mikeinctown

According to everything i have read about the plates, the .40 will feed with either the large or small plate. So if you load 9 and .40 use the small plate, but if you load .45 and .40 then use the large plate.

There will be a little bag of parts for the machine that you hopefully will have saved. It is not an entire assembly, just the parts to switch it over. There are a lot of people who rather than switch the parts over with each conversion, would rather just buy a new primer assembly and make an easy and quick change.

So in other words, buy the 1050 press from now on?

What you don't see there is that you may need to travel 10 hours to get across the state. haha. Where I am in Cleveland I;ve found two USPSA ranges that are an hour from me and which account for 3 matches a month, plus a half dozen other places within 2 hours. My big problem is that to get there on time I'd need to leave my house between 6 and 7 am on a Saturday or Sunday. Ugh.

very interesting. As the story states, here on the news it was reported that he was an off duty cop. Nothing mentioned about his side business or the fact that he is a competitive shooter.

With teh TSA there is no rhyme or reason as to their rules. the best you can do is to print out their own rules and actually show them as necessary and get a supervisor involved. is it no wonder some airports are trying to dump the TSA?

Wow, I had no idea 22 was still in short supply. I had actually started selling off some of the stock I had built up. the 325 count boxes of Federal were in at a local store for a while at $20 a box, and everyone and their mother has the 500ct boxes at gun shows for ~$35 a box. Powder is also in great supply now as well. In fact my local place has had HP-38 (and Win 231) in stock for months, and I think I even saw Clays in there a while back. I hadn't seen that stuff in the 2 years that I've been reloading. 9mm is now between $10-14 a box depending on brand, and at Walmart I even saw some of the 125gn Winchester on the shelf. The only thing that still isn't cheap is the damn .380. Costs more than my .45 ammo!

Between the Atlas tutorial here and several excellent youtube videos, one should be able to do everything themselves. If you can find someone willing to help.... BONUS. My Sp-01 came from Automatic Accuracy but I'm still likely just gong to buy CGW parts and do the work myself.

Thank you for the super easy to understand explanation. I've never shot a match before but would watch the ones they would have on the various shooting programs. I was always trying to figure out how a guy could have a score of 119 and lose to another guy who had a score of 108 even though the guy with the 108 finished like 2 seconds sooner. My thinking was that the points should have been more a determining factor and couldn't understand how the guy with the most points lost. Also stopped yesterday and watched a USPSA match and would have loved to have gotten in on the action. I really really need to get myself a holster, magazine pouches, and a few other essentials. Looks like so much fun.

You can buy good used 550s out there for $400 or less, so if that is your price point, go for that. in my area there is someone selling a Dillon refurbished 550 for $375. Obviously it comes with no extras, but it will do a lot more and can use most any die.

So did it come with any caliber conversions or just the tool heads? And yeah if you just got the powder drop but not the pass through die, you'll need that. (and the caliber conversion comes with the powder drop funnel) Might be helpful to post up some photos of what you got so that you will find out if you are missing any rods, linkages, or other minor parts. (my apologies if you already did, as photos get blocked on this PC I'm currently on)

One more reason to own and use a Dillon.

What is so different about the shadow orange that would make it non legal? Isn't it just a shadow with the orange aluminum grips? Forgive the ignorance, but I see the canada version on the CZC website as well and from what I can see it's the same pistol with just custom grips.

When I actually do see a 5.25" barrel XDM at the local place, it normally isn't there the next time I go in. So someone is buying them and using them, otherwise the case would look like the Kimber case does.

I got a frankford wet tumbler. It's louder than I would like, but you don't even need the pins to get them fairly clean. Wet tumble then let dry and you can decap all you want. if you want them perfect the tumble again with the pins after decapping. I can't remember the name of the guy/company but he came up with a small motor on a welded stand that turned rollers and he built tumblers out of 6 and 8" PVC. One of his rigs goes for like $400, but its sweet and you don't have a bunch of loud gears like the frankford deal. Takes less space than the cement mixer too. I would have gone dry tumbling, but I didn't want to keep buying media, and I didn't want to deal with any of the dust.

