njl

AFAIK, there is a 650-only strong mount, a 650/550 strong mount, and the SDB strong mount which is the 550/650 strong mount plus a top plate. On the 550, the press mounts directly to the strong mount, as if the sides of the mount were legs for the press.

I haven't heard of anyone else doing it "my way", but I keep a little dab of lansinoh "lanolin" at the outside base of my right index finger. When my thumb and index finger tips feel dry, I'll touch the thumb to the spot of lanolin and rub the thumb and index finger tips to spread it out. My pistol brass get lubed on the way from the brass bin to the press. It's easier on the brass, the press, and my shoulder this way.

Mossberg 930, extra barrel, lots of ammo worth the leftover $.

Yeah. 8lbs of Promo is still just a little over $100...if you can find it.

When I was just starting out with pistol reloading, I'd bracket by about .2gr and take 10-20 of each to the range to chronograph. Lately, I just try to research the heck out of the loads I'm going to try, pick a charge weight, load ~20, and test them. This weekend, I'm testing some .38spl loads, each is one charge weight, but I'm testing 4 different bullets in 2 different weights. I loaded 24 of each, figuring on doing 2 cylinders through 2 revolvers of each.

When adjusting "the paper clip" I'm reminded of the Star Wars line "we only need to keep them from escaping." It needs to not quite be touching the brass, or it'll do more harm than good.

If you have a chronograph, it's easy enough to measure. I did this one day a while back with two .45acp loads: .45acp 200gr Precision FP (moly coated lead), 4.8gr WST 1.195" OAL, CCI LP. I tested these in my 21SF by pointing the gun up (or down) before each shot. UP: I did 2 strings...just to be sure, and got 840 and 849 fps averages. Down: 758 fps average .45acp Zero 185gr JHP, 5gr WST, 1.195" OAL, CCI LP I tested these in both my 21SF and 30S. 21 UP: 852 fps 21 Down: 770 fps 30S UP: 804 fps 30S Down: 707 fps With this load, ES and SD were much smaller for the UPs than the Downs. In all of these, there was a very noticeable difference in recoil between the ups and downs. I'd heard of position sensitivity, but I was amazed by the size of the effect.

Calipers? How else would you measure it?

Due to added time for more powder to settle into the powder bar cavity? I've never measured that effect.

Loaded carefully and with appropriate powders, any of them should work. Chronologically, I've used the following in 9mm and/or .45acp Glocks: BBI, Precision, Bayou, Black and Blue, Missouri Bullet. I'm not sure if I even have a favorite. I do prefer Hi-Tek over whatever Precision's coating is, but I've shot a lot of Precision bullets through my Glocks. At this point, I think it comes down to bullet profile availability (they don't all make the same selection of shapes/sizes) and price.

Here's what they normally look like when placed in station 3: Here's the bad one (before using the seating die):

ok...so it loaded just slightly crooked, and though I couldn't shorten it with finger pressure, and chambering it 5 times in a G21 made no difference, 1 hit in my impact bullet puller disassembled it with enough force to bounce the bullet off the bottom and back into the case mouth hard enough to gouge it in two places. I'm going to guess that it would have fired safely, but that velocity and accuracy might have suffered.

Maybe just for the sake of furthering science, I'll load this "short shot" bullet as a dummy round and see if I'm easily able to shorten the OAL by hand or by cycling the round a few times into a G21 chamber.

I actually did chrono some 225gr TC and 200gr RNFP, all Hi-Tek coated today and a couple weekends ago. I'll update this post when I bring the book in from the car. Missouri Bullet Co, Hi-Tek coated 225gr TC, 1.200" 3.74gr Clays G21: 763fps G30S: 743fps Bayou 225gr TC, 1.215", Clays 3.7gr G21: 692fps 3.78gr G21: 749fps G30S: 714fps Bayou 200gr RNFP, 1.200", 3.95gr Clays G21: 771fps G30S: 749fps G30: 711fps I'm not really concerned with power factor...just trying to load ammo I can use for GSSF and maybe bowling pin shooting...the latter of which I'd like to keep the velocity up close to >=800fps regardless of bullet weight. Powder charges are all 5 charge averages. I'll probably do the 200gr again at 4-4.1gr and be happy with that.

