Mec 600 jr. problems

[MOA]

I too will agree with Mega, if I new what I know now years ago I would have just started saving my money and gone with the PW to begin with. The fact that the hull is supported its entire length is a major difference from MEC. The whole engineered final crimp is also completely different, never had a bad crimp from the PW.

Example:







But, than again if all the stars are lined up just right the MEC will give you this:







Even a new factory uncrimped 10 ga hull will crimp fine with the old style metal dies.

[robert6715]

MOA, Is stacking buckshot a pain in the butt without being able to remove the hull from the holder on the Ponsness? Seems like it would be.

Rob

[MOA]

robert6715,

Actually in this case as you can see by the image, I am using the silver hulls that are produced by Winchester for the handicap trap crowd. The load data is the same be they red or silver, but I suspect the silver has just a hair more room in them than the red hull. I am in this case using 00 buck and they just align themselves very easily without any trouble, and quite quickly too. I have only loaded maybe 400 buckshot loads so far on the PW reloader, I've loaded more on the MEC, but that is only due to just getting the PW a month ago or so. I can tell you this, you have a much higher chance of shot, be it buck or smaller shot all over the floor with a MEC than with the PW, don't ask me how I know and I won't have to lie. So far I am really liking my PW. I plan down the road to get another head with the ten and twenty gauge tools on it so most of my future shotshell loading will be done on the PW. I plan on keeping the MEC's, but will get them set up to do mostly the 3" shells in 12 and 20 ga while I have the PW set up on standard length except for the ten which I will set up for the 3-1/2 from the get go. I am going to have to get a new set up for the loading bench, I have to have room for two rockchuckers, two partner presses, the Hornady LNL AP plus the four MEC's, the Ponsness Warren, and a Master Caster from Magma and still have room to clean the shooting sticks and just general room so I don't feel confined while trying to get some stuff done. You still need room to clean and sort brass, storage of supplies, lube boolits, all kinds of space is needed, so I am planning to get things organized differently when we move. I will get this setup done this one final time. I can hardly wait to be done with it, so tired of having to move stuff back and forth all the time to get anything done, it makes the job twice what it should be as far as time spend doing a specific project.

[MOA]

robert6715,
What size buckshot size do you find yourself using on the Island, and for what purpose?

[robert6715]

I load #4 for fox calling & Lots of 00 & 000 that my native friends use for marine mammal harvest, mainly sea otters.

Rob

[MOA]

Interesting, buckshot for aquatic hunting. Amazing how unique uses are so localized. Always wanted to do Alaska. Life just gets away from us somehow. I envy your experiences.

[megasupermagnum]

I wish I could try a Ponsness Warren, before buying one. I guess there is nothing against returning it though. On my MEC, I can make crimps close to your PW pictures, but not all the time, and only with winchester or remington target hulls. My biggest gripe is that it can be so inconsistent. I can try for hours to get it adjusted JUST so, but every shell is a little different. Sometimes you just buckle shells when trying to stuff just a little too much in a hull, but what I hate is when I get 3 good shells, 4 that are kind of strange looking, and 1 that for some reason super tapers the hull. That's a bit of an exaggeration, but every MEC I've ever used is touchy. I've never tried the metal dies, but I blame it on a "set" die, and lots of variation in hulls. Just varying the wad seating from 30 pounds to 40 pounds can produce a crimp that goes from barely closed with negative taper, to one that starts to buckle and is WAY over tapered.

[EDG]

If your MEC has a problem you will never get consistent crimps.
The plastic crimp starters on my 700 Versamec never made me happy. I switched to the old style brass sheet metal crimp starter and I had much more consistent results. The MEC final crimp station function is very sensitive to the stacked height of the powder, wad and shot column. In my quest for the lowest possible cost skeet loads I used almost any cheap wads found at dealers and gun shows.

I used Rem, Win, Federal, Pacific and several brands of clone wads. I used mostly Rem and Win compression formed hulls. Twelve ga ammo was loaded with Red Dot. Twenty ga ammo was loaded for a long time with Green Dot. However crimping the Green Dot loads never looked as pretty as I wanted. I tried Unique in place of Green Dot and it changed the stacked height of the powder and wad column enough to make better crimps. So I switched to Unique.
As time went on I learned to adjust the wad column height with the wad seating pressure ram.
When the wad column was too tall I just compressed the wad to collapse the wad cushion section. When too short less pressure was used.

