Thoughts on a Lee turret for low volume calibers?

[dnmccoy]

I just moved away from the Turret and the biggest reason was the priming system. I had alot of people telling me to prime off the press, but that seemed to negate the whole point of the turret. I would try to prime and would have primers falling and rolling all over the place. YMMV

[dcmdon]

I did another 50 rounds this past week and shot about 100 rounds this weekend. Lots of fun. Its about a hot .44 Special load right now.

I've used this gun more in the last couple of weeks than I have in the previous 3 years.

dnmcoy - the primer works fine for me. Just not very fast. I'd say about 1 in 20 doesn't work and I have to take another stroke with the safety prime. I rarely end up with a primer on the ground. Not ideal, but not worth priming off the press in my humble opinion.

I have decided to leave the auto index off the press for now. Its plenty fast for what I'm reloading. The rounds I shoot a LOT of are done on my 650

Don

[dnmccoy]

I could get the primer to feed if I slowed to a snails pace, which just seemed to negate the speed of an autoindexing turret. The fastest I was able to achieve with refilling primers,powder and chasing the occasional primer was around 170ish/hour

[98sr20ve]

You guys need to tune the height of the primer setup. It works pretty darn good on the two LCTs I have setup. Both just needed a little tuning. One needed a washer under the little plastic arm. Not exactly hard to do. Never setup a non-lct turret.

[dcmdon]

dnmcoy - I guess its all about expectations then. 170/hr is plenty for me. Also, If you are getting 170/hr, I'd guess thats a lot faster than you can comfortably do with a single stage. It is for me.

If I need faster, I'll set up a caliber for my 650. The beautiful thing about this turret press is that a caliber change takes about 3 minutes and cost $15, if you use the same powder drop. If you buy a different powder drop for the new turret, it takes 30 seconds and cost $50.

Thats tough to beat. In my mind, this press has all the benefits of a single stage, with a lot more speed. I love the flexibility. I can batch for certain steps and then run in series for others. Just last week, I waiting for the Alox on my bullets to dry so I ran 100 cases through the deprime, resize, prime stage.

When the bullets were dry, I just picked up at the powder drop stage and then ran each round through to finish. I really love this thing. Total flexibility like a single stage with much better speed than a single stage.

I also like that I handle every casing going in, and every round going out. It provides a level of QC for certain rounds that is nice. With my 650, I never handle cases or ammo, only bullets. I'm not knocking it, but that is the price you pay for speed.

**98SR20VE - I have not done the washer trick yet. I don't know why. I'm sure it will help. As it is, I simply prime when the ram is not quite at the top of its stroke and it works great. I'll gain speed if I don't have to lower, stop, then lower again. But frankly, I'm happy with the speed I'm getting.

Don

Edited November 28, 2011 by dcmdon

[98sr20ve]

**98SR20VE - I have not done the washer trick yet. I don't know why. I'm sure it will help. As it is, I simply prime when the ram is not quite at the top of its stroke and it works great. I'll gain speed if I don't have to lower, stop, then lower again. But frankly, I'm happy with the speed I'm getting.

Don

For some reason this is a common issue. I guess it's better that it's too low rather then too high. To low is a easy fix. To high may not be fixable.

[Steve RA]

The least expensive Dillion I was referring to earlier is the BL-550. It's a nice press that can be configured any way you might like it. And, it is less expensive than a Square Deal B.

[WyrTwister]

I was going to get a single stage but this seems to have a little more speed.

Also caliber conversions are ridiculously cheap at about $10 and very fast.

On paper It looks like the perfect compliment to my 650.

One other thing is this looks like great press to use when working up loads. I'm not saying the 650 can't be used that way but it's a pain in the butt

So I'd like to hear from some people who have used one.

Reviews on the Internet seem to be universally positive. Which seems to be the case with most of Lees single stage stuff, while their progressive stuff is very mixed.

Thanks for all your advice.

Don

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The Lee cast iron turret press is just about the greatest value going . Add the primer system

http://leeprecision.com/xcart/Safety-Primer-Feed-Small-and-Large.html

And the disk measure

http://leeprecision.com/xcart/Pro-Auto-Disk.html

And it is even better .

God bless

Wyr

[WyrTwister]

Does anyone have any thoughts on the Pro autodisk vs the standard auto disk. The pro is $50, the standard is $30. I'm normally the kind of person who gets the better product, but I can't find anything on the interwebs that recomments the pro. Shoot, I can't even find anything that differentiates between the two.

Don

I now have 2 of the Pro Auto Disk measures . My cousin has the standard Auto Disk . I like mine better .

God bless

Wyr

[WyrTwister]

I'd recommend the Dillon 550B - or whatever the least expensive one is called.

Steve ,

The square deal b won't load rifle. So it's of no use to me. Besides, in many ways

this is superior to the 550 as far as my needs go.

The 550 will cost $430, the lee turret will be about $150, it will allow me to make small batches at about 150 rounds per hour. Caliber changeovers are fast and ridiculously cheap and it's portable enough to bring to the range for load development.

I already have one 650 with plans for another so I can keep one set for each size primer.

This will be used for stuff where the speed advantage of the 650 isn't worth the setup time and expense.

If I could find a 550 cheap it might be different, but there are never any used ones around there never seem to be. There is one thing that continues to impress me about this lee. It's that there seem to be plenty of dillon shooters who use this press for load development. Many wouldnt take a loadmasters or pro 1000 if you gave it to them, but they have nothing but good things to say about this little press.

