DILLON 650 TROUBLES-HELP

[sigsauerfan]

as the title say, my new 650 givve me a lot of troubles.

first,the powder funnel seems not inline with the cases,most of the time,i must use my finger to prevent the funnel from crushing the case mouth,this almost all the time. WTF?? looks like the funnel is never pefectly lined up with any of the cases.

2nd,after i loaded 100 rounds, the chute started blocking the shell plate,preventing the shell plate to reset in low position,i've got to bent the chute to eleminate the problem.

3rd-when seating a primer, the lever become hard to push at full aft,,sometimes there's a ''tack'' kind of sound, indicating a primer hard to seat,maybe not perfectly in line with the flash hole,and on top of that,i've got a primer partialy crushed in the flash hole, and 2 primers seated upside down, dont know how it didn't kboomed in my face but however,i've been lucky it didn't exploded during the seating process.

i disassembled the primer filler tube, and the shell plate,cleaned it all(NOTHING was dirty,no debris in the set-up).

4th- i have a brand new RF-100 primer filler....is it normal sometimes some primers are filled in the tube UPSIDE DOWN??

i'm a bit disapointed by the perf of the machine, i think it must be something related to fine tuning,but realy dont know where to start.

any comments and help would be appreciated.....i've only been able to make 150rounds in 4 hours, so many glitch at the same time, incredible.....

Edited August 3, 2010 by sigsauerfan

[CHA-LEE]

It sounds like the base that bolts to the ram shaft is loose. Take the big bolt out of the middle that retains the shell plate, remove the shell plate and make sure that the two allen head screws that secure the aluminum base to the ram are tight.

[sigsauerfan]

It sounds like the base that bolts to the ram shaft is loose. Take the big bolt out of the middle that retains the shell plate, remove the shell plate and make sure that the two allen head screws that secure the aluminum base to the ram are tight.

ok.thanks my friend.i'll try that immediatly before pulling the hammer out , i'm kind of really upset at the moment, i tried different things but nothing work...isnt it suppose to load 600 rounds in 1 hour??lolol..sh** i have a match this week-end and cant see how i'm gonna make it trough...lolol... i was way faster with my lee turret

[CHA-LEE]

Once you get your 650 tuned up correctly you can easily run 600 rounds in an hour. But keep in mind that you need to have everything setup precisely before you can go gang busters on building up a bunch of ammo quickly. There are no short cuts to setting up the press correctly. Its not like horse shoes, close isn't good enough. It needs to be setup perfectly and yes, that will take a little while to do. I would suggest you enlist some help from a local shooter that has a 650 already to help you double check your setup and settings. That will be your quickest path to getting it up and running properly.

[sigsauerfan]

Once you get your 650 tuned up correctly you can easily run 600 rounds in an hour. But keep in mind that you need to have everything setup precisely before you can go gang busters on building up a bunch of ammo quickly. There are no short cuts to setting up the press correctly. Its not like horse shoes, close isn't good enough. It needs to be setup perfectly and yes, that will take a little while to do. I would suggest you enlist some help from a local shooter that has a 650 already to help you double check your setup and settings. That will be your quickest path to getting it up and running properly.

yeah! i understand that...but looking at it, i dont know what could be settled better than what i did with it....the machine is pefectly flat, the level is perfect,my dies are correctly mounted....as you said,it may be the machanical settings of the machine itself.

i noticed the toolhead had a little play once installed with the dies on, i've shimmed to make sure there's no more play in it, but it didn't erased the problems at all..

[GrumpyOne]

Not to be a smart a**, but did you read ALL of the instructions and watch the ENTIRE video/dvd before you set it up? From reading this forum for a while now, everyone who has problems with a Dillon, whether it be a 450,550, 650 or 1050, the root cause seems to be the same. OE. Either in setup, or lack of understanding of setup.

It sounds as if your primer up is not quite inline with the shell plate, that you may have the shell plate tightened too much, or you may have the wrong brass pins for the rounds you are loading.

[sigsauerfan]

It sounds like the base that bolts to the ram shaft is loose. Take the big bolt out of the middle that retains the shell plate, remove the shell plate and make sure that the two allen head screws that secure the aluminum base to the ram are tight.

you were right cha-lee, these 2 allen bolts were completely loose. i thightened'em up, made a quick test and it run ok now(i hope), the funnel seems miraculously inline now, i tried 30 rounds and none has been crushed by the powder funnel (finger crossed).

i'm not 100% sure , but this may have been also the reason as why the priming pin was kind of grippy, or not centered with the flash hole???

