Shoulda' known better...

[jhrosier]

My new Lee mould:

http://images40.fotki.com/v1263/photos/5/590147/2786028/new_lee_mould-vi.jpg

Complete (no extra charge!) with 1/32" burrs hanging into the cavity.
The photo doesn't show the 1/64" gap under the sprue plate.

So now I get to pack it up and pay postage to send it back.
Maybe the replacement will have burrs evenly placed on both cavities.

Jack

[joatmon]

WOW!!! Now that is the PITTS!!!!!

[454PB]

I recently received one the same way. My wife said "your going to send it back, right? I said no, I'll try it first and see if it causes any problems. It didn't, the mould works great and the burr helps identify which cavity it came from.

[Boerrancher]

The burrs wouldn't bother me as bad as the gap under the sprue plate. I have a lee mould that has a burr on on cavity, and like 454PB said about his, it didn't interfere with the boolit dropping or cause any other problems. I figured it would help hold the lube on.

Best Wishes from the Boer Ranch,

Joe

[DLCTEX]

Ten minutes spent with an exacto knife and some sandpaper would be cheaper than the postage IMHO. Lee could do better quality control, though.

[snuffy]

Shoulda' known better...

Than what?

Most of my molds are lee. I've gotten a couple of bad ones, I either sent them back or made them work. Lee-menting works! It might even make that burr go away! For the price, I'm not going to complain. I may even keep the bad one, order another, then have extra parts for both.

[jhrosier]

It seems that we will get whatever level (or lack ) of quality that we are willing to tolerate.
I don't have a problem being a picky SOB, if it gets the message across.
Perhaps the quality will improve if everyone raises Cain, when it is appropriate.
If I accept the faults and repair them without comment, I am sending the message that poor workmanship is acceptable.

The defects are far too obvious to escape even a casual glance.
Unless the moulds are machined, assembled, and boxed by one machine, several people who obviously don't care, handled the product and could have easily kept it from leaving the plant.

If Lee needs to raise the prices 50% to ensure a reasonable standard of quality, they should do so, while they still have a reputation to protect.

I've worked in manufacturing/machining for most of the past 42 years and can say that this kind of poor workmanship is simply not acceptable on any level, at any price.


An implied warranty of fitness for a particular purpose is a warranty implied by law that if a seller knows or has reason to know of a particular purpose for which some item is being purchased by the buyer, the seller is guaranteeing that the item is fit for that particular purpose.

Jack

[snuffy]

If Lee needs to raise the prices 50% to ensure a reasonable standard of quality, they should do so, while they still have a reputation to protect.


That's exactly what would happen. Then you might just as well buy NEI or Lyman.

The one lee mold I sent back was a .458 340 that cast boolits at .464. There's no way to fix that, so back it went. The mold I got back cast at .459, which is what I wanted.

You can demand perfection but you will seldom get it. Especially from lee.

Their round ball molds are the best that can be had. The tangital sprue cut off results in almost no sprue sticking up. They are cut with a cherry, then a carbide ball is squeezed in the cavity resulting in a very smooth surface.

[HeavyMetal]

It is true that you get what you pay for. When you pay the honest asking price, without complaint, you have the right to expect "reasonable" quality in the product purchased.

Like many business's that have the potential to outgrow production capablity Lee is shipping a ton of product.

Yes you can fix it , I can fix it and so can many others but this is a blatent Q.C. failure and the only way management at Lee will know something is wrong is if you tell them.

I will also say that it would help if Lee's management would take thier fingers out of thier ears once in awhile.

[454PB]

jhrosier is exactly right about quality control. However, I ordered two Lee molds at $18 each, and the shipping brought the total to $47. These two new moulds bring my total to 18 Lee moulds, and this one with the small burr is the FIRST one that had a defect. I've owned several Lyman moulds that had defects, and I fixed them myself. Shipping and the hassle of waiting for return from repairs is not worth 15 or 20 minutes of my time to make repairs.

[oso]

How did you let that burr get under your saddle? I'da scrapped it off before it got that far.
Remember to have some fun whatever you do.

[1Shirt]

Kinds like taking an ugly girl to the dance. If she can dance and has a decent personality, sort of makes it ok!
1Shirt!

[jhrosier]

Well....
It took them a month, but I got a replacement mould in the mail today.
No apology for the poor quality of the original mould and no reimbursement for my cost of shipping.

I will probably remember the double shipping charge when I look for my next mould. It puts the price just that much closer to what the discount houses get for a lyman.

I any case, it looks better, no burrs and the sprue plate is level.
I thought that it was somewhat unusual to find the cavities smoked.:confused:
It looks otherwise unused.

