chaotik

I am curious how others reload their .223/5.56 ammo on a progressive press. I have been reloading on a single stage Lee press for awhile, but recently bought a Dillon 550b and .223 carbide dies for the Dillon. With my single stage press, I do the following: deprime with a universal deprimer clean/ream/uniform the primer pocket with hand tools or a drill Lube the brass & run through the sizing die Measure the cases and trim if necessary Prime the brass with a hand priming tool Charge the case with the Lee powder measure Seat the bullet in the press Crimp (occasionally) The most tedious portion of all of this is the case preparation. I am not sure how the process can be speed up without skipping some steps. It doesn't seem like you should prime the brass without taking care of the primer pocket and trimming the case if needed. So, how should a progressive press change this approach? Thanks for any advice or suggestions.

Thanks. I will try to upload a video of what the powder thing is doing: http://imageshack.us/clip/my-videos/191/vecxthchutrvnqkdexlrgn.mp4/ You can see in the video where it seems to "hang".... which may be normal ???

Ok, thanks everyone for the help. The bar appears similar figure 20 when it is closed, and looks like figure 21 when it is fully open. I loosened the hex nut of the bellcrank screw and that seemed to at least partially eliminate it getting "stuck" on the way down. So I suppose that I had too much tension in the screw and this did not allow the bellcrank to move as freely as it should. What would help is to see a closeup video of the bellcrank in action; I will search youtube for one.

It moves that far on the downstroke of the handle, but does not appear to move further. The issue is when I raise the handle up, the 2 points that I have indicated with the green arrows seem to "stick" when they articulate over one another. Since I was loading one round at a time, and was not priming the cases at the time, I did not force or push the handle all the way back up and forward.

Thank you. That helps. But it still seems to get stuck at a certain point where the bell thing rotates over the shoulder (I have indicated the 2 parts that seem to stick with the green arrows). I can easily push the handle down and the powder bar moves out, but if I don't apply a slight amount of pressure it appears that it might stick at that intersection at times. Perhaps this is normal, but I had a squib load so I a little paranoid about the whole thing.

The first frame in the picture is before I pull the handle. The next frame it seems to get stuck as the case is going up to be charged. The third frame the powder bar is completely over and powder is dropped. The last frame is where it gets stuck on the way down and did not completely return (so did not charge the powder bar & resulting in the squib load).

I ordered 223 carbide dies on 1/11/2013 and received them in the mail today.

Sorry about the image, but I am pretty much a novice about loading images into a forum post. The sticking problem appears to be where the 2 pieces in the red square meet when the press is actuated... I really don't know if this is normal or not. It appears that the flange on the bellcrank thing is riding over that shoulder. I have another powder system which I have yet to set up, and although it is not attached to a failsafe rod, the powder bar and bellcrank cube do not move beyond the point where contact is made on the shoulder. Hope this makes sense, but it is hard to describe without having a good handle on the nomenclature. Thanks!

Loading titegroup powder; charge between 4.0 and 4.4 gr. I was mistaken. It appears that the powder bar is not fully moving out to charge every time I let the handle move forward on the downstroke (I am not always priming cases in the press). There seems to be a point where it (the handle and powder bar) get stuck and I have to push the handle beyond this point to get the powder bar to fully move. Is this because a screw is too tight or too loose? Thanks for your help!

I recently bought a Dillon 550b and while waiting for 223 dies to become available I am reloading 9mm. My press is set up correctly as far as I know. When the case goes up to activate the powder die, the powder bar appears to move appropriately. However, randomly and frequently, no powder is dropped into the case. I did not notice this with my first set of test reloads, and had a squib. The bullet was stuck in the barrel after the gun did not go bang on a cartridge. Had to take the gun home and remove the bullet from the barrel in a vise with a punch. So everything appears to be moving appropriately when the empty case goes up to the die, but sometimes no powder. It is random and I see no specific pattern. Any ideas??? (fortunately I did not persist in my attempts to fire another round down the barrel with the stuck bullet, or this would have been a very different post). I am not really new to reloading, and have been reloading on a Lee single stage press for awhile. Many years ago I had a Dillon square deal that I used for reloading when I was doing some pistol competition in the early 90's. Thanks for any suggestions.

I ordered 223 dies on 1/11/2013 and am also waiting. Let us know when you get yours.

I ordered a 550 press on 1/11/2013. Received the press on 2/8/2013. It was ordered with .223 dies which are still on backorder. I also ordered 9mm dies on 1/13/2013 which arrived about 10 days ago.