Edited August 4, 2010 by sigsauerfan

[sigsauerfan]

Not to be a smart a**, but did you read ALL of the instructions and watch the ENTIRE video/dvd before you set it up? From reading this forum for a while now, everyone who has problems with a Dillon, whether it be a 450,550, 650 or 1050, the root cause seems to be the same. OE. Either in setup, or lack of understanding of setup.

It sounds as if your primer up is not quite inline with the shell plate, that you may have the shell plate tightened too much, or you may have the wrong brass pins for the rounds you are loading.

no every parts regarding the priming system(seater pin) seems to be the right ones for the 9mm rounds i'm loading at the moment....

i think maybe cha-lee pointed the right place to check, the allen bolts he mentionned under the shell plate were exactly loose, not thightened at all....i just hope everythings will be right now, just the case feed tube that move on his seat making the case feeding a bit random, i must snap the tube to make the cases falling in the swivel hole who drop the case in station 1.....

but anyways, thanks for the heads up grumpyone,for sure going in a hurry is probably not the best thing to do with a progressive press, and i will remember what you said.

Edited August 4, 2010 by sigsauerfan

[Seth]

There is an alignment tool that's used EXACTLY for this. Call Dillon and they'll send you one with good directions. Get the press aligned and it'll be much happier.

[jaredr]

There is an alignment tool that's used EXACTLY for this. Call Dillon and they'll send you one with good directions. Get the press aligned and it'll be much happier.

seth - can you pass on any more info or share a pic of this alignment tool? just curious, i've been using my 650 for a few years now and had never heard of this tool.

thanks in advance - jaredr

[sigsauerfan]

There is an alignment tool that's used EXACTLY for this. Call Dillon and they'll send you one with good directions. Get the press aligned and it'll be much happier.

well,thanks for the info,i'm back from browsing their site, couldn't find out. will call them soon about it , it's interesting , specialy when moving with the complete remake of a brand new bench.

[Seth]

It fits in the powder die body and aligns the primer punch hole to the toolhead.

My press needed a few things for its 40,000 mile tune up and they suggested the alignment tool. It was a 20 min job.

[jaredr]

thanks Seth

[sigsauerfan]

It fits in the powder die body and aligns the primer punch hole to the toolhead.

My press needed a few things for its 40,000 mile tune up and they suggested the alignment tool. It was a 20 min job.

seth , if you dont mind, could you explain , if ever the primer punch system isn't lined up with the TH,how the primer punch can be moved in the right angle???

[mlmiller1]

According to what I've read, the toolhead is designed with a little play in it for, I think, the slight variations necessary to adjust for variations in brass & so forth. It is not supposed to be perfectly tight. There are some folks that shim their toolheads up snug but I've never found it to be a problem to have some play in it. I recommend you remove your shims on the toolhead.

I didn't quite understand what you were saying about the casefeeder problem. It should be dropping cases consistently & steadily. One of my 650 casefeeds works best on slow speed, the other one on high speed. Kind of weird.

MLM

ps, good luck, the 650 is an awesome machine but it does take a little time to get used to.

[sigsauerfan]

According to what I've read, the toolhead is designed with a little play in it for, I think, the slight variations necessary to adjust for variations in brass & so forth. It is not supposed to be perfectly tight.

There are some folks that shim their toolheads up snug but I've never found it to be a problem to have some play in it. I recommend you remove your shims on the toolhead.

I didn't quite understand what you were saying about the casefeeder problem. It should be dropping cases consistently & steadily. One of my 650 casefeeds works best on slow speed, the other one on high speed. Kind of weird.

MLM

ps, good luck, the 650 is an awesome machine but it does take a little time to get used to.

thanks for the good words.

the toolhead shim trick is something i learned on this forum, i've even seen a special bracket in sale exactly for this purpose eleminating the free play in the TH slot....not sure what it worth .

i shimed the TH before looking at the loose allen bolts under the shell plate pointed by cha-lee, but now you remind me i should maybe remove the shims i throwed there since station 2 look ok now.

the problem with the casefeed tube is that it tilt on his seat and the case doesn't enter in the swivel funnel who feed the 1st station.