Jack

[Springfield]

Me, I'd rather the price stays low, even if I do have to spend 15 minutes making the mould work for me. I have more time than money. I'd be willing to bet even if they charged twice as much I would find something I didn't like anyway, so I'd rather pay less. But then I'm a tinkerer.

[dwtim]

Same here! I like $18 molds. Knock on wood, all my Lee molds arrived without defects. I did have a defective mold, but it wasn't a Lee--and I don't care because the maker replaced it promptly. I paid the shipping one way.

I assisted with QA in one job. Nobody's perfect, especially when he works second shift, the coffee machine is out of order, and his eyes are blurry. Someone is bound to miss something, at some point; either checking is done by sampling to save costs and keep production high, or some poor sap will get confused and miss something after looking at hundreds of similar parts. The experience has helped me tremendously with hand loading.

I wonder what Lee does with those defect molds? I'd love to buy a batch of rejects and hone my Lee-menting skills.

[missionary5155]

If anyone gets a Lee mold that casts .464 (45-70) Do not send it back.. offer it for sale. How many Trapdoors and Rollers or Winny 1886 or Marlin 1881 could benefit !

[compass will]

Nice camera! It even looks like a finger print under that gray hair on the top 1/2 of the mold.
Is that a big lens in macro mode?

[jack19512]

If Lee needs to raise the prices 50% to ensure a reasonable standard of quality, they should do so, while they still have a reputation to protect.






Uh.... from one Jack to another no thanks. My reloading and casting costs me enough already. I have around 8 Lee molds now and they for the most part do a good job. I have only had to do very minor work on a couple of them. Mainly the pins back out but it's an extremely easy fix. Like another poster said, if you want to pay 50% more buy another brand.

[Namerifrats]

I agree, Lee Moulds are very nice for the money. Can't please everybody though

[jhrosier]

Nice camera! It even looks like a finger print under that gray hair on the top 1/2 of the mold.
Is that a big lens in macro mode?

Thanks, Panasonic FZ-20, macro mode.
Hair is real, finger print is tool chatter marks on mould.

Jack

[Buckshot]

..............jhrosier, is certainly correct in expecting to find a product ready to go when you pay for it. I have never had a bad Lyman or Saeco mould. I've had a couple Lee's that had issues, but happily not unfixable. I had an RCBS 7mm-162 that cast oval boolits :-). Since they are cherried it seemed to me that the block halves never closed on the cherry completely.

I sent it back to them with a note. No too long later I got it back, and swinging the sprueplate aside I could see that it was the same. Don't know what they did to it as it was exactly the same. Maybe it was sitting on a bench someplace or got in with another batch and was sent back before anyone looked at it? No note or anything.

Stoked up the pot and included a couple oval boolits with the blocks, enclosed a note and fired it off. Pretty quickly it was back with 2 perfectly cast nice ROUND boolits and a signed note that said, "Sorry. Now you have normal bullets". One time I bought a box of a hundred 1/4-20 hex head bolts. Modern practice is to roll the threads on. On every single one the thread did NOT sprial up the shank of the bolt in the hum drum fashion we're all familliar with.

Instead, these were special. The thread went around the shank in a perfect radial groove. One atop the previous. You couldn't have threaded a nut on one, or screwed one into a hole to save your life. Somehow or the other in the rolling process, however they're held, it got all catty whumpus. When I took them back I asked to keep 2 of'em and had some fun with them.

My point is though that while I or anyone else dislikes it when something like that happens, when thousands of something are made it's probable a leaker is going to get through. Especially if the QC system employs human beings doing the checking, and if those same human beings do it day after day. Not saying it's right, just saying it happens.

..............Buckshot

[monadnock#5]

I work in an industry where when we get it wrong, and bad product gets out the door, planes (civilian and/or military) crash, submarines don't come back to the surface, smart bombs and torpedoes end up anywhere but on target... you get the idea.

As you might expect, the chronic screw-up personalities get weeded out fast. With the economy on the ropes, the culling process has gone into overdrive, and getting faster everyday.

I know that the tools we choose to cast boolits in no way constitute matters of life and death. I understand why the managers and employees aren't held to the same high standards that the workers in my line of work are held to. I think it's great that The Cast Boolits Forum does not have a flock of Philadelphia Lawyers on retainer eagerly awaiting the arrival of the next Group Buy.

I've got to say though, quite frankly, if we could get 25% of the respect and conscientiousness expected from those in my type of employ, I'd be a happy camper, and the world would be a better place to live.

[jack19512]

I work in an industry where when we get it wrong, and bad product gets out the door, planes (civilian and/or military) crash, submarines don't come back to the surface, smart bombs and torpedoes end up anywhere but on target... you get the idea.

