Duds will really mess you up in timed or rapid fire matches. Range command:"With five rounds ,load".. Meaning,you can't load 6.. in case there is a misfire.In timed fire,I have cleared, picked up and loaded a fresh round and got the shot off. Timed fire is much tougher to get off an aimed shot........
The press arrived Monday. Got it set up despite a real lack of instructions. Started loading some .38s. Made some mistakes. Crushed some casings until I got the die set right to flare the casing enough. Set up went much easier with the 9mm dies. Made enough of each to do some shooting and test things out. Planning to hit the range on Thursday. With any luck, nothing will get blown up!
Crushed casings go with the deal, it happens. Lee instructions aren't always the best either. Come to think of it, most of the instructions are pretty bad. Everybody figures somebody else already taught you.
How many primers ended up in upside down? And how many were missing alltogether, which you notice when you take the cartridge from the powder measure and see it leaving a trail... No smoking Wily E. Coyote!
You get a rythym for setup. It's when you load the bottle neck rifle dies that you will really start breaking stuff in interesting ways.
Yup, had a few primers missing or upside down. It's surprising what you miss while distracted by figuring something else out. By the time I started with the 9mm I had a mental rhythm going.
Maybe someday I'll do some .308 shells. It never really get shot lately though.
I did find the whole thing kind of enjoyable though. I don't get to do that kind of precision work very often anymore.
got to agree with Jramsey, Please slow down and find somebody that has reloading experience to help guide you through the process. crushed cases happen, and you can see the results and know that they aren't right. Another issue you need to be aware of is Squib loads (without powder and just primed) can be catastrophic, I've seen the results of a bullet lodged in a barrel and a second round fired, destroyed gun and injured the shooter. Throw the rounds away that you have loaded. Not trying to pile on.. Just trying to interject a little knowledge.
Just trying to keep someone from getting hurt while learning a great hobby.
I was in the third grade 44 years ago when my dad started teaching me the basics of reloading and I still learn with each new caliber I acquire.
Don't claim to know it all nor do I care to but I've never thrown a double charge,missed a charge or inserted a primer upside down, but have seen the damage done to some fine firearms and there owners caused by carelessness.
A double charge of Bullseye is no laughing matter nor a squib loud if not caught.
I can go slow enough that I will never crush a case, but I don't want to. I'm stuck financially with a single stage press, and I can generally do a step with the press at nearly two cases per second. Going this quickly, I will inevitably mash maybe 2% of cases, more when I am getting used to a new caliber. I'll take the 2% attrition rather then halving my speed.
The progressives are the ones that end up burning me... I love how they can crank out the rounds (like 1000+ rounds plus of .45acp out of a Dillion 1050 in a relaxed evening). But there are a lot of moving parts to keep right, and it's easy to get 20 rounds downstream before you discover something is going wrong.
In general, there are two steps I take my time with and make sure I don't screw up, as they are the ones that really could be dangerous.
The first is the powder. Kind of bad is "no powder". The primer will pop, the bullet will get half way down the barrel, and if you don't have the presence of mind to know what just happened and crank out another round, bad things could happen. It'll probably just hurt your gun (or just clear it), but it's for sure a bad thing. Even worse would be an overcharged round. This would normally be a "double throw" from your powder measure, but it could also happen if you just did something totally wrong in your setup, or had some kind of odd other problem. Again, it would probably in most cases just end up being a "proof test" of your gun and just scare the daylights out of you or break something that doesn't hurt you... but it could go really wrong.
So I slow down dramatically for the powder step. I double check the book and stick with proven loads. I do 50 at a time in an open tray... Throw the first, verify it on the scale, carefully do all 50, weigh the last throw, stop and relax for a moment, then look down the mouth of all 50 and make sure they "look right". For everything but maybe .32 acp, that'll show you a double throw or an empty throw clear as day. If I have somebody helping me, we both visually check the tray before seating the bullets.
On rifle rounds, this is less of an issue. For 30/06, 6.5x55, .308 winchester, .303 british, etc, etc, the right amount of a good rifle powder like IMR4895 puts the case about 70% full. You will know a double throw because most of it will end up on your lap.
The worst I've done is .32 acp. It takes like 2.9 grains bullseye, or 3.2 grains unique (don't trust me on these, look it up). That is a ridiculously small amount of powder. So the powder measure (at least the cheap lee ones) are stressed to even go that low, your scale is much less precise, and a double throw is tougher to tell from a single throw. But you can still tell if you look closely and are careful.
