The Dillon RL-1000B

[ovenpaa]

I have felt there was a need for a Dillon progressive press for a while now, we are primarily long distance shooters however that is not where our reloading time is spent. We are geared up for precision reloading and so we should be as we design and build the kit we use! Also the vast majority of LR outings use less than 50 rounds, especially as I no longer shoot competitions. We also shoot .22LR however no reloading is required, just grab a couple of boxes of ammunition and head for the range.

The time consuming part is reloading for the Marlin .357Mags especially when using a single stage press and the procedure is as follows:

De-cap and into the stainless media cleaner.
Dry and place in trays of 50
Over to me to Size and case flare and back into trays of 50
Over to the Viking to the powder charge and back into trays of 50
Back to me to seat and crimp
Finally the loaded rounds are boxed up and go into the ammunition safe for the next outing

It really is a time consuming operation, especially if you need to load 250-300 rounds so we end up loading just enough for the small competitions I shoot leaving virtually nothing for practice hence the need for a Progressive press of some sort.

I had considered a 1050B in the past as I had always wanted to try my hand at volume reloading for the .308 however I was put off by potential errors leading to poor accuracy plus the 1050B is a commercial system and priced accordingly and I just could not justify the outlay. There was also the 550 or 650 however they seemed slightly limited in some ways although there are tens of thousands of users who are going to strongly disagree so really it was just a matter of doing it the old fashioned way.

Then I spotted the Dillon RL-1000B for sale on here with some negotiation it was far too good a bargain to ignore so I said yes and it arrived Friday in large parts in a sturdy box and thankfully in undamaged condition for the most. I say for the most as careful inspection revealed that there were some minor post packing issues (Guess the courier)

First job was clean everything and get it assembled. The original Dillon manual came with the machine however it seems to miss out huge lumps of information and assumes you have an assembled and set-up machine to start with, luckily it is fairly obvious how the thing goes together and by early evening it was bolted together and cycling. There were however a few small issues, the good news is there was also a large box of spares so I set to replacing the ground steel pins holding the case feeder in place. I also swapped out the pusher to suit the .357mag brass we will be using. I cannot check the stroke and set-up of the feeder yet as the new shell plate has not yet arrived from Dillon. The good news is the tracking shows Your item departed a transfer airport in LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM on April 8, 2017 at 2:29 pm. The item is currently in transit to the destination.

Case feeder time, a nice feature of the rotating disk on the RL-1000B is it is universal and the nice people at Dillon emailed me conversion details which means it is just a matter of removing the plate via 2 cap head screws, pull out the existing 1/8" ground steel pins and re-insert in the correct sequence which is Pin, two spaces, Pin and repeat then replace the disk. There was a large washer underneath which did not appear to be original so it was discarded. The wiring on the case collator was tidied up, a big handful of brass added and the tube soon filled up and a quick tweak of the limit and it stopped when required.

Next job was the powder hopper, unfortunately the plastic tube had been damaged in transit so I set about trying to source an alternative however it is a 2.5 inch diameter tube (63,5mm) which is a bit of an oddball to us here in the now metric UK and suitable material is either impossible to find or outrageously expensive so I have set the Viking the task of finding something suitable before I resort to Plan B.

I needed the powder hopper to function so I carefully wrapped it in Hockey tape to stop it cracking further and cut away the damaged section hence the black section on the tube right now. Plan B? Replace it with a length of 2.5 inch OD aluminium. There is an obvious downside in that you cannot see the powder level however it does give me an excuse to machine a suitable indicator system and maybe even add an alarm.

On the subject of alarms the primer load station needed one however first job was to swap out to the small primer feed plate. Remember me saying this was the later B model? Mine has a serial after #400 which means it has the thicker primer feed plate which apparently is a good thing. One thing that did not seem quite right was the primer fill tubes, with the red pick-up cap on the end the tube was tight to enter the outer tube and when I attempted to pull it out the red cap was left behind however this was easily resolved by machining a little bit off the outer diameter for 5,5mm which enabled the end cap to be fitted and still slide into place.

Next job was fit a new primer level alarm, the one that came with the machine was damaged and oddly I had a spare sitting on the shelf. The problem was it was designed for a larger diameter end cap and this was easily resolved with a few minutes on the lathe so now there was a primer alarm fitted. One thing that is handy is the primer tube is 17 inch in length as opposed to the shorter 12inch on the 1050B so I can hold more primers, the downside is to top up the primers I have to remove the alarm by unscrewing, lift the fill tube out, pick-up another 140 odd primers and reverse the procedure. The fill tube is easy enough to deal with as I can soon make some more and I have spare ends. I also have spare clips so I can drill the ends and fit them to prevent primers falling out before use. The downside is filling and fitting the primer fill tube is time consuming and something to look at for the future, after all what is the point in having a progressive press if you have extended down time loading the consumables.

