Corbin presses

[JRLesan]

Why is the Corbin CSP-1 press considerably higher priced than the Walnut Hill press???

[303british.com]

My guess would be higher overhead. Dave Corbin employs several people and has a larger operation than his brother. Richard is a one man show.

[bullet maker 57]

I will agree with 303british.com. I have not seen a Walnut Hill press, so I do not know the differences. From the pictures, the Walnut Hill does not seem to have all the extra cosmetic things that the CSp-1 does.

[JRLesan]

Was hoping someone had hands-on knowledge of real mechanical differences that would explain the nearly $300.00 price difference. I have both a (year '94) CSP-1 and a new Walnut Hill. I have not used the WH as yet as dies have just now arrived within the last week. I was thinking of selling the CSP-1 as I surely don't need 2. Researching Dave Corbin's sight revealed the $750.00 price tag. It may well be that a 20 year newer model incorporates some hidden design changes but it sure doesn't look like it. As soon as winter (and, hopefully, some free time) comes I'll find out for myself but thought perhaps someone here had an explanation.

[303british.com]

I own both presses. THE WH is physically larger. It is also built stronger. The materials seem to be the same between the two presses, with the WH having larger diameter columns, a taller overall frame and larger handle. Both presses will do the job, but it appears to me that the WH press is the better of the two. It is easier to put your hands in and around the dies. The R.Corbin die diameter is larger (stronger) than brother Dave's. Using either is much, much better than struggling with a Rockchucker or similar press.

Besides cost, the fact the the WH press is beefier was the reason I bought a second WH. I run three presses - 1 D. Corbin and two R. Corbin presses, preferring Richard's later design.

[midnight]

I use the Walnut Hill and have used my brother's CSP-1 but that was years ago and I only made paper patch cupped base 0.452 bullets to patch up for the Martini-Henry. Making a pure lead unjacketed bullet is not much of a challenge for either of these presses. One nice thing about the Walnut Hill is that you can still use Dave Corbin's dies on it since more of Dave's dies are out there on the used market. All you need are Dave's punch holders and an adapter for the ram.

Bob

[aaronraad]

The price difference isn't necessarily anything to do with the mechanical difference and everything to with marketing.

Their presses are marketing tools (pun intended) that allows them to do what they do best, add value to HSS/tool steels using their bullet swaging die and punch tooling skills. I would argue that Dave's pricing strategy is different to Robert's overall. This is probably one of the many differences in how they wanted to run their business when they originally started out together.

Either way they approach the pricing on the presses, they still can't make enough dies to keep up with the market. Presses always seem to be in surplus. I don't think Robert has changed the Walnut Hill press price for last 5 years either, whereas Dave moves his prices up regularly. Maybe Dave follows inflation figures, but I'm not that well versed in US inflation figures over the past decade?

For me both are well over-engineered. I would be hard pressed (pun intended again) to recall a report regarding a significant failure of either press model. Just like the price tag on a Rockchucker, you want something with a low failure rate, good tolerances, low wear and a warranty (with service) that has a reputation so good it's synonymous with the industry after decades. We'd all be buying a Lee Classic Cast otherwise I'm sure.

[303british.com]

...For me both are well over-engineered. I would be hard pressed (pun intended again) to recall a report regarding a significant failure of either press model. Just like the price tag on a Rockchucker, you want something with a low failure rate, good tolerances, low wear and a warranty (with service) that has a reputation so good it's synonymous with the industry after decades. We'd all be buying a Lee Classic Cast otherwise I'm sure.

I've never heard of a failure. In some other thread, I mentioned that the Rockchucker was tough to operate for forming jackets from RF cases. I remember cursing it regularly. I adjusted the die up, down in the middle and still needed to muscle it more than was necessary. It's not supposed to be a physical workout!

When I was selling bullets, another thing that convinced me to use Richard's presses was not having to fiddle with the stop pin of the Series II, now CSP-1 press. I bent/deformed a few before I figured out how to set everything up. I didn't want to invest in the conversion pkg for my Series II and bought a WH. Having a second press solved a number of problems. Adding a third press makes bullet making dead easy. Of course, not everyone has the room or money for this, but since I was selling, it was a write off.

In the end, I went with the less expensive, stronger, easier to operate press - the WH. Both may be over engineered for what they do, but I bought a lot of extra bullet making equipment with the money saved.