After a while it gets intuitive. You still must look things up, but you know that a .32 will use something like 3 grains, a .45 or 9mm will probably have close to 5 grains, and a .30/06 will be something like 42 grains. And you know what 5 grains looks like, and what 40 grains looks like. So if something was going terribly wrong, you would look down the filled .45 shell and say "that can't be right" (and you'd be correct).
The other big risk is a damaged case. For better or worse, I'll reload and shoot just about any case that looks damage free. I'll do casual inspections all along the way... before I shoot them, when I pick them up at the range, before I tumble them, after I tumble them, and at each step in the reloading process (4 to 6 steps depending on cartridge). So all along the way, I am spotting split or gouged cases and throwing them away with extreme prejudice. Any doubt, in the trash they go.
But the final step after everything else is done is a very careful inspection while packaging them up. Take the tub of loaded rounds, and go sit at a comfortable table with a big pile of 8x10 old printouts from the recycle bin.
Fold the paper roughly in half, and lay down 8 to 15 rounds (depening on how many you use at a time and how big they are) flat and carefully lined up with the bases on the fold. Do a quick primer check (upside down or missing). Then look for case damage, rolling the whole line right and left so you see all sides. Any doubt, throw them in the "pull the bullets" bucket.
If they are good, fold up the rounds by turning the paper into an envelope and taping it shut. Label each envelope with powder type and weight, and bullet type and weight, and date reloaded. The dating (or other way of identifying this "batch") is important, as if you do get a "hot load" or other "this couldn't have happened but just did" situation, you can recycle that whole lot and be done with it, without having to scrap more than necessary. If you didn't want to reuse paper destined for recycling, you could even pre-print the batch and load data right on the paper and fold it such that it shows when you are done.
This takes a little more time, but it gives me the "final check" step to look for split or damaged cases.
The only time I have really had problems is when I have borrowed time on a progressive press. You are so detached from everything, that when the machine goes astray, you may not know it, or may not know it for 100 or 200 rounds or so.
Handloading with a single stage press (even starting as an absolute and total newbe), I have probably handloaded 2000 rounds (well, the same 200 rounds 10 times ), and had two cases that lacked powder. In both cases, I heard the "thunk" instead of a "boom", cleared the weapon, saw the notable absence of light coming through the barrel into the breach, and put the weapon away until I could check it. Got home, took the gun apart, took an old aluminum cleaning rod, and tapped the round out. It wasn't a misfire, I was slugging the bore.
I expect my "dud ratio" for the progressive would be 2x to 10x higher, FWIW.
The upside of this is that I have experienced duds. In the .45 it was obvious something went really wrong.
So when it happened to me in a .32, even though it was fairly subtle, I knew immediately what happened and didn't try and put another round through.
Makes me wonder if I would even be able to tell in a .22lr out of a rifle...
OK... I do realize that the powder charge is a critical thing. I was curious how accurate the measure was anyway, so the first thing I did was to charge a casing and weigh the charge... 5 times, just to get a feel for the consistency. The charge was consistently a bit low from the starting grains, so I tried the next size hole in the measure. This gave me a slightly bigger charge than called for. I swapped back to the original hole and weighed 2 more charges just to be sure things were working right.
The powder I chose needs a good fill that is easy to see. A double charge will top the casing. Knowing that there's no way to double check this I am taking a visual check every time I place a slug on the casing. I still did a couple of random checks with the scale as I went just because I am paranoid. It seems to me that everything else can be checked externally.
Did I miss something that can't be checked externally? I made damn sure I was comfortable with the charging stage before closing up any rounds.
I know how to use a dial caliper (I've got my dad's from his tool & die shop with his name engraved on it, kind of cool). I set things up for an OAL right between the Max. for the slug and the Min. for the load data. Casing lengths were checked before I started. The crushed casings (from not enough flaring of the casing and the slug not sliding in correctly) were easy to spot. The upside down primers were also easy to spot. What else needs to be checked out?
The range I'll be shooting at has a friend as the range officer. I'll be letting him know what I've got going on before shooting starts. If he has any concerns I don't think he'll let me proceed. He knows I'm starting out reloading and didn't seem too concerned about me doing it. He has been doing reloads for decades and also serves as the shooting coach for my wife's club. I've read the advice provided by the good folks here. Thanks a bunch. I've also read the entire Modern Reloading by Richard Lee.