On the subject of loading consumables one thing the press does not have is a bullet collator, this means I have to manually add a bullet to the case before cycling and even though this is the only manual intervention required other than moving the operating arm back and forth it is one operation I need to get rid of.

There are a few commercial options available for automating bullet feeding however I prefer to build my own, I had planned on using a bullet feeding die and adding a rotary collator of my own design however I suspect I will end up building a cassette type feeder instead which speeds things up a bit and if I feel the need to fit a rotary collator I have a couple of ideas.

So there you go, a Dillon RL-1000B up and nearly running. There have been discussions on various forums about this model and the general opinion is Dillon no longer hold spares for them however I had no issues ordering the .357 Shell plate, they also had the ejector wire and both are in the post. I have a couple of spare shell plates with the machine including a .223 and we are talking about building a little mouse gun (.223) for ourselves so I could in theory use the Dillon to rattle off a thousand or so rounds whenever needed. One thing I am not 100% about is the accuracy of the powder charge system however I have some idea on this which I will implement when I change the tube. After that it will be a matter of throw one, weigh and repeat until I have an accurate system, or as accurate as I can get it and from there make a decision.

What I have noticed is the general build quality of the RL-1000B is absolutely superb. They were over USD2500 when new and I have read comments that suggest based on inflation such a machine would be closer to UDS9000 if it was to be built today, I am not sure about that however it was certainly not cheap in its day. This is a commercial machine and with the addition of a drive system the machine is certainly capable of 1500 rounds per hour for extended periods with minimal intervention. Materials used are predominantly stainless steel and good quality aluminium castings and superbly thought out and I have to say I am thoroughly delighted with its acquisition and look forward to getting it set-up and producing ammunition and moving it to its final location adjacent to the new armoury.

Finally, if anyone knows anything about this model, anecdotal or otherwise I would be interested as information is sparse out there on the world wide web.

Many thanks to the Running Man for packing everything so well and kindly throwing in a set of Dillon 223 Dies despite some hard negotiations. Happy days :)

[Sim G]

The RL1000 is a fine machine. The build quality is the same right across the range. I've had several Dillon's in the past and I'm still running a 24 year old RL550B today. Just thinking about it, three of my old machines have gone to saddler.....

What I do know about the RL1000 is the availability of spare parts/cailbre conversions is a real problem for some. I was of the belief that Dillon stopped supporting this machine some time ago? US forums and auction sites are your best source for parts. Warranty breakages are still backed by Dillon's lifetime guarantee with the 550. Is the 1000 the same as the 1050 is only warranted for a year...?

I do understand that a bargain is a bargain and a Dillon is a really great piece of kit, but I'm not convinced it's not a bit of overkill. In the pistol days I was doing 500 to 750 rounds a week of 9mm and .45 ACP. That equated to about 3 hours total reloading time with two RL550s.

[ovenpaa]

The 1000 only has/had a one year warranty as far as I know however Dillon have already supplied and shipped some small items free of charge and the only item they have not had in stock has been the perspex for the powder thrower. They also had a .357 shell plate in stock which is heading this way.

Yes it is an absolute overkill as it will predominantly be used for .357mag however it is a good excuse to shoot more :)

[saddler]

I've had several Dillon's in the past and I'm still running a 24 year old RL550B today. Just thinking about it, three of my old machines have gone to Saddler....

...though you've had a load of Gucci kit too, fluffy - inc a couple of 870's & a luvvly Auto 5 that was too much gun for your girl like physique.
(& two of "my" Dillon machines are still in your garage)

[ovenpaa]

In the absence of the 2.5" diameter perspex which was proving to be awkward to source I opted for aluminium. Downside is it is not transparent so I added a piston and stainless indicator rod which gives an instant indication of the remaining level of powder plus there are no issues with static electricity and powder sticking to the inside of the perspex tube. It is also shiny which is always good :)

[Lever357]

In the absence of the 2.5" diameter perspex which was proving to be awkward to source I opted for aluminium. Downside is it is not transparent so I added a piston and stainless indicator rod which gives an instant indication of the remaining level of powder plus there are no issues with static electricity and powder sticking to the inside of the perspex tube. It is also shiny which is always good :)

DSCF0014.JPG

Forgive my ignorance but what is the big circular item top left??

[Christel]

Blue one? Case feeder.

The one that looks like something out of MIB, remember the flying saucer being part of the New York 1964 world exhibition?

[the running man]

Nearly killed me getting it out of the attic

[ovenpaa]

Nearly killed me getting it out of the attic

The ParcelForce man looked pleased when I offered to carry it off the back of his van :)