This is my first post in the shot shell section here. Why?
I have been reloading shot shells more than 50 years. Most of that time I have been using MECs. I am a long time skeet shooter. Loadi g shot shells with my MECs is not a challenging task other than dealing with the boredom. I have not adjusted much of anything in the last 30 years. There is not much to shotshell loading for skeet since about the only thing I ever changed was the wad brand. So there is not much to post about shotshell loading.
You might do well to haul your loader over to someone that has a working MEC and compare the two.
Other than changing to the brass crimp starter mine are just like they came out of the box.

[Cap'n Morgan]

As I recall it, to get a perfect crimp on my MEC I adjusted the cam so it would just barely fold the crimp and the edge still had a bit of flare. Afterwards, I then ran the finished shells through the crimp station a second time with the cam set for a deeper crimp and got a well defined crimp with a smooth rounded/tapered edge.

I would expect the more expensive progressive presses has two crimping stations, but I'm not sure.

[Hogtamer]

Load height must be perfect for a perfect crimp. Close gets you, well, close.

[jimb16]

WOW! I've got 4 600 jrs. and a PW. Once I adjust the crimp station on the MECs I get just as good crimps as I do with the PW. The PW is set up for my 12 ga. skeet load and I keep a 12 ga MEC for specialty loads. The other 3 are for 16, 20 and .410 loading. I get very good crimps on everything I load. The only real problematic one is the .410. There are at least 3 different length cases for the 1/2 once loads and I have to readjust the crimp for each one.

[megasupermagnum]

WOW! I've got 4 600 jrs. and a PW. Once I adjust the crimp station on the MECs I get just as good crimps as I do with the PW. The PW is set up for my 12 ga. skeet load and I keep a 12 ga MEC for specialty loads. The other 3 are for 16, 20 and .410 loading. I get very good crimps on everything I load. The only real problematic one is the .410. There are at least 3 different length cases for the 1/2 once loads and I have to readjust the crimp for each one.

How about some pictures? Remington STS's don't count.

[bdicki]

I load on MEC grabbers, 16,12,and 28ga. The 12 I load STS, Nitro, Gun Clubs, Winchester CF reds and silvers all with the same settings. Sorry I only have STS's with me, they all look the same except some are longer so the crimp closes more. Some have holes and some have curls.

[megasupermagnum]

That says nothing. I can do that with a lee loader hand kit. Try that with a federal, estate, rio, chedite, remington straight wall, etc., or any 3", then you will see the shortcomings of a MEC.

[bdicki]

That says nothing. I can do that with a lee loader hand kit. Try that with a federal, estate, rio, chedite, remington straight wall, etc., or any 3", then you will see the shortcomings of a MEC.

Why would I, although I do load Cheddites for 16 ga with good results.

[megasupermagnum]

Why would I, although I do load Cheddites for 16 ga with good results.

You posted on a thread about MEC crimping problems with hunting loads. Nobody, myself included, has every said a MEC wont make good target ammo.

[EDG]

I am sure you can get the MEC to work fine if you want. If you don't want it to work you will keep finding fault with it.
I don't really think you get such good crimps with a Lee hand loader kit . I have a LEE loader kit that is some times used to test a new wad or hull. Crimping plastic requires such high force that I do that part on the MECs.

That says nothing. I can do that with a lee loader hand kit. Try that with a federal, estate, rio, chedite, remington straight wall, etc., or any 3", then you will see the shortcomings of a MEC.

[robert6715]

Loaded on a 600 jr. 3" Remington "nitro steel" .25" yellow plastic base wad, 32 pellets #4 buck, MG42 wad, 30 gr. blue dot , 4.5cc sperical buffer. Every single shell turns out like these. Same goes for 12 pellets of OO instead of 32 of #4.

[megasupermagnum]

Now that is impressive. I've NEVER in 10 years got crimps that looked that good on my MEC.

[higgins]

I've used two pre-1985 600 Jrs for a long time now, and never had any crimping problem that couldn't be solved following these directions. https://www.mecshootingsports.com/Co...ents/600jr.pdf

A good start would be to make sure all the parts on the press match the parts in the drawing for whichever 600 Jr. one owns. The only nasty looking crimps I ever got were with hulls that weren't much good for reloading anyway, or when I deviated from the components, primarily wads, listed in a shotshell manual; not a real good idea anyway.

We often say "fit is king" when talking about cast bullet diameters, but with shotshells "load height is king" for a good crimp.