As you might expect, the chronic screw-up personalities get weeded out fast. With the economy on the ropes, the culling process has gone into overdrive, and getting faster everyday.

I know that the tools we choose to cast boolits in no way constitute matters of life and death. I understand why the managers and employees aren't held to the same high standards that the workers in my line of work are held to. I think it's great that The Cast Boolits Forum does not have a flock of Philadelphia Lawyers on retainer eagerly awaiting the arrival of the next Group Buy.

I've got to say though, quite frankly, if we could get 25% of the respect and conscientiousness expected from those in my type of employ, I'd be a happy camper, and the world would be a better place to live.







All of this over a mold, an inexpensive mold at that. :veryconfu Life is just too short. It happens with most products and to us all at one time or another. :roll:

[HeavyMetal]

This may be a little off topic but I'm gonna take a shot at it anyway!

This is not about one mold, or two for that matter!

This is about providing the consumer that which he ,or she, has been promised for X amount of dollars!

I will use Ruger as an example! We have all heard the stories of broken product, not warranty stuff, that has been repaired by the Ruger company for no charge. Everyone I know thinks highly of Ruger as a company and as a product. Everyone knows that if you do have a problem it will be made right and fast!

I haver never had an issue with any Ruger product. I have had several with Lee.

To be honest Lee has always taken care of the issue, when brought to there attention, promptly, but they sure have a lot of them.

Every company has warranty issues. Every company attempts to keep these numbers as low as possible.

It seems Lee has either no idea what thier warranty percentage is, or they have never taken the time to figure it out.

This is my beef! The product is good when it's right, it's fixed if it's wrong, but how do you ship second rate product on a constant basis and not know it!

That is the question I would like Lee to ante up and answer!

[JDFuchs]

I know when im geting an item form Lee im not geting top quality. But for 30sec of deburing and a bit of fiddling with the plate and or handles Ill jump on before spending an extra $20 on a mold that i may never use more then once. I have worked as a machinest and you are asking for a lot of extra man hours. Somthing that I would expect if I were spending $50 or more on a mold, but Im cheep and dont mind it. Lee has its place and everyone else seems to go for true perfection in the reloading busness and I hate having to always spend a huge chunk of money on a random bit ill hardley ever use.

[TAWILDCATT]

I too worked as machinist.you want perfection pay the price.I dont know how many molds Lee makes but I will bet it is many more than any other company.
how much does a machinist get an hour.10 minutes is how much.
with lee you get the mold and handles.handles for RCBS are $32?,more for Saeco.
$50 for the molds.you bet I will tinker.:coffee:[smilie=1:
HI- JH

[Leadforbrains]

So what is the overall consensus here? Are Lee molds basically bargain basement. Kinda like radioshack? Not terrible, but not all that great?

[canyon-ghost]

That uniquely American saying, "you get what you pay for"?

[jack19512]

That uniquely American saying, "you get what you pay for"?








Or "A fool and his money is soon parted". I have around 8 Lee molds and all work fine. Not saying some of the more expensive molds aren't better in one way or another or not saying that some of the more expensive molds don't have problems once in a while too.

[Buckshot]

So what is the overall consensus here? Are Lee molds basically bargain basement. Kinda like radioshack? Not terrible, but not all that great?

..............I look at Lee moulds this way. Their 2 cavity blocks (no more single cavity except Minie' bullets) are good for what you paid for them. WIth care you'll easily get way more then your money back when they do die. They're dainty and require some thought and carefull use in order for them to live. You do NOT expect to hand them off to your kids or grandkids when you shamble off life's trail. That is, unless you don't USE them :-)

The HB 1 cav moulds require even more help and attention.

The 6 cavity blocks are a magnitude better then any other Lee mould. They need a setscrew against the sprueplate pivit bolt, and they need a steel pressure pad under the cam surface for the sprueplate's handle.

All new moulds I get (new to me or newly made) get a good going over. Usually all the Lee moulds need is the same flushing out (I use carb cleaner) as any other newly made mould. But if a mould does need some tidying up, it's a Lee 98% of the time. Part of that may be that cast iron machines to a powder or very weak grainy flakes that just don't hang on. Aluminum CAN produce burrs or tag ends that can be carried across parting lines due to it's very nature.

A few minutes spend with hardwood toothpicks, possibly a touch with an X-Acto knife or similar has it up and ready to go. It would be nice if it didn't, but by now it's just no big deal so long as that's all it is. For me personally, and very honestly it's just no big deal. So yeah, Lee IS the least expensive mould out there. They're eventually disposable, and when their time comes you just let them go :-)

..................Buckshot