40 S&W reloading thread

[Irving]

I've been saying for years that I'm going to start reloading. Well, I actually have all the components I need now to do so. I've been reading different sources and trying to find a place to start. Here is what I'll be working with initially. This is going to be pretty beginner stuff, so I apologize in advance for asking the day one stuff.

RCBS turret press
Lee dies
Mixed .40 brass
CCI small pistol primers
Accurate Arms #5
Berry's plated 180g (also have 135g plated, but I'm going to start with 180)

I'm going to start with 180g and 1.125 OAL.
Trying to set everything up to get a consistent OAL tonight and ran into some things I wanted to ask questions about.

First, while loading empty cartridges to establish a baseline OAL and get my flare where I want it, I had some bullets have some plating scrape off due to no flare. This caused an issue with the bullet, and the case. I assume that the bullet on the left is no good with the gash in the plating, even though the bottom is in tact. All the pulled bullets that didn't lose any plating, still have this heavy ring around them, are they still useable?



I'm unsure of the brass, but the crease worries me. This picture was taken after running it through the resizing die.



Here are some measurements I took of 10 bullets, 10 cases, and 10 cartridges. I have one outlier in case size (and don't have a trimmer). The OAL is more consistent than I thought it would be, but is it consistent enough? It looks like I need to bring the bullet down just a hair. What can you tell me about this information that I've gathered tonight as far as consistency and acceptable variation?


Here are the pictures of the 10 rounds I made tonight (no primer, no powder).



This first one on the left looks a little bulged.