dcmdon

Thank you. Thats exactly what I was looking for. In doing more reading, I've learned that Lee coats the inside of all their powder dies with a healthy serving of oil. Those who don't clean the oil and don't know they have to aren't happy. those who do clean the oil are universally happy with this and the universal charging die. Don

Hi all, I'm starting to reload .223 on my Lee Classic Cast Turret. Its all set up and I'm going along fine doing stuff in a batch method, measuring out powder with a combination of dippers and a trickler. But I'd like to go up a step in speed. I've got a lee pro-auto disk powder measure and a doubler kit. My question comes from the use of the Lee universal rifle powder die. It had mediocre reviews on Midway, with one guy saying he has to clean it every 50 rounds. I'm looking for some input on this. If you believe that the die is not a good product, can you tell me what would work instead. The die doesn't need to be universal. I'm fine with caliber specific dies. Thanks, Don

I actually bought a Lee Classic Cast turret AFTER I already owned a Dillon 650. I had a desire to load .44 magnum in relatively low volumes. The complete conversion for my 650 would have been about $200 + dies. I discovered the Classic Cast turret after a suggestion on this forum actually. I bought the entire press with the better powder measure for $180 shipped from fsreloading.com . It is a wonderful little press. If I put the auto advance bar in it, i can crank out about 100 rounds per hour. If I want to batch process stuff like resizing and depriming .223 cases, I can remove the advance bar and run it like any other single stage or turret. The only cost for a conversion other than the dies is a $10 turret head. The powder measure can be moved from head to head in about 30 seconds, and the use of the pre-sized auto-disk allows me to change drop quantities in about another minute. I use a label maker to keep auto disk settings and powder for each caliber. In the last 2 months I've set it up to load .357 magnum, .460 S&W and .223. The pistol setups were no brainers. I keep the riser on the powder measure so the only thing to change is the autodisk. Its a great way to work up loads before you go to the trouble and expense of setting up your dillon. The .460 will always be a low volume cartridge, so I bought Lee dies. I will eventually move .223 to the 650 I have set up for 9mm (Same shell plate and primers system) so I bought dillon dies. The only thing I have to figure out is what to use for the powder die for .223 since the universal Lee powder die for rifles gets less than stellar reviews. Don

Dawson only uses metalform tubes. Springs are Wolff, follower and baseplate are his. I did not get wilson because I was going to use them for local practical matches and want to be able to easily seat a full mag with a down slide. The general consensus is that the Wilsons would be better if they were a bit longer. shown by your need to clip coils.

I thought I'd give some updated feedback. My Dan Wesson PM9 continues to run flawlessly with the Daswon Precision mags I bought back in August. I've not had any malfunctions at all. None in probably 1500 rounds.

Another reason why a small primer .45 would have been better if it was the ONLY kind of .45. But as it is, its a royal pain in the butt. pjones - I've got 2 - 650s also. one for small primer and one for large. I probably could have gotten away with one 650 if all .45s had small primers. Most small primer is headstamped either CCI or Federal. pjones, what brand of primers were you using? Federal?

Well, when you are done with the titegroup, AA5 works well in 9mm also.

I was thinking about that. I want to make sure I am going to keep this gun before I did anything like that. I don't want to mar up the finish if I'm going to resell it. The gun shoots great. I'm just finding the slow slide cycling to be a bit of an annoyance.

Scott - I'm a bit late to the party here but I use AA5 and clays. AA5 works great in 9mm. I use 5.3 gr under a 147 gr Precision Bullet. I use clays for light .45 target loads. For that, its 4.0gr of Clays under a 200 gr SWC. As others have said, Clays is a very fast powder and isn't suited to high power loads. But for low power loads, I really like it. At these lower pressures, it burns much cleaner than anything else I've ever used. (At similar power, Win 231 smokes like black powder) Also the fast impulse seems to provide a little better slide speed than slower powders. Finally the cleanliness results in noticeably less gunk in the gun. Not a bad thing. Hope this helps.

Well, I got a chance to put about 200 rounds downrange last night with the 4 Dawson mags. They worked perfectly. They are very easy to seat on a closed slide. I actually loaded them up a couple of days ago and left them loaded for a day until I shot them. Not sure if it was necessary, but they are a piece of cake to load, even the last round. Notice how they stick out more than most. Thats the longer mag tube that some have mentioned. I'm fine with that, since this isn't a carry gun. Don

Thanks grahm. When I was younger I worked for an A&P (aviation) mechanic we used to anneal the copper drain gasket washers in a cast iron pan cranked up to 11 on an electric stove. It worked great, but the stuff got VERY hot. I wasn't sure at what point that began to happen to brass.

death, last year, I had some wet range pickups and it seemed like it took forever to get it all dry. I laid it out on my porch, then of course some of it was oriented mouth up, so even when it was dry, a good shaking got more water out. It was just a major pain in the butt. My new place, I have don't have a deck. Just a patio that isn't really clean enough to go spreading shell casings on. So I wanted a way to dry it inside. Either way. The tumbler sans media worked great. Don

