Which Dillon press?

[mag41uk]

Plus one on the LnL Auto press. And I have used the 650.
So much simpler than a 650 and much easier/cheaper to do calibre changes.
I have the case feeder on mine.
I only use large primers in mine so haven't needed to change the primer feed.
I had a load master in pistol days and it was junk. I spent hours looking at help videos but could never get it to work as intended.
The case slider had a mind of its own and I gave up priming on it. This sort of defeated the idea of increasing out put.
I was loading 9mm/10mm/45acp/38 and 45 colt on it and it was equally fickle with all of them!
Best thing I did was get the LnL.
That said you will find folk who hate that too!
Its worth looking on the bay as some US sellers use eBay global delivery which is very cheap and duty is paid up front.
I just got an RCBS Summit press for less than £200 all in.
Tony

Tony

[Mike357]

On the L n L, can you buy the case feeder and the bullet feeder without the rotary units at the top? So every 20 rounds or so I would top both feeders up. Looks like $1400 for the press with rotary feeder.

[dodgyrog]

I've got 3x 450's 1x 550 and a 1050. The 1050 is a high volume machine for doing my 38spl rounds - 2000 at a go.
The 550 is for chopping and changing and I have a dozen tool heads set up.
The 3x 450's are set up in the 3 most used rifle rounds I use.
In your case I'd go for the 550 second hand or an updated 450 (cheap from eBay.com).
I have no experience of the 650.
pm if you want more info.
ATB

[Cj10]

I have a super 1050, LnL with case feeder and a Loadmaster.

The loadmaster is set just for 357 and works most of the time, but is my least favourite progressive. With the LNL, I am set up for a number of calibres, and it relatively easy to change between them.

My super 1050 is set up either in 223 or 9mm. Very reliable, quick, and consistent. Calibre changes are not cheap though. Have got a space on my bench for either an annealer or a 650, just can't make my mind up!

Ceri

[Primer]

I've tried a 650 at our club for 9mm and its very nice and is much better built than the Lee loadmaster I have but then it certainly should do at 4 times the cost.

When I got the loadmaster I hated it, I got less than 40 rounds out of it (38sp) in the first few sittings and i just reverted back to my classic turret press, it was just problem after problem, once I got the case slider to finally slide the cases into the shell plate it worked fine till the primer ram got jammed and chewed up two primer sliders which are now not made but Lee have made a replacement primer feeder arm and once fitted it started to work fine (ish) apart from it not liking some of the CBC (magtech) cases and then it started to jam on the primer ram again but on only 1 section of the shell plate, this has been rectified by me taking a file to the shell plate and removing some burrs and since then it has worked great until I decided to change to 9mm and now the primers often stop feeding from the tray to the primer arm and its easy to forget to keep an eye on it and then produce a bunch of unprimed rounds. i have the bullet feeder and case collator setup on it and when it runs it produces a high rate of rounds but you just have to keep your eye on 3 stations all the time.

I think if Lee spent a bit more time on quality control so that their stuff worked out of the box then some of it would be very good but i have had to spend too much time fettling everything to get them working.

If i could go back in time i would have saved the money i have splashed out on all the Lee gear i have and gone for some higher quality stuff like Dillion or Hornady, you live and learn. I will certainly be keeping my eye out for some better quality gear in the future.

[GRSporth1]

Have a 650 myself, having started with a Lee turret. Lee turret jammed every 20 rounds, Dillon still looks new after 20,000+ and can't remember when it last jammed.

Heard good things about Hornady LnL but no personal experience.

Just because its an auto index progressive press doesn't mean you always have to do everything "automatically" - e.g. I use hand measured powder charges when loading "high quality" rifle ammo.

If you load a lot of different calibres, make sure you factor in the cost of extra toolheads, powder dies etc.. although you can be clever with "conversion kits" and other parts (I load 5 different calibres, but only have 2 conversion kits plus a few extra parts).

If you want to make anything in quantity, or are short of spare time, buy a 650. If you are fiddling with lots of calibres or load development, go for a 550.

[rox]

Just because its an auto index progressive press doesn't mean you always have to do everything "automatically" - e.g. I use hand measured powder charges when loading "high quality" rifle ammo.

I thought I was the only crazy guy doing this! Nice to find someone else straddling the supposed divide between high quality ammo and the 'dark-side' of the progressive press! I still struggle to find a measurable difference between the output of my Dillon and what I used to produce on single-stage presses; it has taken a while to get the process just right though. Picked-up a Mr BulletFeder a couple of weeks ago, so my "World's slowest Super 1050" is about to get slightly less slow.

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