School me on ... Progressive Presses

[Firebird]

Uhh, actually I DO use a universal de-capper die on all my pistol brass before cleaning them so the primer pockets get cleaned.
With my Coax I can do about 30 rounds a minute once I get the motions down, takes about 10 minutes to reach that rate of speed but 500 cases goes by in about 20 minutes or so. What takes the time is I'm still using a vibrating brass cleaner, so it takes hours in the Walnut to clean the cases; then switch to corncob for more hours if I really want them shiny.

[casac47]

A progressive press is not a magic bullet(sorry, I couldn't resist). There will be a learning curve. You have multiple dies to adjust as well as the powder drop and primer setter. My RCBS Pro 2000 Auto Indexing press works great once everything is set up. But, it can take me 30 minutes to an hour sometimes to get things where I want them. Priming seems to be the weak spot on all the progressives. My press uses strips which I have to fill. If I'm doing .45 acp, the primer ram will need to be changed. The strips hold 25 primers and snap together. Sometimes they don't stay together and you end up with an un-primed case circulating. Even if everything works perfectly, you need to learn how to "feel" when the primer goes into the pocket. They can get turned sideways and, I have set one off in the feed system (minor damage, RCBS replaced a part for free). There is a lot going on and you have to pay attention. Having said all that, there are few things more satisfying as hearing a fully loaded bullet hit the hopper each time the handle is pulled. If you decide to go progressive, give yourself plenty of time to learn your system and pick up more storage boxes. I never load less than 100 rounds at a session and usually it's more like 200 or 250.

[toallmy]

I know a lot of people have a problem with lee but for around a year I have been using a lee loadmaster without a problem unless I made it . I load 9s ,45, and 357s . It's a new machine with the new primer tray and I love it . I put in the time to set up everything like I wanted to , and got the feel of it , but several thousand rounds so far have been a joy. By the way I would like to thank the members here for all the help figuring it out .

[W.R.Buchanan]

Red Green or Blue they all accomplish the same things, in pretty much the same way.

I have found that sizing and depriming on a single stage for Bottleneck Rifle cases is the best way for me. They get tumbled to remove the lube and then into the D550. But I only do my high volume rounds like .223's or .308's on that machine. All the rest are done on a Rockchucker to size and deprime, tumble, and then onto my C&H 444 to load. These rounds are usually done in 50 round batches so there's no advantage to the progressive for short runs.

For pistol cases I tumble them first to clean them and they go directly onto the D550 process as they are always done in large batches.

Lots of ways to do this but essentially everyone is telling you the same thing. You need a single stage press, a semi progressive like a C&H444 or Redding T7, and then if you need the volume,,,, a progressive to pump out many rounds in a short time.

Then you will be fully equipped and can really start saving money!

Randy

[seagiant]

Then you will be fully equipped and can really start saving money!

Randy

Hi,
Huh????

[OS OK]

If you want clean brass and primer pockets then you have to change up the old habits. It was simple for me as I don't let brass mount up by the bucket load before wanting to reload.
Depriming and cleaning has become a separate part and after retrieving them from the cleaning stage, they either go into production or into good quality zip lock quart baggies for stowage until I want that caliber. I have thousands waiting to be reloaded, they are in drawers under the bench, deep long wide drawers and using baggies they almost fill the drawers like pouring them in loose.
When considering going into a higher production rate, no matter how great the difference over single stage, you just have to reconsider the entire process otherwise you get a bottleneck somewhere that may seem insurmountable.
I take primed and cleaned cases to the press even when I use the turret or the single stage, it has become part of the reloading process and can't envision it being better for quality control, especially those situations where you get inconsistencies on seating primers in the progressive press as we have seen discussed recently.
I don't use a feeder for brass or projectiles...just the left paw, that's as fast as it gets around here.

[Don Fischer]

I clean my case's with fired primer's in. Never had a problem with residue in the primer pocket but now and then I scrape out the corner's of them. Use One Shot and re-clean for an hour or so before loading them, just enough to get the One Shot feel off them. I've got a progressive press but It just doesn't work well for me, probably me as i've been doing single stage for a whole lot of years. i can do 50 9mm's on my single stage faster than on my progressive. Problem being having to fool with the primer's. Did 75 case's on the progressive couple days go and spent more time trying to get the thing to work than actually actually loading ammo. Out of 75 case's I had seven that didn't take a primer ans three that loaded a primer in edge! Soon as i got done, I went and ordered a set of dies for my Rock Chucker!

