Lee Pro Auto Disk - Yes or No ?

[varmint243]

I am currently setting up my third progressive press.
On the last two I made linkage up to make my Little Dandy measures work.
It takes me a day or so to get the linkage made up and functioning smoothly.

This time I was considering the Lee Pro Auto Disk.
My experience with Lee has been hit and miss.
Lee makes some fantastic stuff and they make some lesser stuff.
What seems to be the opinion of the Lee Pro Auto Disk ?

thanks, DaveV

[Artful]

I have several and once broken in work fine.

[dragon813gt]

I love it w/ a few exceptions. It doesn't do well with very small charges. And mine leaks like a sieve w/ very fine ball powders like H110. You are limited to what the discs will throw. There are ways to modify them to make them adjustable. Or to make them a specific size. It works very well and is extremely consistent. I would not want to load handgun ammo w/out one.

[milprileb]

For multiple tool heads, I put these on my Dillon (various pistol caliber use) and on my Lee Turret press for other pistol calibers. The Lee units do just fine. I would never use them for rifle loading but for pistol, they are simple and do the job as well as my Dillon measure

[cuzinbruce]

I had one that I got with a bunch of other stuff. I did not like it at all and sold it ASAP. It's only virtue was the price, IMHO.

[joec]

I use Lee Pro disk setups on my pistol calibers but use the Lee Perfect powder (bench type) mounted on my powder thru die fine for my 45-70. I do this as it handles stick powders much better than the disk powder measure does. I've never had a problem though with either leaking though I've read a number of reports of them doing it. I break mine in with a hopper full of graphite powder before ever putting powder in them to start. I also do adjustments with the graphite to stop the leaking as if it leaks with the graphite it will leak with a fine powder like H110. Never had a problem though with the Pro disk but can have leaking problems if not adjusted properly with the Lee Perfect powder measure with very fine powders.

I've also learned that going with a double disk using smaller sizes rather than a single disk in many cases will get you closer to exact measurements you might want. I've even set up the Lee pro for 3 disks but since going to the Lee Perfect not used it any longer as it isn't necessary.

[1bluehorse]

I am currently setting up my third progressive press.
On the last two I made linkage up to make my Little Dandy measures work.
It takes me a day or so to get the linkage made up and functioning smoothly.

This time I was considering the Lee Pro Auto Disk.
My experience with Lee has been hit and miss.
Lee makes some fantastic stuff and they make some lesser stuff.
What seems to be the opinion of the Lee Pro Auto Disk ?

thanks, DaveV

I've been using them since the 90's on a couple different Lee turret presses, the first few I had weren't the Pro model and always had good luck with them (have a couple of the Pro models now also).....just the other day I was having a LOT of problems trying to get my RCBS progressive press and Uniflow measure to work with 9mm reloading (this is my first go round' with 9mm loading).....the linkage system for the Uniflow just wouldn't adjust correctly for the 9 to drop a consistant amount...also was spitting powder everywhere....setup a Lee disk measure on the press and no more problems, a consistant 6.9gr. (49cc cavity) drop over 500rds....not sure I'll go back to the Uniflows on either press....sure wish they had a green hopper though......

[joelitespeed]

I have used several on different presses. Once i got used to the proper cavities with the powder types I am happy with them. I could never get the micro adjuster insert to work well though.

[DaveInFloweryBranchGA]

I've got three Lee Pro Auto Disks and have used them all with their double disk kits, their micrometer disk and their micrometer adjust insert. I tuned all of them (polished off or trimmed plastic flashing, tuned disks to each other using a granite block/sandpaper, etc.) for the powder and purpose I had for them. In all cases, I was very satisfied with the performance, especially so considering the price.

The only negative I have for them is the hopper doesn't hold enough powder to suit me. But neither do the RCBS Uniflows I have. I like a hopper at least as large as the Hornady LnL and would prefer one that would hold 2 pounds of powder. When you get to loading big volumes of a particular load, even small pistol cartridges can start using up the powder in the measure and require lots of fill ups.