Dump a few hundred rounds in a plastic bag, do a 1 second burst, move the brass a bit, and then another couple 1 second bursts. Then work the brass around in a bag for a minute then dump into a cardboard tray for 5-10 minutes. It will be dry enough for loading. If you are going to load a few thousand rounds then just spend a couple minutes getting them all done before you start. (keep the bag closed when not used as it will still have residual case lube in there.) You don't need to take it outside, lay the cases on their sides, stand on your head or send your first born to Dillon or even Hornady) When you check for your powder drop, you shouldn't need to use a case at all. Just place the little powder measure pan that probably came with your scale (also available at any store that sells reloading supplies) under the powder drop and cycle 5-10 times by hand. Then weigh the result and adjust as necessary. If you are trying to weigh a single charge on a pistol case you'll drive yourself nuts trying to get the measurement exact.

The lube will not only help the press feel like it runs better but I think you will notice that there is less variation in bullet length. Before I started using case lube I'd get a variation of as much as .010-.015 but after the case lube it's at like .005. (that is with coated lead) The press operates smoother so you get a consistant function each cycle.

This. It is key to use the dillon die as the die sizes to the correct diameter for the powder funnel, and setting it as low as it can go is spelled out in the press instructions. I also use the one shot with a pile of cases in a gallon bag and then just dump them into a box to dry some before they get tossed into the feeder. Press runs like butter unless I'm using the LEE FCD and coated lead.

That makes no sense. How does it slide out easily but not back up without breaking? Are you raising the ram of the press so that there is no spring tension when you pop it out, and again when you have to pop it back up into the hole? In the photo the Op posted here shows the broken part. To remove, you raise the ram so that the bushing can be pushed down through the hole and the rod slides through that narrower part. The narrower part looks like the busing may slide through it, but it does not. When you reinstall, you still need the ram raised so that there is no spring tension. then pop the bushing back up through the hole. It should just slide in and out fairly easy.

The "quick change kit" which has a separate tool head and powder measure is like $110. You then need a caliber conversion kit which is roughly $75, and then your die sets. Figure $200 per caliber plus dies. Seems like a bunch until you do a change for the first time and much of the work involved is a matter of pulling two pins out, sliding out one tool head and replacing it with another. You can also get tool heads from 3rd parties that are nicely machined and anodized. (some people get colors corresponding to a specific caliber) I keep my eyes open on Armslist and at gun shows. I've been able to pick up a few quick change kits which included dies and caliber conversions by keeping my eyes open. One is a caliber I don't even shoot at the moment, but was cheap enough that it didn't matter much.

You need to pop the rod out from the metal bracket where the white delrin bushing is. If you lift the assembly slightly with the handle, the white block can be pushed downward through the hole and then slide out of the way. As far as I can tell, the spacer thing is not supposed to slide directly out of the metal bracket without first being popped down and out.

When I was getting high primers like that, I found that the handle was bumping up against the bullet bin. Sliding that bin away and toward the back, and then making sure to push and pause solved the few problems I was having. (if you center the bullet bin the handle wants to hit it, but if you slide it a half inch or so toward the rear, no more issues)

Exactly. The rod is loose enough to pop out of place if adjusted correctly. Perhaps that is the problem the OP is having? You have to tighten the nut down on the spring pretty good for proper adjustment. Once adjusted, the rod pops out of place very easy. I never pull the pins to dump the powder though, I just loosen the two bolts and remove the powder measure. Guess pulling the two pins would be easier.

The 1050 may be easier to operate, but it surely can't be simply because of the primer insert operation. that is seriously the easiest part of working the handle on a 650. One thing I found that really impacts the operation is which dies you use. The difference between using a Dillon crip die and a LEE FCD is a huge one and one in which I found needed a lot of extra effort. It could be that I am feeding coated lead through it rather than plated/jacketed bullets. Still, the Dillon die was super easy and smooth and my 10 year old (when I got the press) was able to effortlessly operate the 650.

I don't even have a 1050 and I watched that video. very well done indeed and it covers everything in a short amount of time. Should be added to a sticky thread somewhere.