Lock and Load AP

[Spartan1980]

I had one. You know that old saw about pay once, cry once? I now have a 650 so I paid twice.

The Hornady had several features I liked better, the powder measure was better with the quick change inserts. The regular ones are cheap enough you can buy one for each caliber, set it, and just have one setup for your calibers as they will store in a Hornady die box with the dies just fine. I also liked that you could bypass priming, that if you didn't seat one, another didn't feed like in the Dillon. I added the case feeder and was very disappointed. The housing was just flimsy as hell (now fixed with later models) and seemed like a jury rigged afterthought. The case feed for it was extremely cumbersome to bypass, as in NO WAY to bypass, and required complete readjustment everytime something got out of sync in your load sequence.

The last straw was the thing refused to seat large primers completely and was also very sketchy with small. I sold the whole thing with full disclosure and bought the Dillon 650. The build quality is definitely better on the Dillon. Do yourself a favor and buy a Dillon of whatever flavor you choose.

[LittleLebowski]

I came very close to buying one, but ultimately the majority of the anecdotal data online that I read was negative compared to the Dillon 650 (now replaced by the 750) so I got the 650 and I am happy. Some of the folks that have the AP seem to be able to get it running well with tinkering and there's a well known timing issue with well known fixes (I really did research this). Many, many people recommend the Lock'N'Load AP tuning videos from 76HighBoy on Youtube (below).

[daved20319]

I have a 650 and a friend has the LNL. He seems to like my 650 better than the LNL but I have a casefeeder and he does not.

One thing that he complains about is the inconsistency of the powder measure on the LNL when throwing smaller charges.

Dumb question, maybe, but does your friend know that there are 2 different drum sizes for the LNL powder measure? Reason it comes to mind, I was just struggling with some very inconsistent pistol charges from mine, then realized I still had the rifle drum installed. Swapped in the pistol drum and it was back to its usual near perfection.

Haven't tried this one with extruded powder, but I know it gave me fits when I was still using a Uni-Flow, so I generally stick with ball powders. And somewhat related, my Frankford Arsenal Intellidropper IS awesome with extruded powder, at least with Varget. I just loaded a ladder with Varget for my 6.5 Creedmoor and was check weighing every load on my beam scale, all but 1 were dead on. Later.

Dave

[SecondsCount]

Dumb question, maybe, but does your friend know that there are 2 different drum sizes for the LNL powder measure? Reason it comes to mind, I was just struggling with some very inconsistent pistol charges from mine, then realized I still had the rifle drum installed. Swapped in the pistol drum and it was back to its usual near perfection.

Haven't tried this one with extruded powder, but I know it gave me fits when I was still using a Uni-Flow, so I generally stick with ball powders. And somewhat related, my Frankford Arsenal Intellidropper IS awesome with extruded powder, at least with Varget. I just loaded a ladder with Varget for my 6.5 Creedmoor and was check weighing every load on my beam scale, all but 1 were dead on. Later.

Dave

Yes, he knows, and has spent a lot of frustrating time trying to get it to work with flake powders. Ball powders do seem to work fine.

Another friend has seen the same issues with when using the Hornady measure in a single stage application. I have an LNL powder measure but have only used it with short extruded powders and it seemed to work well but I wasn't going for extreme accuracy.

[Tawadc95]

I've been reading and watching for a month now and came down to the LandL or the 750 but leaning towards the LandL.

This mad rush on firearms stuff made the decision for me. I was going to grab the first of either I could find available and it ended up being a 750 this afternoon, it's actually being shipped already. Not very scientific but it's the time we live in currently.

Pretty sure I'd be happy either way. What made me more relaxed about a Dillon is some of the aftermarket items that can cure my cons of Dillon, chief of which is the powder bar adjustment. I will go with either the UniqueTek powder bar micrometer or the Armanov dial for powder adjustment. Either way gives me a recordable and easily returnable setting which is what I'm used to with RCBS uniflows for my Piggyback.

Great posts and I have really enjoyed the input, thanks.

[olstyn]

Yes, he knows, and has spent a lot of frustrating time trying to get it to work with flake powders. Ball powders do seem to work fine.

Another friend has seen the same issues with when using the Hornady measure in a single stage application. I have an LNL powder measure but have only used it with short extruded powders and it seemed to work well but I wasn't going for extreme accuracy.

Flake powders definitely produce less consistent results through the LNL powder measure, at least if my experience with Unique vs N320 vs CFE Pistol is any experience. CFE Pistol (very fine-grained semi-squashed balls) and N320 (small, short rods) both produce very consistent +/- 0.1 grain or better, and Unique (medium/large flakes) is often +/- 0.2 grain or worse. This is borne out with chronograph results as well - Unique produces high double digit standard deviations in velocity, whereas it's possible to get both N320 and CFE Pistol down to single digit SD.

Obviously that's just my personal experience, and as such is anecdotal, but it has also been my experience that flake powders tend to be less consistent through almost all powder measures, not just the LNL. I tend to wonder why flake powders even exist when ball and stick powders are so much more consistent. Are flakes easier to produce, or do they have some other advantage I'm unaware of?

[olstyn]

Pretty sure I'd be happy either way.

The premise that both the Dillon and the Hornady are good is where I started from as well, and back when availability was not an issue, it seemed to me that the Hornady was basically the functional equivalent of the Dillon 650 for the price of the Dillon 550. That and the fact that I liked the LNL bushing concept made it an easy choice for me at the time. If I was looking for a press now, it would be hard not to be more concerned more with availability than price, and I cannot for a moment fault your decision. May your new blue press serve you well.

[daved20319]

Flake powders definitely produce less consistent results through the LNL powder measure, at least if my experience with Unique vs N320 vs CFE Pistol is any experience. CFE Pistol (very fine-grained semi-squashed balls) and N320 (small, short rods) both produce very consistent +/- 0.1 grain or better, and Unique (medium/large flakes) is often +/- 0.2 grain or worse. This is borne out with chronograph results as well - Unique produces high double digit standard deviations in velocity, whereas it's possible to get both N320 and CFE Pistol down to single digit SD.

Obviously that's just my personal experience, and as such is anecdotal, but it has also been my experience that flake powders tend to be less consistent through almost all powder measures, not just the LNL. I tend to wonder why flake powders even exist when ball and stick powders are so much more consistent. Are flakes easier to produce, or do they have some other advantage I'm unaware of?

That explains my lack of awareness of the issue, with the exception of Varget, all the powders I've used to date have been ball. I remember using Hercules 2400 a lot back in the '70's, but let's just say I was a lot more "adventurous" in my teens . Guess I've been lucky, I haven't paid as much attention to the type of powder, just the application, but no flake powders have found their way into my powder stash. Will be making a point of continuing that trend in the future. Later, and thanks for adding to my education.

Dave

[ER_STL]

I stumbled on a 50% off L&L a few years ago in a local Gander Mountain that was closing. While I wasn’t looking to upgrade from my LCT that had been serving me well, it was a no-brainer at that price. I followed the advice in some of the videos LL linked in and the press has run well for the most part. I likely would have bought a Dillon 550 eventually had I not found this press but given its current function I’m not likely to switch.

Edit: I’ve used exclusively WSF as a powder in this press and I’ve had no issues with powder throws - consistency has been there.

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