...and all this might be the reason why my OAL is all over the place on this batch lololol

Edited August 4, 2010 by sigsauerfan

[mlmiller1]

Ok, still not sure what you are saying about the case feed but maybe I have an idea. If the feeder is dropping brass down the tube but it is not feeding properly onto the case slider, maybe try this idea. The beveled plastic piece that moves up & down that is attached to the case slider has two sides to it. Be sure you have the correct side toward the press. The long bevel works for rifle brass, the short bevel for pistol. It also has an adjustment to it. If it is too close to the press, it tries to drop brass but it wedges it against the side of the hole. If it is too far away, it doesn't activate the drop enough to actually drop the brass. Check out those adjustments if I made any sense at all. I think perhaps I should go to the dillon website & get the correct name for the parts so I could make better suggestions.

Keep at it, I think you have the press going your way now. Tweak the little things as you go along & you should be making mucho ammo/hr soon.

Not sure why your OAL would be varying, though. Of course, if you were not getting complete full strokes up & down every time you pull the handle, you will get variations in length. Depending on what kind of bullet, you could probably hand feed your loaded rounds back into the press at the bullet seating station & finish seating the rounds to correct length. This is probably only a good suggestion if you are loading Jacketed bullets, not plated or lead ones. Either of those will scrape lead off the bullet since these rounds are already crimped. If they are jacketed rounds, just push the bullet on down where it should be, & let it recrimp. Again, I'm using the wrong word of course. You probably should not really be crimping but merely removing all the bell from your brass if you are loading normal pistol ammo. If you are loading for ultra high pressure pistol rounds or rifle rounds, crimp may be the right word. Sort of depends on what you are doing.

MLM

[sigsauerfan]

Ok, still not sure what you are saying about the case feed but maybe I have an idea. If the feeder is dropping brass down the tube but it is not feeding properly onto the case slider, maybe try this idea. The beveled plastic piece that moves up & down that is attached to the case slider has two sides to it. Be sure you have the correct side toward the press. The long bevel works for rifle brass, the short bevel for pistol. It also has an adjustment to it. If it is too close to the press, it tries to drop brass but it wedges it against the side of the hole. If it is too far away, it doesn't activate the drop enough to actually drop the brass. Check out those adjustments if I made any sense at all. I think perhaps I should go to the dillon website & get the correct name for the parts so I could make better suggestions.

Keep at it, I think you have the press going your way now. Tweak the little things as you go along & you should be making mucho ammo/hr soon.

Not sure why your OAL would be varying, though. Of course, if you were not getting complete full strokes up & down every time you pull the handle, you will get variations in length. Depending on what kind of bullet, you could probably hand feed your loaded rounds back into the press at the bullet seating station & finish seating the rounds to correct length. This is probably only a good suggestion if you are loading Jacketed bullets, not plated or lead ones. Either of those will scrape lead off the bullet since these rounds are already crimped. If they are jacketed rounds, just push the bullet on down where it should be, & let it recrimp. Again, I'm using the wrong word of course. You probably should not really be crimping but merely removing all the bell from your brass if you are loading normal pistol ammo. If you are loading for ultra high pressure pistol rounds or rifle rounds, crimp may be the right word. Sort of depends on what you are doing.

MLM

thanks mlmiller. very appreciated. i still dont know WHERE to check for adjustments, your Q's are gold.

[ScottyPotty]

ps, good luck, the 650 is an awesome machine but it does take a little time to get used to.

This...

I bought a used 650 and had some trouble setting it up properly. With everything you hear about these Dillons you would think that they would just go. Like you I had issues and became a little flustered, but once I figured out the issues and how to set things up it was amazing!

Round after round of ammo, started pouring off the press. It was so different then the loadmaster (what I came from) which requires constant adjusting. I have loaded about 2500 rounds of 223 without messing with anything - the best part? Priming on the press with mixed head stamps. Something I could only dream about before.

Edited August 4, 2010 by ScottyPotty

[benos]

sigsauerfan,

Also don't forget - call Dillon when you can be in front of the machine - they're your friend.

be

Dillon Precision: 1 800 223-4570

[sigsauerfan]

sigsauerfan,

Also don't forget - call Dillon when you can be in front of the machine - they're your friend.

be

Dillon Precision: 1 800 223-4570

oh! thanks benos. yeah! might be better when in front of the machine ,so i can follow their direction more easily instead of trying to figure out .....