[roots911]

I have 4 of them and they work very well. For small charges I use the micro adjustable cavity slide. Very repeatable charges. Use them for 45, 9mm, 30 carbine and light load 7.62x39.

[Love Life]

Well worth the money. use on my RL550B for loading 38 specials.

[el34]

Very consistent throws for handgun on the Lee Classic Turret. I sometimes just as successfully use the microdisk if I want to get in-between charges or to load 380 (3.1gr HP38). Just got the dbl disk to try with 223 but haven't gotten to that yet.

I don't like the knurled nut for attaching it to the riser but pliers make it ok.

[35remington]

A little correction to one of the above posts is very necessary.

It doesn't meter small charges well IF large flake powders are used in small cavities......in other words, Red Dot or Unique or Clays or 700X in 380 or 32 Auto sized charges ain't gonna work, but small flake and ball powders like Bullseye and TiteGroup work awesomely even in very small cavities. Lee even alludes to this in their instructions.

What happens is the the disks are the same thickness and vary charge size with different hole diameters. Once the holes in the disk get too small, the large flake powders bridge in the charge holes instead of filling them completely. With 45 ACP charge sizes or larger it's not a problem. Some 38 Special loads are borderline. A good rule is that 4 grains or more of the large flake powders like Unique or Red Dot will work fine, but don't go below that in cavity size.

Said by a guy who tried it and found out the hard way. For most powders it works quite well, and the Pro is much better than the standard Auto Disk. That has plastic holes that wallow out over time and the hopper gets loose, but the Pro has brass thumbnuts and metal rods that don't wear out even with very frequent disk changes.

I use mine a lot for pistol and reduced rifle loads and like it quite a lot. If using the Double Disk kit careful selection of cavities are needed (follow instructions) and you can't ride the loads right to the edge of maximum but must stay somewhat below.

In most instances this is no problem whatsoever.

[HeavyMetal]

Been playing with the Pro Disk measure for a few weeks, added a few options like the swivel mount and the adjustable micro disk as well as the riser.

I dislike measures that jump around when loading but this isn't as bad as the Dillon 550 the BIL had.

What I did not like was the fact that the powder was exposed to open air as the system was cycled. Granted it was only for a moment between the time the disk slid out from under the hopper and dropped the powder in the case but it's still open and my fear is a fan or breeze blowing powder out of the cavity during the transition period.

Hey call me paranoid if you need to but I did come up with a fix for that issue: took an old medicine pill bottle, cut it length wise with a Dremel tool saw blade and then epoxy'd it base down to the powder hopper using clear adhesive silicone.

By placing the hopper on a piece of wax paper on a flat surface the glued on pill bottle is flush with the hopper base and now cover the powder slide as it move over the case filling area.

Up side is I don't worry about messing up my powder charge and I got a cool place to put a Pen for making notes on powder type, charge size or other load information

[44Vaquero]

Ok! HeavyMetal I am going to call you "Paranoid"! What setting do you use that fan on? Hurricane!

I run 4 of them including the old manual drop version and love them. In 20 years I have never seen a flake escape out the top! You may lose some around the wiper or between the disk and the body. Honing the risers on the casting body closed the gap and ended any errant powder escaping.

[dbosman]

setup a Lee disk measure ....sure wish they had a green hopper though......

.
Can someone remind me what the other color, Lee used to use for the older style powder hoppers? The die boxes that doubled as spare powder containers.

[44Vaquero]

White, Smoke and Red are the only colors I remember.

[HeavyMetal]

Yellow for a short time

[dragon813gt]

They still use yellow for die boxes.

[seaboltm]

Awesome measure. I use mine like others here, that is for pistols. I too use the Lee Perfect powder measure for rifles and for max loads of H110. The lightest charge of Bullseye that I can get the disk to consistently throw is 3.7 grains. With charges that low I tap the hopper every pull of the handle. I don't care for the little Lee scale or their aluminum presses. Everything else I have ever used from Lee worked very well.