Here are a few pictures of my workshop when I was converting Russian Steel 12ga. Hulls to use 209 primers and shortening them from 2.75 inches to 2.50 inches to use in my 1887 lever action shotgun repro.
In the above picture, the shells on the far left and far right are unmodified Berdan primed hulls. The one in the middle has a #209 primer seated in the hull replacing the original primers. Note the headstamp markings. The center one tells us that it was manufactured in December of 1992. December 1993 is the date on the outboard hulls. Also note the icon that tells the shooter that the hull has a Berdan type primer.
Here are the first batch of shells, all loaded and waiting for the glue to dry over the over shot wad.
This photo shows the array of tools used to shorten the hulls and load them.
This Photo shows the how the original primer looks compared to the modified case w/a 209 primer.
This photo shows the C&H 12ga sizing die mounted in my RCBS Rock Chucker. I use RCBS Case Lube to size these hulls.
The antique tools seen here are great for reloading brass hulls, but they did not work all that well with the Russian Steel hulls. I was real leery using the priming tool with the 209 primers, so I went with the Lee Loader’s priming tool/wad seater and the wooden mallet.
. I removed the de-capping stem from the die body as it wouldn’t remove the No. 209 primers from the hulls.
The picture above shows all I needed to reload my Russian hulls once I have re-primed the hulls.