SmallCaliberCentral

I am thinking about upgrading my old rock chucker single stage
to a hornady lock n load ap.
Any thoughts on this.I have never used a progressive press.
don't know if i really need one as I don't shoot but a few hundred a month
if that. How easy is it to do load development on these.
I would imagine you would have to hand feed the powder for this.
Any thoughts??
Thanks

My thoughts.

When you "upgrade" make sure you leave room for the single stage press.

Good advice from Waldo, bud. I use a progressive for all my shotgun and pistol loading, but when it comes to precision rifle, the single stage press is the way to go.

If you shoot an AR or similar platform, a progressive is fine, but if you're interested in precision shooting, a progressive has no place on your bench, at least not on mine.

Some will say a Dillon makes good ammo, and they're right, but no way can you keep the degree of attention and precision to the same standard by using a mass production machine.

Make me three. When I got my Forster press it was a toss up between the Forster Co-Ax and a Harrel turret. If I was shooting an AR platform it would be the Harrel and nothing less.

I use Dillon 550 single stage for precision and progressive to save much time on big loading projects. The dies are the same and the powder measures are incredibly accurate( better than my Redding or RCBS measures). You can go slow but sure in a progressive mode, save a lot of time, and turn out a very good round. Just my opinion, to me success is measured by dead prairie dogs, and my loads get their share.

Make me number four. I also use a progressive for pistol and shotgun, but not for my centerfire rifles.
Call me old fashioned, but I weigh every powder charge and visually check each round before it gets into the ammo box.
Been doing this for 40 years; it works for me so why change?
Rgds, Gerry

I purchased a very lightly used Dillon 550B two months ago. I set it up to load some 223 rounds so that my son could shoot a borrowed AR-15 before going to boot camp.

I gave the Dillon a B-. Powder measure sucked - inconsistent. Priming..well...was a D. Instructions - D+.

I made some adjustments and now I give the Dillon an A-. The powder drop throws ball powder spot on, every time. BUT, if you have to stroke the handle without a case being filled with powder, the next charge will be heavy....every time. Once you know this and dump that charge, then it is ok.

Dillon does NOT like soft Winchester WSR primers. Rem 6.5 & CCI anything are fine.

Accuracy. I just returned from the range 30 minutes ago. I shot my 204 (handloads on a single stage), 223 (handloads from single stage AND loads from the Dillon)........the Dillon does provide good accuracy. There was no difference in group sizes between my single stage handloads and the Dillon. One caveat - I did not use the same bullets in the 223. My handloads are 69 gr Nosler HPBT's. The loads for the 223 out of the Dillon were Remington 55 gr PLHP's. Different powder as well.

The powder drop will consistently drop Benchmark as well. I also tried H4895 - ok. Can be a 1/10th of a grain off....but that is not bad for that size of stick powder.

One other caveat as well. My rifle is a factory Savage. Some of the people posting on here have above average factory rifles, that do deliver better accuracy than either of my Savage's (or at least they should!!!).

Also - most, if not all of the previous posters have 15-20 years more reloading experience than I do as well!!!!

Thanks Guys for the input.
I am still on the fence here.
You all seem to use dillon presses.
Has anyone tried the hornady lock n load AP.that is thier progressive.?

Nope...looked several times, but never used one.

I started on a 40 year old Rockchucker Jr, then had to let it go-the cousin that owned it needed it back! So I bought a Redding T-7 turret press. I almost bought the Lee, but I got this press (2 years ago) for $130.00. Seems the distributor published the wrong price because two weeks later a new "monthly" specials catalog arrrived and the price was now $160.00.

Anyway, I really like the turrets. The Redding is slower to change out than the Lee, but it has enough die holes for two calibers on each turret.

If I ever begin doing a lot of handgun shooting I will get a Dillon for it. Otherwise I like being able to measure each powder charge and know it's the right charge-especialy as some pointed out-for the precision.

The Dillon 550 B gets my vote. I've owned mine since 1986. I use it for .38 special, .45acp, .22-250 and .204 Ruger. Most recently, I loaded 1100 rounds of .22-250 and 500 rounds of .204 for a prairie dog trip. I wish my shotgun press (MEC 9000G) worked as well as the 550B does. Brian Enos has a section of his forum dedicated to the Dillon presses. http://www.brianenos.com/forums/index.p ... SF&s=&f=52

Dillon also has the "NO BS LIFETIME WARRANTY" which I have used to replace worn parts a few times. You call them, tell them what you need and they send it. If you do buy one, I would recommend their spare parts kit which is about $15. If you do need a part, because that little spring just flew clear across the basement and fell somewhere behind the furnace, you'll have a spare in the parts kit and you can get back to reloading A.S.A.P. A call to Dillon will get you a replacement part to put back in your kit. That way you don't have to wait for a new part to arrive.

Varmonter, I'm like you as i don't shot as much as most of the guy's here. But i do alot of load testing and i've been useing a rock chucker for some year's now. I just got a new forster co-ax press last week so it's stell pretty new to me. I've been playing around with it, like neck sizeing, full lenght sizeing, setting bullets in cases with no powder or primers in the case's. Just to see if it would at any point give me any run out on my loaded round's at all. To say i'm impressed with the forster co-ax press would be and understatement. But look at them all or read every thing you can fine about them. Good luck on what ever you end up getting.

Lee C - have you measured runout on a loaded round out of the CoAx yet? Do share the results please....

Acloco, I've full length new cases with it new ones. Then I neck size some fired cases with a redding bushing die checking for run out as i went. Then seating only 5 bullet's in empty case's just to see how much run out i would get in the end. In the end i check the run out on the seated bullet. I got a half of one thousandth run out, witch i'm very happy with. But this was only so i could see what the forster press would do. This is not a very good test even in my book. But i did fine out what this press can do if i hold up my end of the work. And only time will tell really how good it is. I was getting about 2 thousandth run out with my rock chucker press. But that's been around a few year's. But like i said befor read what ever you can fine on all the press out there. then go with what ever one you think would work best for you. I read alot on the 6mmbr forum and ever thing here and it's all helped me a great deal. Be for I got my 204 and found this forum i thought i know alot about reloading. But when i came here to this great fourm. I started to read all the post every one put on here. I found out just how much i really know and it wasn't much. But with all the help from the great guy's here I'm starting to put out some pretty good ammo now i think. Good luck on what ever press you should get.

Lee C - well said....I can only echo your sentiments.