im Lazy so bought a second primer assembly so I don’t have to disassemble it, just need to undo the couple of bolts while the case holder plate is off and swap over the complete part
Certainly an option, but you still have to swap the plunger. Which means you are only, like 2 screws away from just swapping the wheel and drop tube. Okay, I see. Sir! I compliment you on level of laziness I respect!
I thought I’d post here, to keep it all neat and whatever…
@MangoBombs few things to consider, a big one is - money vs time. What do you have more of?
Consider what you are loading. If you are loading a bunch of calibers, factoring in a conversion kit and a quick change tool head into price of a firearm might be a reasonable option, removing and re-tuning dies every time is a major PITA. If you are happy priming elsewhere and only load for 1 calibre, Lee might be a good option. Although, if you are loading for 38, then you are loading for 357 too. Then you’d want to consider how much you are loading. From memory Lee doesn’t have enough stations to have a bullet dropper and powder check system. If you are cranking out a bunch of ammo, you will either spend a lot of time doing it or you will need a powder check (under throw/over throw alarm) system. Or not, it depends if you like living on the edge and how you feel about squibs.
Ideally, you’d want
- a sizing station,
- charging/expanding station,
- powder alarm check
- bullet dropper (for bullet feeder) station,
- bullet seating
- bullet crimping
That’s 6. On a Dillon you have 5 and you’d need a all-in-one seating and crimping die to solve that. Or you’d have to forego a bullet feeder/dropper (that is if you are cranking out 300 rounds as a novice, it only goes up form here). As a baseline, I’ll do 500 or 1000 in a session. I know @1Fatman goes harder than that.
So yeah… Frankford Arsenal (I think) is releasing one soon, I am kind of excited about it. Maybe hold off until that’s out (early next year maybe) and see if that does it for you.
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Cheers for writing that up.
I’m happy to prime off the press, and am only considering reloading for 9mm at this point. I’m not keen on squibs and in general want to be as confident as possible in the reliability of my reloads.
Right now I definitely have more free time than free money - the cost-saving aspect is the primary factor in why I wanted to reload. Accuracy/reduced recoil over factory were secondary/tertiary considerations.
Of course I also want to crank out as many rounds as possible in a given time to be able to practice/plink as much as possible.
Checking out the price of the Lee @bentaz mentioned, it certainly seems reasonable.
I’d be willing to size/deprime on the single stage and do the rest on a progressive with 5 stations. I’m currently seating and crimping separately - something I can combine to reduce time spent reloading.
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I still sized/deprimed on the (sic) Pro 1000, but then I’d give them a bath, prime all my brass in front of the TV with a hand priming tool, then send em back through for loading.
It’s a simple matter of pull a die out here, chuck a die in there.
There’s a thread on here about getting the best out of the press and some experiments/ additions and modifications to it.
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For my 2 cents worth,
As @juststarting said I will go hard and pump out 3 thousand or more rounds in a sitting on the Dillon 650. Once it is setup it is just a matter of keeping the case feeder and bullet feeder full and top up the primer tube every 100 cases.
If you are going to be shooting a lot of rounds I would recommend saving the money and buying the Dillon. They are brilliant to use and make loading bulk rounds easy. They have been around for a lot of years and have a life time warranty so you are covered for future problems if any pop up. plus there are a heap of mods and bits that you can get/do that makes it even better.
I know that money is always a factor but if you can keep doing it on a single stage press while you save up for the right setup then it only hurts once. Everyone that reloads will have horror stories where they tried to do it cheap only to have to buy a more expensive piece a second time when they realize that it doesn’t do what they want it to do. If you wanted to start off cheaper you can buy just the basics, without the case and bullet feeders etc and build up once funds become available. You can also get spare tool heads and then once setup you just swap them over to load different calibers and only takes 5 minutes to do and away you go…
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Just shoot revolvers. I have a 650 and I never have to load thousands of rounds at a time, buy a bullet feeder, check my 2.4g nanna loads. Im living the dream, man.
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You need to shoot more lol, time to lift your game…
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Spot on!
I’m gunna get all experimental with a SUPER SIMPLEX soon lol
Well, my case feeder motor just pooped itself. I could hear it, huffing and puffing, but gears weren’t turning… But, I’m running on empty here, so what to do, what to do… Ordered a replacement and decided to see if I can get it going.
Did not expect to be servicing a miniature gear box, but I got it back for now.
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What am I lookin’ at here exactly? Motor burned out? Clutch gone? Gears stripped?
Top photo, bottom left, 2 chipped teeth. Top right cog, missing the teeth.
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So what was the fix? Sounds pretty catastrophic without replacement gears.
Took the bits of metal out that were jamming the gears.
Bottom right you mean?
Im blind. And not for a good reason.
Good evening Dillon connoisseurs.
Question, any of you use that flexible mirror thing that clips on top of the case feeder, to see what’s in there without climbing…