Re: first load fail
Give us some more specifics. What dies? Caliber, brass, FL sizing, neck sizing? Thats a VERY vague post and I'm not sure there was a question in there anyway.
I had a similar thing happen when I was loading my 1st set of .308s with a Redding Match S-Type neck die (see my other thread for details). The readers digest version is that the decapping ball was slightly too big for the case mouths and was was stretching the shoulder on the downstroke as the ball was trying to slide out of the sized neck. Problem was solved when I swapped the expander ball for the decapping pin retainer which wouldn't touch the inside of the necks on the way out.