Modern progressive press reliability?

[Rio]

I have reloaded for roughly 30 years. All single stage precision rounds for my rifles. Early in my reloading I also reloaded pistol ammo like 9mm, 40 cal and 45. Back then it wasn't any cheaper so I quit loading for them and just bought the ammo. Now days my kids are getting into shooting and I am contemplating if it is worth it to buy a progressive and reload our 9mm rounds.

The reason I am hesitant is back when I reloaded for our autos I never heard of catastrophic failure of them in relation to reloading error, double charge or other issue. Now days I read about a couple every week, on the Internet of course.

So so what is the reliability when it comes to progressive presses and producing safe ammo. And by safe I mean my kids safe. If I reload a round and it blows up on me that's one thing but for it to happen to the kids is not a chance I am willing to take.

So what do you think?

[Reddirt62]

I started on a Dillon 550b over 20 years ago, now do most my reloading on a 650. In all that time the only issue I ever had was a single squib. In my opinion what press you use has little to do with whether or not you produce safe ammo....that is the operators responsibility. I will say that I can knock out a pot load of 9mm very very quickly! 😊

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[220]

Most are intrinsically safe in design, if they weren't they would have been pulled from the market long ago.
Problems can be traced to the operator, some people shouldn't be allowed to operate a hammer let alone a progressive reloading press.

[Rio]

I have wondered as well if more people unwilling to do it right and having an Internet connection are getting into reloading?

What progressive would you recomend?

[220]

Im sure the blue fan club will say dillion is the only option. I used a couple of pro1000's for over a decade, they work and produce good ammo but certainly not in the same league as most progressives but a lot cheaper as well.
Have a LNL-AP now, great press, 5 stations gives you a lot more options on how you set up and allows you to run something like a RCBS powder lockout die.

[Rio]

The progressive stuff is new to me. I was looking at Dillon's site they are definitely diffrent than what I am used to.
The price of the pro 1000 is much nicer than others. What really sets them apart is is simply speed or other factors?

[220]

Bit like new cars you can spend very little or a large fortune on something to get you from A to B. The cheaper ones still get you to B but the experience is usually much nicer if you spend a bit more.
Arguably you get better quality materials and more options. hopefully better reliability and customer service if needed as well.

[1bluehorse]

Saying a (any) progressive press is the responsible factor in a gun blowing up is like saying the hammer is the cause of a bent nail. It's all on the operator. Also, regardless of what your read on different forums about reloading equipment (progressive presses) not a whole lot of difference in reliability between the top three "modern" presses RCBS, Dillon, Hornady. It's pretty much just the different features each press has and individual taste.

[TexasGrunt]

9mm is the round with the longest payback. It's dirt cheap to buy the stuff. If you cast your own bullets you'll be paying $0.07-$0.10 per round. One can pick it up for $0.14 a round or cheaper if ya take your time.

A Hornady LnL AP and accessories is going to run you around $600 at a minimum. At your best savings, casting your own bullets, you'll have to load 8600 rounds before you start "saving" money. That's IF you already have the equipment to cast the bullets.

Plated bullets are $.07 each. You'd be saving $0.01-$0.03 per round max.

IMHO loading for 9mm is not really worth it unless you consider it a hobby.

If the only thing you are going to reload is 9mm and you want a progressive get a Dillon Square Deal. They are a pretty bullet proof machine.

[mjkonopka]

I agree that 9mm will take the longest to start seeing savings, but if you look hard you can reload for quite a bit cheaper than that. Right now the only expenses I have are primers and powder, primers run me $100/5000 and powder is about $75/5lbs. That's if you cast your own bullets and have brass on hand. At that price I am reloading 9mm for $28.57 per thousand rounds. All my pistol reloads are around that price for me, give or take a few dollars. Only thing that changes the price is how much powder I need to use.

[pergoman]

I am a Dillon loyalist and have gotten a handful of shooting friends into reloading on 650's. As far as i'm concerned, there is no good reason to look anywhere else. All 3 press companies have great customer service. On rare occasions when something broke on my 650, Dillon sent replacement parts immediately. I have never blown up a gun or had a squib load. I have loaded between 15K and 40K rounds per year on my 650 for the last 20 years. I load mostly pistol stuff now and almost entirely with my own cast/powder coated boolits. I have made 20+ trips out west to shoot prairie dogs and each 7-14 day trip consumed thousands of rounds I loaded on my 650. All that being said, there are very few things I have encountered in life that I would endorse as strongly as my Dillon.