While I'm new to using a reloading press, I'm not new to precision mechanical assembly. The issue of crushed cases went away with setting the expander die just a bit deeper. Sure having someone looking over my shoulder might have saved a couple of casings, but now that I have a better feel for how much flare is required it's working just fine. BTW I was trying to use the minimum amount of flaring as I could. That does mean some amount of trial and error.
Jramsey, seeing as you seem to be about the only one that feels I should stop, I'd like to hear your feelings why. I trust you have my best interest in mind, so I'd like to hear the area of your concern. Feel free to PM me if you would rather keep it between us. It's just that I feel confident that what I have right now is safe to fire. Some detail of your concerns would be very beneficial.
Thank you all for the advice. I really appreciate it.
P.S. The first loads were .38 sp. wad cutters that will be shot from a .357 mag. That should provide another good margin of safety too.
What powder did you use? A full .38 sp case is a lot of powder, even with deeply seated wadcutters.
Take at least one of them to a quiet place and shake them to make sure you hear powder flopping around. That lets you know you didn't compress the charge.
It's not a full case unless you double charge. It's easy to see that it is loaded though, and a double will top it off being completely obvious.
I used the same powder in the 9mm which does give you a compressed charge according to the load data. This charge also gives a very low chamber pressure according to the load data.
I can't hear anything shaking these or factory loads. Maybe I should have taken better care of my hearing when I was younger!
The IMR4227 does take a lot of powder for the energy you get. That is why I selected to start my reloading with.
Ahh! That makes sense. Good choice, up to the point it risks compressing the load.
The lee manual is nice for that, it gives volumes for the powder in addition to weight, and gives different overall lengths based on the powder and bullet you are using. Must have been a LOT of work over time.
Yeah, Lee's book talks about compressed loads. He doesn't seem to feel that it's a big deal, but does mention that some shy away from them. He doesn't really mention what the potential risks of a compressed load are though. The load data does represent a whole lot of work, especially when you start to look at all the different types of ammo he has data on.
i recommend the lee auto prime hand held unit. (unless i missed something and you have that) its almost impossible to screw up installing primers. you'll never have one missing & i've never had one in upside down. once i size the cases i prime them 100 at a time.
A priming tool is on my short list of farkles. Right now I have to place them by hand into the primer holder. Still debating over getting the auto primer or the press mounted set up. Either one would make that step more reliable and faster than doing it manually. Even with the press mounted set up, once you develop a pattern you are not likely to miss priming a casing, and it would eliminate the possibility of loading one upside down. It's an obvious error once the bullets are put into a tray, so I don't see it as a safety issue.
Shot 40 rounds of the .38 without a hitch. Very happy with that. Shot some production .38 for a back to back comparison. They felt and sounded the same. Groupings were slightly better with the production ammo though. I got some advice from the range officer on things to try that may improve that.
Switched to the 9mm and was having a lot of issues with the spent casing not clearing the ejection port. I was wondering how this load would work, because the load data shows a very low pressure. I think it's just too low to cycle the gun. They fed and fired just fine, just didn't clear the port when ejecting.
Looks like I'll be trying some different loads. No surprise there though. I'm quite happy with my initial results! Thanks all for the advice!
I've always had a need to understand and appreciate the varieties of all kinds of machines. The non-temperamental nature of a revolver is always a great thing. I still have a great appreciation for a semi-auto when fed a good diet. Happily I can appreciate one without depreciating the other. I do recognize this as an advantage of the wheel gun though. It's kind of like having to explain why you would want more than one motorcycle. Hell, I'm not even sure how many hammers I own! I do however appreciate what makes each one special from all the others though.
I lump it in the same category of water cooled versus air cooled bikes. 99.9% of the time, I like the extra power and quietness of my water cooled bikes. .1% of the time, with a head gasket leak and no coolant half way home from work... notsomuch....
A revolver ( double action, as in a Colt Python, or S&W Bodyguard ) has very simple operation. Point, pull trigger.
An auto can be as complex as a 1911. Manual safety, multiple modes of carry, grip safety, action must be cycled to load, magazine a separate, losable part, etc. Or as simple as a Glock. Must cycle to load, separate magazine... but once prepped for carry, same as revolver in operation.