...i wasn't aware they were willing to give direct advice on the phone...nice, i still have some doubts about the rough action of the press when at full aft seating a primer....

Edited August 5, 2010 by sigsauerfan

[rick t]

sigsauerfan just what part of the world are you in? If someone on here has a 650 and is fairly close I'm sure they would come fix/teach. I know I would I am in NE Pennsylvania.

[sigsauerfan]

thanks for the offer rick t, realy appreciated, but i think i'll be able to sort this out with the help of your Q's guys.

well, back from a lill reloading session, loaded 100 rounds only, still the case feeding tube (no case feeder ATM) gremlin to fix (wich is the reason of my low round count production) but woaw, the fix suggested by cha-lee paid off, the whole action of the machine is quite smoother than what it was at the beggining, also my worries about the rough action of station 2 GONE with the tightening of the allen boats under the shell plate, hurray for this part of the equation .

realy, this forum is filled with knowledgeable members ready to help, our pistoleros community couldn't look better over any other forum i guess

i might have to start a new topic over my OAL wich is still all over the place at the moment, variation of as much as .12 mill is still an issue, and i dont mix headstamps.

i set everything for a AOL of 1.100, and find myself with variable lenghts from 1.094 to 1.112. most of the rounds loaded are around 1.105, 1.106,but there's a few who are realy at both end of the spectrum , i think crimping has something to see with this, or maybe the occasional case missing in one of the station (caused by the case feeding gremlin).

i use dillon(3 set including the seating die) dies, except the crimper which is a LEE CARBIDE CRIMPER.

my toughts on the random OAL are:

1-crimping process(unlikely,otherwise all rounds would show the same measurement)

2- the occasional case missing on one of the stations

3-variations of bullet lenghts(frontier FMJ RN) measurement show a very thin variation wich can not explain the dancing OAL

4- maybe i should pop a beer and chill out

any comments or opinions are more than welcome,to date everyone here has been of great help....

Edited August 6, 2010 by sigsauerfan

[benos]

...i wasn't aware they were willing to give direct advice on the phone...nice,

Absolutely. They are ALL ABOUT that.

be

[gdedrick]

Ok, still not sure what you are saying about the case feed but maybe I have an idea. If the feeder is dropping brass down the tube but it is not feeding properly onto the case slider, maybe try this idea. The beveled plastic piece that moves up & down that is attached to the case slider has two sides to it. Be sure you have the correct side toward the press. The long bevel works for rifle brass, the short bevel for pistol. It also has an adjustment to it. If it is too close to the press, it tries to drop brass but it wedges it against the side of the hole. If it is too far away, it doesn't activate the drop enough to actually drop the brass. Check out those adjustments if I made any sense at all. I think perhaps I should go to the dillon website & get the correct name for the parts so I could make better suggestions.

Keep at it, I think you have the press going your way now. Tweak the little things as you go along & you should be making mucho ammo/hr soon.

Not sure why your OAL would be varying, though. Of course, if you were not getting complete full strokes up & down every time you pull the handle, you will get variations in length. Depending on what kind of bullet, you could probably hand feed your loaded rounds back into the press at the bullet seating station & finish seating the rounds to correct length. This is probably only a good suggestion if you are loading Jacketed bullets, not plated or lead ones. Either of those will scrape lead off the bullet since these rounds are already crimped. If they are jacketed rounds, just push the bullet on down where it should be, & let it recrimp. Again, I'm using the wrong word of course. You probably should not really be crimping but merely removing all the bell from your brass if you are loading normal pistol ammo. If you are loading for ultra high pressure pistol rounds or rifle rounds, crimp may be the right word. Sort of depends on what you are doing.

MLM

Thanks. This was really helpful.

I had set up my caliber conversion to 45 ACP from 9mm and first 100 rounds ran great. Had 2 jams of brass (40 size) that had to clear. Then, it would not drop brass onto the shell plate. Made the adjustments to silver aluminum piece (body bushing) you screw from underneath in station 1 (your comments were helpful to know which direction to go with it). Now, it works great.

Greg

Edited March 4, 2012 by gdedrick