Bullet puller? What do you have?

BoomFlop said:

Does the collet damage the bullet? Is the only real negative to the collet the cost?

The Grip-n-Pull, does it work well?

I'm between those two right now......hmmm?

Steve

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It works great for me and it is so simple and fast I don't understand why anyone would use anything else

I have an RCBS inertia puller and an RCBS collet puller, not really crazy about either one, but...... The inertia puller does get a little messy with powder because the bullet is mixed up in with the powder and they have to be separated. As for deforming the bullets with the inertia puller, I read a good tip on the forum about putting a foam earplug in the bottom of the puller before you use it. I've not done it yet but will next time I need to pull a bullet. The collet puller is the one that I will use most if I have a number of bullets to pull. It will remove bullets three times faster than the inertia puller due to the manner of running the bullet up into the collet, tightening the collet around the bullet and then bringing the ram down to separate the casing from the bullet. I have found that the collet puller "will" deform the die if there's too much neck tension on the bullet. When I am working a load I usually will load five rounds of a particular load at a time so as not to have too many cartridges to pull due to excessive pressure. Also I've never really had good luck with pulled bullets, just not the same as new ones.

I'd also add that the inertia puller will pull anything that anyone would want to pull, even elephant's teeth if one needed to. But I have found that the collet puller has a lot of difficulty with crimped casings, it'll work sometimes it will take two or three bites into the collet, where the inertia puller you can just keep hitting the hammer on a hard object, for me that is the anvil part of my bench vise.

The grip and pull is even faster.

I've got all three types but use the inertia puller most often. The "hammer" type is easy enough when pulling only a few bullet heads. A soft piece of foam in the chamber prevents soft/pointy bullets from getting damaged. I rarely shoot that type of bullet anyway. My inertia puller doesn't have a hole in the side so all the powder is easily contained and then poured into a pan.
The Grip-n-Pull is by far the fastest if many bullets need to be pulled but they don't work well on .224 bullets unless plenty of bullet shank is exposed above the case mouth. Actually, the Grip-n-Pull doesn't work on any diameter bullet if you try to grab the ojive.
The collet pullers are just too slow for me but they do work well providing you have a collet for each diameter bullet that you may want to pull.

For occasional use here and there, I find the inertia pullers to work the best.

And when you have some that are really hard to pull, seat the bullet a little deeper before you try to pull it. Makes it a whole lot easier.

Like everything else, each system has it's drawbacks if used improperly and sometimes even properly.

I found that If you use a good fitting collet and adjust it to seat against the neck opening to get the maximum bullet contact you can remove the most stubborn bullets.
Also use a little finesses when tightening the collet. Over tightening can damage some thin jacketed bullets like match bullets.

Like reloading, work out a rhythm and use just enough force to remove the bullet and damage will be eliminated. It's all in the set up.

Like anything else there is always the exception and One or two will give you problems
so you need to inspect each bullet before you reload it and if it looks damaged in any way, use to for fouling or break in shots, and if you really don't trust it, Toss it you still saved the case, primer and powder charge.

I especially like the system when looking for a different style of bullet with the same weight because everything is the same as before except the type or brand of bullet and it gives me a good representation of what bullet the barrel likes best.

J E CUSTOM

I have a hammer and a collet. I like the collet better.

I use the RCBS collet setup. I like it. The hammer was garbage.

I had a primer go off on me in an inertia puller and ruined a perfectly good pair of underwear. Never again. I now use a collet puller.

Being cheap, I got a kinetic one for sale for about $10 when I started. I haven't needed to use it much but it serves it's purpose. A little loud if you live with others and o only dared use it on the concrete

grip n pull didn't work for me, couldn't get a solid grip on the bullets, sold iy

just use the old fashion RCBS Hammer style. ALL are a PITA

Used all, I prefer the collet style puller from hornady. Keeps powder in shell and doesn't damage bullet. Unlike hammer style, you must buy collet for each caliber. I still use hammer style on black powder loads. The wad keeps the powder in, so couple light taps and bullet just slides out of very light taper crimp. Only time hammer type works well.

LongProng said:

I had a primer go off on me in an inertia puller and ruined a perfectly good pair of underwear. Never again. I now use a collet puller.

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Dang

Hammer & Collet. Collet for finished loads for the reasons stated time and again earlier - powder mess. Hammer for pulling uncharged cases I'm using to set dies to seating depths. Foam, cotton, cloth wad in the hammer keeps meplats from getting bungged up.