What's likely to happen if one of these got by (say someone using a bullet feeder and not paying real close attention)? Would gas getting up around the sides of the bullet base cause problems (leading if this weren't a Hi-Tek coated bullet)? The base being out of round, seems like at the very least, wouldn't be good for accuracy.

I was loading a small test batch of Bayou 200gr RNFP .45acp with 3.95gr Clays and had one that just sort of fell into the belled case all the way to the crimp groove. Normally, they only "drop" in to just about the beginning of the lube groove. I removed the bullet and on detailed examination, found it's missing material below the lube groove. It's about 4gr light, and at its base, is only .441". Up at the driving band, it's .452". I don't do any casting, so I don't know how this sort of thing might have happened. All I know is, whatever went wrong with this one, it seems to have happened before the coating process, because the coating is intact.

If you're in no hurry, keep an eye on Aimsurplus and Cdnninvestments and reach out to Summitgunbroker. Each occasionally has used (often police trade-in / might be LE-only marked if that matters to you) mags for cheap. I loaded up a while back on G19, G17 and G21 mags at $12 each. I have no problems with buying used mags...if anything's wrong, send them to Glock for replacement. I've only had to do that once (with an FML G19 mag where the lining was coming apart and would snag case heads on their way up).

I wouldn't worry too much about the low primer alarm. I have one, but have stopped using it. IMO, it's only slightly more useful than a low powder sensor, but was more of an annoyance to me. For a press that old, sitting in a box in a garage that long, it probably does make sense to send it back to Dillon to get it checked out and refurbished.

Fuzzy pictures, but yeah it does. If the bulge is only on one side of the cartridge, you're seating them crooked. Assuming you're using a Dillon seating die, which way do you have the seating stem? Those truncated cone JHP probably won't mate up well with the round nose end of the seating stem. You may also just have to go slower and make more of an effort to be sure the bullets start out reasonably straight in station 3.

I'm really doubting it's a sizing issue unless your sizing die is not set properly. What bullets are you using? Measure some, particularly a bullet from one of your disassembled gauge failing ones. What diameter are they near the base? What OAL are you seating them to? What brass are you using (mixed, or a single headstamp)? When you look at the cartridges that fail to gauge or barrel test, if you look around the circumference of the cartridge, can you see or feel a bulge in the side of the case around where the bottom of the bullet should be?

It's easy to see if resizing is the issue. After resizing a case, remove it from the press before doing any of the other operations on it, and drop it into the gauge.

If you try inserting them into the gauge backwards (primer end into the gauge), will they start going in? I see a lot of .45acp brass in which the extractor has created burs in the case head, and these burs are big enough to stop the round from gauging. They can be filed off...but I don't think it's necessary. It sounds like you're only checking after the full process (resizing, flaring, seating, crimping) and don't really know that it's a resizing issue. More likely, if it's not burs, you're creating bulges in the side of the cartridge by either seating bullets too deep, using oversized bullets, or not seating the bullets squarely enough in the case.

Most bullet producers I've dealt with have had issues getting their product packaging to survive shipping. The best I've seen is how Montana Gold packs their cases. Heavy plastic bag inside a heavy cardboard box that perfectly fits inside a USPS flat rate box. Any other form of packaging, the boxes containing the bullets tend to blow out their sides.

Rudy doesn't offer lenses that I'm aware of in my Rx, and I wanted cheaper interchangeable lenses anyway, so I went with the Rx insert. I have Magster and Rydon frames, several lens sets for each, and one Rx insert I move between them.

You might do two "product lines". Cheap: dirty brass, sorted by caliber, anything other than boxer primed brass removed high end: deprimed, wet tumbled, resized, pockets swaged There's obviously a lot more effort involved in the latter. Some are probably willing to pay for it. Many are not.