[OS OK]

pergoman...that's the best endorsement I've read on this forum for any manufacturer, no kidding. It almost makes me sorry I bought the LnL but...since I have large paws it's easier for me to work on a press that's spread out a little bit especially when I have to reach in to grab a brass to check the charge weight or place a cast for the seater. That's the only reason I didn't buy Blue in the first place...well, the powder lock-out die was a must too.

[John Boy]

Dillon 550B with the Tool Head modified for the 650 Powder Check
http://www.uniquetek.com/store/696296/uploaded/Using_a_Dillon_Powder_Check_on_an_RL_550B_Press.pd f

[dverna]

I have no qualms about the safety of loads produced on any of the progressive presses I use....Dillon and Star. I did not feel that way about the RCBS Green Machine...but thankfully that piece of junk was removed from the market decades ago.

A powder check die can be mounted on any press with 5 or more stations and even on a Dillon 550 if you seat and crimp concurrently on with the same die. If a double charge really worries you, I suggest a Dillon 650 with the powder check die.

[Silverboolit]

Another press to consider is the Lee Classic Cast Turret. Not as fast as the progressives, which are nice, but will put out the ammo quite quickly. You have to ask yourself how many rounds are you going to load per week/per session. Return on investment as well as cost of caliber changes should be looked at also. Just another option to look at.

[OS OK]

You fellas keep emphasizing 'return on investment'...I never looked at these tools that way. They are tools, they allow you to create something you couldn't otherwise. When you buy them they will last your lifetime. If you worry about the day in the future that the press will finally pay for itself in savings I think you are focusing on the wrong point. It's about making quality ammo, safe and in whatever quantity you want. Never having to worry what is in stock at the gun store...your independent for life.
I'm not trying to be argumentative about this payback issue...just never could worry about that part.

[Rio]

The time to savings was a thought as well. What makes me think I will need large quantities of ammo, as it sits 2 kids and a wife shoot between 500 and 800 rounds every time we go to the range. Both kids aspire to shoot competition. That's not even addressing my shooting. I have molding equiptment and sizing equiptment, a lot of reloading stuff just not progressive. I know it's not practical due to it being so slow to try to keep up with that usage reloading on a single stage the way I do now. At the same time I definately have other things I could be doing than reloading.

Might go ahead and do what we're doing for a while and once they transition fully into the 9mm's see how it goes.

[wv109323]

I don't think any of the presses on the market today are inherently dangerous. You really have to work on it to double charge a load. There are some presses that you can have a powder check die that will not allow a double charge. Others use lights and mirrors to visually inspect the powder level in each case before seating a bullet.
The most expensive reloading component is the pistol bullet. Primers are near 3 cents apiece and powder will run about 1 -1 1/2 cents per round. Most buy primers and powder locally to avoid HAZMAT fees. Bullet prices are all over the place. Buying Cast will cost 4 cents each and jacketed as high as 15 to 18 cents each.
9mm brass is inexpensive. There is a lot of promotional ammo out there in 9MM which ,akes the ROI longer on 9MM.

[JohnH]

I don't have the time experience with a progressive as the guys above do but after loading for some 30 years on a single stage, my arthritis began to tell on me. I made the move to a progressive primarily to reduce the number of times I pull the handle. You got kids, they can pull the handle, you can supervise. That's what I did with my daughter, nieces and nephews were young. That said...

