http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...or-Handgunners
This thread here on Cast boolits has a pdf of a book that is very good reading for people learning about casting bullets. It is free for you to download and read. It is in html and pdf.
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http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...or-Handgunners
This thread here on Cast boolits has a pdf of a book that is very good reading for people learning about casting bullets. It is free for you to download and read. It is in html and pdf.
Thanks for the heads up. I'll do that after I clean the gun / work shop upOriginally Posted by VHoward
I forsee a loadmaster fail to prime reliably thread, and a barrel leading thread =)
The OP strikes me as new to reloading and casting. I pointed him to some good info on casting and if he reads it, he should succeed. As for the Loadmaster, I absolutely detested to one I got. I sold it shortly after on ebay for almost what I paid for it. Lee's Loadmaster is hit or miss in quality. You might get one that works ( As I've been reading lately) and you might get one that slipped past quality control and has many issues. Hopefully he got one of the good ones. I wish him luck.
I am a big working with my toys. If I want blue I would of bought blue. But I like helping the little guy.
And I thank you.
I agree with this. I've read in multiple places where either the customer got one with little to no issues or one that was plagued with problems. About half of the guys with issues I chalk up to a beginner that expected little to no tunning to be involved (which all presses need IMO) and then start to immediately bad mouth the press because it's the most inexpensive. Then reloaders in the market for a progressive read these experiences, along with the good ones (but only remember the bad reviews) and never give it a chance or further spread the bad reviews, not the good ones.
I was lucky, I got one that required very little tuning. I am able to case feed and prime easily for both pistol and small rifle. I even got the hornady bullet feeder die working with cast pistol rounds, but that thing took a bunch of work to meme that happen. My disk powder drop doesn't leak and stays very consistent.
That all being said, I can't wait to be able to afford an Enos "as it should be" xl650.
Good luck mgread. I hope you got one of the lucky ones.
-Chris
Seems to me a lot of the issues have to do with reloading 9mm? I don't reload 9mm, so I don't know about that. Seems there are issues with different guns having bore sizes all over the place making for using cast iffy, and being a short tapered case seems to cause some issues with loading. I found that loading 38 long colt heel based ammo I had to make sure the shell plate was indexed exactly or I'd get a crumpled case mouth in the powder charge station. This is a short 38 that is resized with a 9mm sizing die and flared with a 38 special die, and heel based bullet seated. Crimping is with a modified FC die on a single stage with a custom shell holder. I know it's not a 9mm, but it seems a bit more finicky than a standard 45 or 44 straight walled case. Since the powder is flush with the case mouth I have to be very gentle with the press as well to keep from sloshing powder out(black powder, not smokeless). Not a big deal and lots faster than single stage or turret press, but lots more finicky than any other round I reload for.
I was hesitant at first, but wanted to be able to churn out 45acp and the LM was on sale. It was a little aggravating to get tuned rite, but once I figured out the how and why of all the moving parts it proved fairly easy to tune and make run reliably. Wasn't long before I got more shell plates and was doing the majority of my loading on the LM.
Even though I've not had a lot of problems from the primer system, either on the LM or the pro-1000, I am not a big fan of the LM primer system simply because it's on the downstroke of the leaver, there's no feel to it, the pro-1000 is on the up stroke and you can feel the primer seating. In other words you have to make dang sure you've got the primer seating depth set rite. That's the reason I went to two presses, one for small primer and one for large.
There is slack in my LM shellplate and I can't figure out a way to get it better in sync.
The bottom bolt is properly torqued.
It causes slight misalignment issues and priming failure.
I hand feed the 9mm cases as the collator is unreliable anyway for 9mm, and it doesnt take longer.
It works to expand/powder/seat/crimp. The issue is that hand feeding cases, and manually size and prime on a separate single stage, that triples the time required to reload.
I would like a machine that "just works". Probably ordering a 650 soon.
Not sure, but that could be a combination of a couple of things. I've got, or had slack in both my LM's shell plates. Didn't seem to be an issue with the ammo I reload, but I fixed it anyway. This video has easy way to fix, looks funky, but it's easy to do and works. Lee should sell these, but they are easy to stretch out. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_FPefqtth8Y After doing that, shell plate is locked between the ejector and and plunger. The other thing I've seen is a chamfer on the bottom of the shell plate letting the primer feed a bit smoother.
Nice I do that right off the bat.
Work been busy as hell have not had time to clean up the shop yet. I'm hope this weekend I be able to clean and set up.
why cant they just sell a press that works as it is?
That like say why my Car need recall. **** happen.
It does for the most part, but if you want one that works most of the time rite out of the box, spend the grand or better for the Dillion. Or stick with a single stage or turret press. Event the Dillion needs tuning and set up. The Lee stuff is a tinker's dream, it's cheap, and relatively easy to make run good, you just have to be able to tinker with it. For example, I was loading on my new LM night before last, primers didn't want to slide down the chute without tapping the tray. Hmmm, looked everything over, there's bumps on the frame to jar the primers down into the chute, primer feed wasn't contacting them. Popped it out and looked it over, there's a plastic leaver spring that pushes against the shell plate body and pushes the primer system into the frame, bent it out by hand and tried everything again, worked perfectly. Such a slight, simple adjustment, but it required a basic understanding of cause and effect and mechanical aptitude. I'm no rocket surgeon, but at one time was an aircraft mechanic, and am a hobby machinist and blacksmith, in other words it might take me a while, but I can generally figure out the operating principle of a machine. If I understand the principles of operation of something I can generally fix it or modify it so it'll work. Or if I am having trouble I can look up and see what others have done and get ideas.
You want Lee to be perfect out of the box? They would cost in the same range as Dillion or Hornady's press, and non of them are perfect out of the box. They all have issues, though normally less than Lee's. I'll take a press at 1/5 the price of those others and make it work. One of the reasons I reload is to save money and shoot more, not spend it on presses.
Also people complain about Lee's primer system, and while it's not ideal, it does work and I've only detonated one primer over the years out of over 10k rounds loaded. The pro-1000 gave me plenty of warning I was doing something stupid, but I persisted and "BANG". But no other primers went off, no damage to the press. One of the things I like about the Lee primer system is that it's cheap plastic, if you get out of time to where you can detonate a primer, more than likely you will damage the inexpensive primer system without lighting off a 100 primers. Seen plenty of Dillion primer tubes blown apart. The Dillion has a nice, all metal primer feed system. Metal is hard and unforgiving, plastic is cheap and cushions, and very cheap to replace.
You need to adjust the flapper on the advance bar in or out a turn or two until there is just a little bit of slack. Look at this video, guy knows what he's doing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C7Dqpfrt5fI
Well, during a recall, they fix the car for free, and then, they correct the issue for future cars.
That really looks like it could solve my issue. I will have to try this. I have a huge amount of slack, and priming is total fail.
2 turns out and slack is gone. Will see how it primes next time I have some time. Looks promising because now I know that priming will be done on a "fixed" shellplate instead of on one with a lot of slack that tilts primers.
That video taught me something I didn't even know I had an issue with.
-Chris
Me too. I didn't see anything mentioned about it in the instruction sheet that came with my Loadmaster when I had it
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