Why would you not load rifle on a progressive press ?
Why would you not load rifle on a progressive press ?
https://www.facebook.com/dave.bateman.311
kimbers have more issues than time magazine.
Other than 5.56 I don't go through a lot, and it's hard to save a lot of money on that cartridge; what reloading I'll do for rifle will be small batch, very precise, and often neck sized.Originally Posted by dbateman
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Fair enough, for a single stage press I recommend the Forster Co-Ax.
They very make straight ammo, about the only thing straghter are inline dies.
The Co-Ax is easy to use with the quick change dies and and the shell holder that fits most things.
I've used a few other single stage presses over the years but that's the one still mounted to my bench.
As far as the 650 goes, I just had a little look over on Dillon's site. You could buy two Squre Deal presses for around the same money as a 650 with a case feeder. They're a pretty good little press, they're auto indexing but don't have case or bullet feeders for them.
Quite a good little press for the money.
The T-7 turret that has come up a bit around here lately is a fine press as well, you can make very high quality ammunition on one of them. I'm not sure I'd want to load large quantities of handgun ammo on one.
Charging for me is mostly thrown through die, but I also have a beam scale and throw charges and trickle up to weight.
The scale trickler ect can be put anywhere I feel like.
https://www.facebook.com/dave.bateman.311
kimbers have more issues than time magazine.
Thanks DBa! The twin square deal did cross my mind.
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Bench mounted. The Lee doo-dad, verified by a digital scale. I used the beam scale until about 2 years ago. You just turn the dial, powder dumps into the little cup, pour little cup in funnel on pour-through die.
Don't know if I'm one of the referenced curmudgeons, but I use a Chargemaster for rifle loads with the T-7. On the lee turret, which I really just use for pistol ammo, I use the Lee Auto drum up top on one of the Lee powder through expander dies. So far, it works well. The auto disk also worked well for me, mounted the same way.
Oh, and frankly for the volume you're talking about reloading a turret is plenty. I used to shoot 1500-ish reloads a month and kept myself fed with the turret with no real work. I really dig not having to do anything but swap the top and reset my powder measure to move from one caliber to the next. There are some calibers I'm just not loading many of at a time (.44 magnum/special, .45LC I may load 100 a run) and there's some I'll load 1k of (.45 ACP, .357 mag) before swapping.
Speaking strictly for myself, even though I can afford a "nicer" set up, I don't need the speed. I'm not taking shooting time to reload, I'm taking tv time or other general dick-around time and I *like* sitting there pulling the lever making stuff. The added complexity and more things to fiddle-fuck with and adjust and get right and to not break would just be a nuisance to me.
As both SLG and BehindBlueIs have stated, the LCT is a very solid press for casual to somewhat frequent loaders. I find my safe loading pace to be just over 200/hour and my LCT has over 15k rounds through it. I have the TV running for background noise while I'm loading and the time goes quickly. I used to load .38 as well and switching calibers was as simple as changing out turrets, moving the powder hopper and selecting the appropriate disk. I could do it in about a minute if I wanted to.
That being said, one of the bigger benefits of a progressive aside from an increase in your rate of production is the fact that one pull of the handle equals one loaded round once you get going. With a turret of course you pull four times to get one round. That matters to some people more than others and I'll admit that when I'm feeling lazy a 550 starts to look appealing...
Last edited by ER_STL; 02-29-2016 at 11:10 AM.
For those using the lct or other non-progressive solutions, how do you approach priming? Offline, or do you use the lever prime or safety prime systems?
I've done both, but generally just use the lever prime.
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