I bought the Lee Load Master basic press from MidwayUSA. This is a bare bones press, no priming system, no case feeding, just the press and a single turret. I already had all the dies I needed and I didn't want to be stuck with a press dedicated to a single cartridge. I started out charging cases by either using dippers or using an RCBS Little Dandy. Took all of two weeks to buy the Lee Auto Drum measure. Since I clean my cases with a pin tumbling system, I always deprime the cases prior to tumbling. I prime all my cases with a hand primer off the press prior to loading. (gotta remove the decapping pins from the sizing dies to do this) In short order I added turrets for 45 ACP, 45 Colt, 44 Magnum, 44 Special, 38 Special, 9mm, 308, 7.62 x 39 and leave the dies set up so that a cartridge change over is nothing more than swapping out the shell plate, turret and the requisite rotor drum for the powder measure. I've bought extra and leave them set for the charges/cartridges, no fooling around with resetting the powder measure each set up. I also load for 223 and 30 Herrett but swap out the dies for these (a couple more turrets are in the order obviously) I generally will only load 50-100 cases at a time for each cartridge. I have a home brewed powder check die. It did catch a double charge for me, completely my own fault, I removed a case to weigh the charge and replaced it in the resizing station. (that was early on in my learning curve) The Load Master (and I assume all progressives) index the cases at the bottom of each stroke, the press cannot double charge a case, that can only occur through operator error. I've yet to see a squib and am amazed at how consistent the charge weights are even with powders that are known for poor flow through a measure (Unique is an excellent example of this, the worst out I've seen the measure throw this power is .2 (two tenths) grains. I cannot get that kind of consistancy out of a manually operated measure with Unique. Fine grain powders throw shockingly consistent charges, I've measured every 5th case of 100 cases charging them with Tite Group and Tite Wad and seen no change in weight. I've done this enough with these two powders I don't weigh more than one in ten cases any more sometimes one in twenty.

The most dangerous time in using a progressive is stopping to do something be it check a charge weight or go relieve yourself and picking up where you left off. Mistakes happen. I've forgotten to add a bullet to be seated in a case. Take that case out of rotation, dump the powder charge and add it in as the last case. If for any reason you have to remove more than one case from the shell plate, set them in an order where you know which station each case was at and return it to that station on setting back op or clear the shell plate, dump charged cases and begin the rotation anew. The machine can only do what you tell it to do, be sure that's what you want to happen before you pull the handle, cause that's what you're going to get.

As you can probably pick up from telling here, I do not use a progressive for speed. It absolutely loads faster and saves time as compared to a single stage, but the primary benefit to me is the reduction of times I have to pull the handle. For me, the decision to buy the tool I did was right for my need and approach to reloading, prolly wouldn't be right for every one else. I got this press about two years ago now and have wished many times I'd gotten it four or five years ago when I first started toying with the idea. I would not go back to single stage reloading only, the progressive has taken out the tedium of reloading as well as reduced the pain I have from the task and the flexibility of the system I use allows me to do all my reloading on the Load Master. Now I just gotta get a #5 shell plate so i load 303 Brit. on it.

Edit: I always run 1 or two cases individually through the cycle to double check the complete set up, sizing, mouth belling, charge weights bullet seating depths, crimp before running the cases in rotation. Makes keeping track of the set up simplier and reduces the likelyhood of mistakes.

[David2011]

You fellas keep emphasizing 'return on investment'...I never looked at these tools that way. They are tools, they allow you to create something you couldn't otherwise.

I think the ROI comments are directed at the cost of materials to reload 9mm and not the cost of the tool to do the reloading.

If 9mm is the only caliber you wish to load in volume a Square Deal B would give you about 400 rounds/hour. Caliber changes on the SDB are more expensive than other presses. I'm a a Dillon fan having owned them since 1991 and have owned a SDB, 550 and 650. My friends that own other brands tell me they wish they had Dillons after they use mine. The 550 is the best value for versatility IMO. It will load rifle and pistol with great precision. The conversion kits are moderately priced. The 650 is much faster for me but caliber changes are significantly more expensive than those for the 550. Not a big deal for just a few calibers but it might be significant if you want to set up several calibers. I can load 800-900 rounds of .40 in an hour on my 650. The bottleneck is reloading the primer tubes. If you have help they can keep the primer tubes full. The only way I know of to not throw powder or double charge on the SDB or 650 is to short stroke the handle. You just have to make sure each stroke goes all the way in both directions.

With ball, small flake and short extruded powders the Dillon will load very accurate ammunition. Large flake and long extruded powders are more difficult to get consistent throws, particularly if the charge is small but I find the same to be true with my RCBS Uniflow and most other powder measures.