular shellholders.
A regular press has a spring to hold in the shell holder.


But look at this shellholder adapter plate for the Forster Coax press. No spring.


Here it is installed.

But since it is just slid in there and not held with a spring, sometimes when you go to pull the case out the shellholder also slides forward. Maybe the plate is supposed to have a spring to hold the shellholder and I got a defective plate?

That is how it is....What is the hole just in front of the shell holder used for in the last picture? Maybe you could fit a pin in there to keep the shell holder for sliding out when removing the case.

You also may be able to make some sort of "wedge" retainer to place in after the shell holder. (has a split in the middle with a threaded hole...so when the screw is tightened it spreads the spit apart enough to wedge it in the opening.

I wonder - can the shell holder retaining plate be mounted with the opening towards the back? if so, when you pull the case out of the shell holder you will be pulling against the retainer ??

EdgarEg,
i was having the same problem with the small shellholder jaws when loading 30/06 and .308 what i noticed is that the cases that would not come back out of the die had buggered up extractor grooves. i also noticed the the both the small and large shellholder jaws have a large and small opening. i was using the large opening on the small jaws both on the 06 and the .308. after i turned the jaws around and used the small opening on the jaws no more sticking cases even with really buggered up extractor grooves. if you already have tried this then either jaws are damaged or the springs need replacing. HTH
Rick

I use a Lyman TMag Turret II press and it has a spring built into the shell holder reciever so it snaps in place and has never moved.
I use Lee dies which are already carbide so I've never experienced any of these types of problems. I still use RCBS case lube whenever I'm doing rifle brass though. The added length creates a tremendous amount of drag versus a pistol case with a straight wall.

I've got a tub of Mica Slick that I'm going to start using on the case necks for a dry lube inside the neck on my rifle brass too, but haven't tried it yet. Should make things alot easier on the neck expanding/decapping rod cause sometimes it squeaks when I pull the brass back out like it's dry and needs some lube. The Mica Slick won't effect your powder in any way at all and it's dry like baby powder, but super slick. It's made for coating the componenets for shotshell reloading, but also works for metallic reloading as well.

If you are in the market for a new press I'll make a suggestion for this one. It's the one that I have and I absolutely love it! Makes loading for my 10mm where I'm using 4 dies a breeze and there's no die change out, saves me a lot of time and set up.
Link >>>------> http://www.midwayusa.com/Product/169077/lyman-t-mag-2-turret-press

hawcer wrote:That is how it is....What is the hole just in front of the shell holder used for in the last picture? Maybe you could fit a pin in there to keep the shell holder for sliding out when removing the case.

You also may be able to make some sort of "wedge" retainer to place in after the shell holder. (has a split in the middle with a threaded hole...so when the screw is tightened it spreads the spit apart enough to wedge it in the opening.

Thanks for taking the time to help me this. I like that idea. I was thinking that maybe a rubber plug that would be quick to remove and insert would be good. Like maybe those rubber plugs that you use when you work on car brake lines to plug the brake lines while you have them off.
I am trying going back to the auto-jaws like Rick459 suggested first though.

eagle60 wrote:I wonder - can the shell holder retaining plate be mounted with the opening towards the back? if so, when you pull the case out of the shell holder you will be pulling against the retainer ??

Thanks for taking the time to help me this. I like that idea. But I am thinking that maybe then instead of the shell holder slipping when I remove the case it would slip when I inserted the case.
I am trying going back to the auto-jaws like Rick459 suggested first.

Mohunter wrote:If you are in the market for a new press I'll make a suggestion for this one. It's the one that I have and I absolutely love it! Makes loading for my 10mm where I'm using 4 dies a breeze and there's no die change out, saves me a lot of time and set up.
Link >>>------> http://www.midwayusa.com/Product/169077/lyman-t-mag-2-turret-press

Thanks for the suggestion. I was thinking about getting a turret press. I was mainly looking a the Lee Classic. Having three vertical posts instead of one appeals to me. But I will also look at the Lyman now.

Rick459 wrote:both the small and large shellholder jaws have a large and small opening. i was using the large opening on the small jaws both on the 06 and the .308. after i turned the jaws around and used the small opening on the jaws no more sticking cases even with really buggered up extractor grooves.

Thanks. That worked! I just finished resizing over 100 .30 Carbine cases and none of them stuck in the die.

1. I did not realize that the auto-jaws have four positions. The manual for the press is here:
http://www.forsterproducts.com/client_images/catalog19938/pages/files/Co-Ax_Reloading_Press.pdf
It does not mention four positions. It only mentions two.

2. Here is what my auto-jaws looked like before:


And then I turned them over like you suggested and they look like this:


3. When I first tried it I snugged the screws down tight. And the cases stuck in the auto-jaws:


Then I sanded the wear plate (item 46 in the manual) just a little. But I would not recommend that since it sanded off the finish and now I will need to watch for rust.
Then I loosen those two hex button-head screws just a little, just barely.

And then it worked fine.

Looks over engineered and way to complicated for a SE Mo. Redneck like myself, but I learned to reload on a single stage Herters press that's older than I am so the Lyman TMag Turret was a huge step up for me. That's about as far as I care to go with it.

Sounds like you got it figured out though, glad you got some answers from the ones who have experience with your outfit. That's why we come here.