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

For a press to take to the range , consider the Lee Hand Press . And the cast iron turret press mounted permanently to the bench .

God bless

Wyr

[WyrTwister]

I'm new to reloading and just received my Lee Classic Turret (with the auto indexing). I've been using a hand press, and have loaded 500 rounds so far with. I really enjoy the hand press btw.

But with the LCT, I have a question for those who like theirs. I haven't been able to load any ammo yet as I have no more bullets for a few more days, but ran shells through the sizer and flare die, and I am concerned about the play in the turret. There is up and down movement, although slight, but it is noticeable more in front than in back, and I would think this would give some variations in OAL while seating, but I have no more bullets to check with yet. Both turrets I ordered have the same play. Does this have any effect?

Also, while running some shells through sizer and flare dies, maybe half of shells were not lining up perfectly with the die. The ram seemed to be slightly misaligned. When I called Lee, they advised me how to realign the indexing, but then when I said that it was clicking into place and I was still having to use my fingers to guide the shell in, he thought that was weird. I haven't had a chance to try to realign it yet.

Any thoughts on that? People seem to really like this press, but I like my hand press enough to use that and save for something better if I should...

My cast iron turret press works great .

If you worry about play in the turret , has anyone considered how much play there is in the shell holders ?

Mine indexes fine , but I do seem to remember you can turn the square nut at the top of the index rod to fine tune it ? Never had to .

LIGHTLY lube the turret , index rod and the little square plastic " ratcheting " part . It does make a difference if the little square part is upside down .

Which die is " hanging up " the brass ?

God bless

Wyr

[WyrTwister]

Been busy the last few weeks, and finally got around to making some .44 mag for the first time a couple of days ago. Its working pretty well. I haven't done the washer tweak to the safety prime, so for now I put the primer in the cup just before the lever reaches bottom.

The COAL is very consistent. The combination of Lymann and RCBS dies is working well. I've used 2 seat/crimp dies set up so that each is done separately. (Lyman with die body screwed way out of plate, with bullet seater set properly, then a RCBS die with the bullet seater pulled way up and the main body set fo ra nice roll crimp)

I loaded 50 without the auto index and liked the process. Then I loaded another 25 with the auto index when I got a few minutes this afternoon and liked that too. I felt like I was still able to do QC on each round, but production speed increased greatly.

I like the fact that I handle every case as it goes into the machine and every cartridge as it comes out of the machine. It gives an excellent opportunity to visually check things out.

My primer system came with the plastic washer . My cousin figured out that if you adjust the sizing die up or down in the turret , you hit a sweet spot where the Safety Prime hands the primer over to the Lever Prime , slick as a button .

I think you could add steel washers to the plastic washer & achieve the same thing ?

God bless

Wyr

[WyrTwister]

The least expensive Dillion I was referring to earlier is the BL-550. It's a nice press that can be configured any way you might like it. And, it is less expensive than a Square Deal B.

I looked at the BL-550 . Thought I could slowly upgrade it to the " standard " 550 , as funds became available ? Best I could tell , I would end up paying a lot more , part at a time , than the " standard " 550 would cost , complete ?

Then I figured out the 550 is not auto indexing . ( I got used to the auto indexing on the Lee cast iron turret press . )

Then I discovered the price of the Dillon case feeder .

I looked at the Square Deal press . Figured out it is hand gun only . Figured out it used proprietary ( expensive ) dies . I already had dies .

Read up on the Lee LoadMaster . Found help forums & help videos . Bought the LM .

Had some bumps in the road at first ( many self inflicted ) . Six months down the road , I am glad to have the LM .

It is running good . And the caliber conversion cost is lower than the other progressives I looked at . And it has auto index and a caset feeder .

God bless

Wyr

[dcmdon]

Well, several months on, I wouldn't change a thing about the classic cast turret other than the primer system.

I got the better powder system because from factorysales.com the difference was only $21 vs $33. So what the heck.

I've still only made about 500 rounds with it. Funny thing is that my original estimate was that I'd shoot 500 rounds of .44 mag/yr. Now it looks like it will be closer to 1000. In the past I was lucky to shoot 200 rounds/yr, simply because at $30/box, I couldn't justify it. I could shoot .45 for about $7/box and 9mm for about $6/box.

The funny thing is that I'm actually thinking about buying dies for calibers that I already have for the Dillon 650 so that I can keep the dies permanently in a turret and use the Lee for load development. I don't know if it makes sense. but its SO much easier to do that kind of thing on the lee.

Don

[otis_bartleh]

My cast iron turret press works great .

If you worry about play in the turret , has anyone considered how much play there is in the shell holders ?

Mine indexes fine , but I do seem to remember you can turn the square nut at the top of the index rod to fine tune it ? Never had to .

LIGHTLY lube the turret , index rod and the little square plastic " ratcheting " part . It does make a difference if the little square part is upside down .

Which die is " hanging up " the brass ?

God bless

Wyr

I ended up loading trying to load rounds, couldn't get a damn thing to work right, even after adjustments. Spent some time on the phone with Lee, and they basically told me they don't know... So I exchanged it from Midway for a new one, including new spare turret.

And now, I LOVE this press. The fact that it is auto-indexing is a huge benefit in my opinion, so really hoped that was a fluke. My reloading times have significantly improved. The first LCT I had just seemed to be a dud and had all kinds of poor machining, it was just off. The one I got after the exchange is much nicer. I did need to make some slight adjustments, but it is now really running smooth and producing some nice ammo.