Edge to the Revolver?? yes, but.
consider reloading. IF you have pre prepared spare magazines, auto is faaaster. .... then we enter into more complex subjects as to technique and training..... edge for auto.
A revolver has a complex internal mechanism while an auto may or may not have fewer parts. ( 1911/glock) Modern autos are far less labor intensive to manufacture than revolvers, and very simple. Close, but edge auto? tie? What do you think?
A revolver is completely mechanical in action. A lever is pulled ( trigger ) and linkages move everything. A dud round just doesn't go bang, a second trigger pull cycles and fires. Empty, full, good ammo or bad.
An Auto relies on the cartridge going bang in a moderately narrow range of recoil or gas produced. ( depending on operation. Most hand guns use recoil to power the mechanism. Most Rifles use tapped gas pressure. Shotguns are a mixed bag. ) If you get a dud, it's a ( usually ) 2 hand procedure to cycle, ejecting the dud and loading a fresh round.
Edge, Revolver.
But modern autos are better than ever. Reliability in a gun that's been tested with a particular chosen load for hundreds of rounds should be near perfect.
Revolvers are IMO a little more prone to jams from crud from pocket carry. Depends. Both on gun and crud. A dime is a good example of FOD, and can easily lock up a revolver.
hell, call it a tie.
Some auto's can jam from a dime too.
So, like riding, it gets down to your personal bag.
I welcome comments on the subject, but revolver vs. auto is a darn silly argument. Choose the action that suits your needs, fits your hand, and works for the job at hand.
If you dig cowboy, military, hunting, whatever, it's all good. ( I want a Gyrojet ) Peace.
Hit the range again today. I'm quite happy with the results I've gotten so far.
I tried a number of varieties of loads for the .357, and some are giving great results, some show each round not going through the paper straight. Each round would be smudging the same side of the hole though, great consistency. It's easy to see when a wad cutter isn't hitting straight. I'm already getting betting groupings with some of the reload recipes than the factory ammo I've been using. That makes me VERY happy. It's a wonderful shooting gun.
The 9mm is back to working great again with a different powder. Still hoping to get tighter groupings with it eventually. It's nice to see the results of various loads though. No doubt it will take plenty of trial and error testing, but it's pretty fascinating.
Thanks again for helping me take this next step in shooting. I've learned a boatload in the past few weeks. I know there's many more boatloads of knowledge to be gained too. Great fun!
I finally broke down and got the Lee Turret press (the Classic, which gives more options and appears better made than their other turret).
I ended up getting the full kit, $200 from Midway (except that it's not in stock and their ship date is pure fantasy, so you can't actually get it) or in stock from Cabellas for $250 or something.
That includes the auto-disc powder measure, and it indexes automatically. Heads are only $10 or something, so you can leave dies set up if you want, and it uses the normal reloading bases (so you don't have to buy a $40 baseplate for every caliber you load).
I'm pretty happy with it for what it is. You won't confuse it for a Dillon, but if you look at it like a turret single stage press it is really nice. So it's basically a single stage press that you can do 4 steps on without removing the shell from the base plate (which is the time consuming part, on off on off on off on off dang dropped that one and spilled it etc).
The primer system is a little mickey mouse, but easier to use than the hand primer I used to use (again because you aren't handling the shells in and out and in and out).
The auto-disk system is "you are getting what you pay for". I have only tried to use it with Unique so far... so I am using a notoriously poor metering measure on a notoriously poor measuring powder. My results confirm both reputations. If I went to great lengths (I still have one more thing to try) I could get it down to about .3 grains variance in most cases (which is pretty bad, but I could live with) and the occasional half charge (which I *can't* live with).
But its a 4 hole press, so I just rigged up an adapter with old plumbing parts to put my Lyman powder measure (pretty much the gold standard) on the press. It takes an extra operation (the Lee auto disc charges the case on the upstroke) to reach up there and move the charge lever, but it's not a big deal given the peace of mind. And it makes all the right clacky noises.
For different powders (like ball powders) and bigger charges (I was trying to put 3.5 grains for .38 special light loads) the auto disc could probably work pretty well. So I haven't given up yet, but it should't be your only measuring option available.
The press (the classic) looks like it will do all pistol and most rifle cartridges... though I haven't tried the military brass with thick necks .30-06 reloading (which is how I literally ripped the head off of my first Lee single stage press). If I have to do those, I'll probably go borrow the neighbors rockchucker.