Thanks for all the words of caution. I ended up tumbling it in a lyman I have with a perforated top. I left it for a couple of hours and came back to dry brass. I added media, a drop of car wax and its running now. I'm generally very leadophobic, so thanks again for the reminder. I've had several friends with elevated blood lead levels and I try to do everything I can to protect myself. No sense in throwing another potential route of ingestion into the mix. The oven seemed like a good idea at the time but clearly wasn't. Thats why I paused before I acted and floated the idea here. Don

Sarge, Thanks. Great idea. yes, all the water was pretty well knocked off/out of the brass. I actually tumbled it in my separator to get all the water out of the brass. Re the question about putting it where I put my food. The brass was washed with soap and hot water, agitated in a sealed bucket for several minutes, then rinsed and agitated several times. I'm comfortable that it doesn't contain anything that would be a problem in my oven. Or at least anything that was on it was securely attached to the brass. The brass actually looks clean, like there isn't even much reason to tumble it in media. I'm going to give the empty tumbler a try. I've got a Lymann with a perforated lid that might work great.

Hi all, I generally don't clean my brass wet, but did a match this weekend where it was raining out and I was the only reloader on our squad. So I ended up with 30# of wet, sandy, gritty brass. I got it home washed all the brass with some dishwashing liquid and hot water. It came out nice. But now its wet. I really don't want to hassle with laying it out and turning it repeatedly. So i was wondering if putting it on several cookie sheets in my oven at 225 degrees with the convection fan would anneal the brass. I don't think it will, but just wanted to be sure. I'm 99% sure I'm worrying about nothing, but thought I'd float it here just to get some opinions. Nothing is high pressure, its all handgun. Mostly 9mm, .40, and .45. Thanks, Don

I thought kimber of Oregon focused mainly on rifles.

Its a stock Dan Wesson Pointman 9. I don't know what the springs are. I'll call DW tomorrow to find out. I typically use federal primers. They're known for being soft. Whats a reasonable main spring to use with them?

I had never heard of tri-topping until you just mentioned this. Thanks.

Hah. I had not thought of that. My handloads are 147 gr. I like how they feel in my glock. But the Glock slide is about half the weight of the 1911 slide. This is an obvious first step. I'm also using AA5. I'm thinking that going to a faster burning powder might help. I'm already using Clays for light .45 loads, maybe this is worth a try.

Hi all, So I've been shooting my DW PM9 and its a great gun. It just annoys me that the slide seems to take for ever to cycle. So I was wondering if anyone made a standard looking single stack 1911 with an internally lightened slide. The idea would be to increase slide speed but have something that wasn't peppered with lightening holes and cuts. Or if you dont know of any. I'm open to a 9mm gun WITH lightening holes and cuts. I'm not looking for a $2500 custom gun, but more along the line of a $1200- $1500 high quality production gun. Any thoughts? Don

Well, I got a chance to shoot my 200gr SWCs out of my Baer this past weekend. I ran all the rounds through the FCD with the crimp ring backed all the way. Most rounds had some contact with the die about 5/32 back from the mouth, and then right above the rim. There was no contact at the mouth of the case. All of the rounds produced passed the plonk test into the bbl of the gun they were shot from, which is unusual, I usually get about a 2% failure rate. (This is a failure rate for the plonk test. Not for the ammunition. 99% of the "failed" rounds shoot just fine, but I pull them so that I don't accidentally use them in a match). So I think the FCD is helping there. Accuracy has not been significantly affected. I say significantly because I did not get a chance to really shoot for accuracy from a rest. But I think since the die is not really changing the crimp, it should be ok. Theory only, but we'll see. Its still an unknown.

About 4 months ago I went to clays to load some light 155gr 45 acp loads for my Vaquero. 4 Gr of Clays with a 155 gr bullet recoils like a .38 wadcutter. It worked so well, accurate and clean, that I decided to try some for my 1911. My first attempt was 4.0 gr with a 200gr SWC from Precision Bullets. Its shooting great and runs well with my 9# recoil spring. The load has been very accurate and reliable so far.

So last night I did an experiment. I dumped a bunch of brass on a white towel and did a better than usual job inspecting everything to make sure there weren't any nested 9mm or any other problems. I dumped it in the hopper and made 100 rounds. In that 100 rounds, I hit 3 pieces of small primer brass. It took me about 10 seconds to recognize the problem, pull the brass and continue where I left off. I'm still on the fence on whether its worth it to inspect each piece for primer size. Don

I shied away from the Wilson's because of consistent complaints about being able to load one when into a gun with a closed slide, when its loaded with 10 rounds. For what I'm going to use this gun for (games) that matters. Will report back on the Dawson's as soon as I get them. Don

Totally pimped. Its like something Sonny Crocket would carry.