[jetinteriorguy]

I've been using my Loadmaster for about a year now and the thing I've had the least issue with has been the priming system. I use both the case collator and the bullet feed and they work quite well, although I will say there are some bullet types that can have their issues with the bullet feed setup. But for me the thing that every once in a while is a pain is the bullet plate advancing mechanism, but I've discovered that cleaning it every couple thousand rounds will eliminate that issue. The case collator works good for .38/.357 as long as you watch the last one in each column to make sure it doesn't fall off, and for 9mm I added an additional plastic plate on the top with the proper size holes which prevents cases from going in upside down.

[DerekP Houston]

I think cleaning the progressive press is pretty mandatory across the board. every time I stop to refill the primer tube I spray mine off with compressed air. Every thousand or so I take the shell plate off and wipe everything down. Not necessarily mandatory but it keeps me in the habit.

[StratsMan]

I know a few have said you don't need to lube pistol cases, and a few lube them anyway... But I think the OP is trying to understand why that's true... I'll throw in my $.02

Unlike a sizing die for a bottle-neck case, straight wall cases like a 38/357 or a 45 are only in contact with the die for a few thousand-ths of an inch, right at the bottom of the die, so the surface area of sizer in contact with the brass at any moment is very small, and doesn't stick to the case. A bottleneck rifle die is in contact everywhere on the case at the end of the stroke, so there's a ton of surface area that has to release for the brass to pull away from the die. Whether it's carbide or steel, ya gotta lube a bottleneck die.

Everybody has their own tricks of the trade... Personally, I've loaded 100K plus straight wall pistol cases and never used lube on them. Could my loading sessions have been smoother if I had??? Some of them, certainly. Some of those cases do get sticky... Did I need to lube them?? Nope... never a stuck pistol case in a die. Don't get me started about too little lube in a bottleneck case... I've only replaced one die due to such neglect, and I don't plan to replace any more...

[JohnH]

Lots of different approaches, I can only give you mine. I bought a Loadmaster, press only from MidwayUSA this spring. I deprime all my brass, rifle and pistol before running it through a stainless pin wet tumbler. I use Mothers car wash with carnuba wax (some use Armorall) as this leaves a nice slick wax coat on the brass and really makes a difference on resizing pistol brass. It runs notably smoother through the dies. I prime off press and one can tell the difference the wax makes on seating primer pockets as well. Yes, I remove the decapping stem from the sizing die. Yes, priming off press prolly makes the reloading process longer, but for me, a progressive is not about speed, it is about reducing the number of strokes per case for a loaded round to reduce the stress on my arthritic shoulders. I keep my die sets in separate turrents, so that changing out the press to reload different cartridges only involves changing the turrent and shell plate if needed. (44 Mag, 44 Special and 45 Colt all use the same shell plate) I usually reload app 250 rounds in about two hours, that includes all steps of change overs ( the time consumption here is in setting up the powder measure for the different charges) and the hand priming. I use the Lee Auto Drum powder measure. I've found it can be a bit finicky with flake powders like Red Dot but ball powder like Tite Group runs excellently through the measure. Unfortunately my 44 Mag and 45 Colt prefer Red Dot for their plinking loads. Imagine that. But I like the change over using the Auto Drum to that of the Dillon Measure (a past neighbor had a 650) as all that is required to change over the measure is to change out the rotor to one previously set for the desired charge/powder. I had been dabbling with the idea of moving to a progressive for a couple years. Did the same about the wet tumbling system. Wish I'd done both twp years ago. Would have saved myself a lot of work and pain.

[ole 5 hole group]

Here's what you could do if you want - for rifle cases, just neck size if you just want to deprime and clean primer pockets. You don't need to lube the case body - you also don't need to lube the necks if you use a carbide button on the decap rod - Redding makes carbide sizing buttons for the 223 and 30 caliber - not sure if there are other calibers.

Lubing the necks on rifle cases is always advisable, carbide or not, some don't but I would think most do. (some just lube 1 out of 3 or 4 case necks)

Using carbide dies on a Hornady LnL - just put the resizing die in station one - leave the other 4 stations empty - you can deprime a boatload of cases using a case feeder - you can deprime a carload of cases just using your left hand to place the case in the shell holder and the right hand to work the handle. I would think a minimum of 300 9mm's per hour would be very doable manually on a "quality" progressive.

[W.R.Buchanan]

Or you can use Lee Collet Neck Sizing Dies which don't have a expander button. No need for any lube on them.

Randy