Anyway, just an update. I would recommend the Lee Turret Classic over any Lee single stage press. But don't think you will be done when the full kit shows up at your door, it still takes some fussing.
I have a Lyman Turret Press, and I can't envision a single-die in my future. I will take all of my available brass, decap all, clean the primer pockets in all, tumble-clean all, size all, expand all (decap pin removed), prime all (Lee Auto-Prime; I like to feel the primer seating), and bag them. Then as I feel like it, take 50 at a time (like Reep) and charge them in a tray holder from a Lyman Powder Measure. I then shine a light straight down on the tray to do a visual on powder levels. I set bullets as I assemble them, rather than doing the whole tray, and stand them up in a line to do a last visual, then box them with the load info on a sticker on the lid. By doing them in batches, the chance of ruining any single round is minimized, and there is an opportunity to check each case as you go.
Tlat about small powder charges: I have a break-top .32 S&W, and the Good Load for that is 1.0 gr Bullseye behind an 85 gr. HP. I end up weighing each charge with a trickler and pouring it straight into the case.
(Reep, you wondered about the 22LR getting a squib load; Eley has a 20 grain bullet over no powder, just their primer compound.)
I was thinking about this earlier today... I have a cheapo electronic scale now with a "tare" button.
It would actually not be that bad to pop each shell out, put it on the scale, hit the tare button, put it back, charge it with the auto-disc, pop it back out, and put it on the scale again for an exact measure down to .1 grains. Off by too much? Throw the powder in one bucket, the cartridge in another, and you have a do-over.
Still less work than a single stage press, not much worse than my setup with the Lyman measure (which requires me moving both hands anyway) and decent economy of motion. And you are 100% sure of the powder load down to less than .1 grains (though i'd probably accept anything + or - .1 or .2 grains). And no chance of squibs.
Still dialing in my process. Measuring each load worked pretty well. Keep one cartridge on the scale, fill it with the manually operated measure, weigh, and if it is within my stated tolerance (for example 4.50 to 4.70 grains for .45 ACP with LRN and Bullseye) I pour it from the cartridge to the funnel in the top of the flaring die with the cartridge underneath.
Using one cartridge over and over and pouring it into the funnel kept me from having to keep changing the tare (empty .45 ACP brass varies by 5 or 10 grains easily).
This worked well for peace of mind, and probably great accuracy, but it was still a hassle.
I've been noodling the problem for a while, and was thinking up all sorts of interesting approaches using micro-controllers and servos, but not getting excited enough to turn it into "yet another project".
Then I stumbled across a "powder measure die". You can buy them for $30 or so, and I probably would have bought, but they were backordered.
So I spent 20 minutes in the garage with an old broken flaring die I already had laying around, and made my own out of about 25 cents worth of materials.
Here is what it looks like when you throw a double throw of powder:
Here is what it looks like with a zero throw (squib):
This isn't nearly as accurate as hand weighing each charge, but it is WAY faster. So if you are loading for ultimate accuracy (and have already invested the necessary extraordinary amounts of time and money required such that everything else is up to snuff) then you should hand weigh each round.
But if you are looking for "squib and double charge prevention" insurance, this appears that it will work *great*. I need to tweak it a little more and make a couple of more rods with balls on the end. They are just bamboo kabobs, i'll use some JBWeld putty epoxy. Maybe a .20 caliber ball, a .30 caliber ball, and a .40 caliber ball. Right now I am just using the base of the bamboo stick, and I think it will be even more accurate with a ball down there.
To make it, just carve up some pine scrap so it threads or pounds into the open top of the old die. Then use a drill press to drill through the pine dead center with a bit slightly larger than the bamboo kaboob. Then use two o-rings (one to keep the rod from falling too far down, the other to mark the "top" of a normal round). Then put another fixed rod in the top for comparison (a finish nail for now, maybe something fancier later).
You want the rod light, so bamboo worked great, and an old .22 aluminum cleaning rod would work great as well. That might even be better, as you could thread in different tips.
Some days my Lee auto-disc is perfect throwing perfect charge after perfect charge. Other days it can't seem to find it's %$$ with both hands. Some days it works perfect 49 out of 50 times, but #50 is a squib. I wouldn't use an auto-disc without this kind of setup, too much risk.
Anyway, for what that's worth. The Lee Classic turret press is working very nicely after some sorting, I am very happy with it for the price and for how I use it.
