F%*k the loadmaster, XL650 on the way!

[mikeinctown]

Congrats on the new machine! I almost got a Lee before I bought the Dillon and I am glad I paid the little extra.

Just a "little" extra?

Sorry, it was a Hornady not a Lee. the Hornady was close to $400, so $160 more for the Dillon didn't seem all that bad considering the reviews I've seena nd read.

[hceuterpe]

Funny, I came to the realization almost at the same time as you did (late Sept)! Even with Mike's mods, it didn't work that well. I too had the issue with the crunching primers. Wasted a lot of money trying to get this LLM PoS to work properly.

IMO, the major issue with the LLM is that it primes on the upstroke. That and the casefeeder is a joke, the turret had terrible issues with OAL consistency, Lee's poor QC control with parts. A progressive press must just be a pipe dream for under $300.

[nitrohuck]

Why would you buy that case feeder over a Dillon???????? Aren't you swapping FROM the Lee due to issues? Then you buy a "budget" case feeder? /facepalm

Let us know how the case feeder works.

I obviously have not had much time to run thousands of rounds through the press yet, but so far the case feeder is working great! It fed .40sw no problem, which wasn't a huge surprise, but it also fed 300BLK like butter, which was going to be the big wild card here.

All I have to do to go from 40sw to 300blk is take the casefeed plate off, install a bushing, put the same casefeed plate back in and I am feeding 300blk... no need for expensive feed plate purchases.

More time will tell, but initial impressions are looking great for the case feeder. It is perhaps a little more DIY in appearance compared to the dillon, but that doesn't matter to me, it is covered with a two-year warranty rather than Dillon's 1 year warranty, so I am not really concerned.

[ScottyPotty]

I had a LM and got so fed up with it.........everyone kept telling me I wasn't good enough to figure it out. I picked up a used 650 and was amazed I could just make ammo and not have to work on the press constantly. FYI I ran 9mm on the large rifle plate for years.

[habba8]

My loadmaster runs well, l would love to try the Dillon though

[Buddy2]

I pulled the load master off the bench today and replaced it for a XL 650 what a difference. Wish it didn't take me 4 years to make the switch.

[mele]

I've been using a single stage Rockchucker for years. Doing a few hundre rounds a week end.

I was leary about getting a progressive press because I thought it may be a bit to complicated for me.

I went ahead and took the blue pill and could not be happier with my new 650.

I just got it mounted yesterday. Set it up and ran through a 1000 45 acp before I new it. And that was with having to stop and fill the case tupe up every 20 or so!

I got a 223 conversion kist but now I want to wait and get a QC kit so I dont have to change out my dies.

[b1gcountry]

Getting a new tool head is practically as good as getting the quick conversion. Especially if you dump your powder back into the container.

Edited February 22, 2015 by b1gcountry

[mele]

Yeah but i load pretty much the same thing on my 45 and 223 loads

[b1gcountry]

Yeah but i load pretty much the same thing on my 45 and 223 loads

You use tightgroup under 230gr lead for your 223 loads?

[glynnm45]

I'll give you $100 for the POS loadmoaster

haha I believe I will keep it around as a rainy day backup... otherwise I have a friend here who is way more happy to tinker it

Sounds like your problems are basically linked to the primer system. Do what I do and hand prime, problem solved. I have a Dillon 650 AND two LLM's and use them all. I don't even prime on my Dillon anymore.

[nitrohuck]

I'll give you $100 for the POS loadmoaster

haha I believe I will keep it around as a rainy day backup... otherwise I have a friend here who is way more happy to tinker it

Sounds like your problems are basically linked to the primer system. Do what I do and hand prime, problem solved. I have a Dillon 650 AND two LLM's and use them all. I don't even prime on my Dillon anymore.

I actually ended up selling it to my friend who I mentioned in the above quoted post. He was able to put some time into the LLM and it is priming and running ammo without issue now. He had more patience than I in that arena.

On another note, my dillon 650 has now seen over 5,000 rounds and I am in love

[glynnm45]

I find that I now load as much on my LLM's as I do my Dillon 650. Love them all.

[Miranda]

never mind.... I decided the joke made little sense.

Edited February 23, 2015 by Miranda

[BeerBaron]

Funny, I came to the realization almost at the same time as you did (late Sept)! Even with Mike's mods, it didn't work that well. I too had the issue with the crunching primers. Wasted a lot of money trying to get this LLM PoS to work properly.

IMO, the major issue with the LLM is that it primes on the upstroke. That and the casefeeder is a joke, the turret had terrible issues with OAL consistency, Lee's poor QC control with parts. A progressive press must just be a pipe dream for under $300.

you realise dillons flagship (the 1050) also primes on the up stroke same as the load master...

I have used both the LLM and the 650 and actually just bought another 650 and casefeeder this week.

The difference is a dillon with casefeed and dies is about $1000. The lee is around $300 and comes with dies.

I do agree the dillon parts are better made and have better QC. Some parts are better designed too (primer disc).

The lee however out of the box is a faster overall machine for me. A couple of things make the lee run well in my experience.

spend time setting up the position of the shell plate carrier on the ram. This is super important to make sure shells hit the dies square, that it primes square and that it indexes nicely.

Buy the latest primer chute parts and check to see if they need any flashing trimmed off. Also replace that part about every 10,000 rounds (it's only a $10 part).

spend time on the casefeed/case insertion force set-up. that part has also been upgraded along the way.

keep it lubed up.

use a small amount of one shot case lube on cases.

use a sizing die with decap pin removed in station 2 to hold the case while it's being primed.

A couple of things made it faster out of the box. One, filling primer tubes on the dillon takes ages. even the vibra prime is pretty average. The only thing that works is the dillon RF100 and it's $300. On the lee you dump them in, shake for 5 seconds and another 100 are loaded. The casefeeder on the lee actually works very nearly 100% for me. No flipped cases, maybe one in 300 doesn't feed exactly right, a little nudge fixes that. The powder disc system actually worked really well for me. I tried the micrometer powder bar and it was rubbish. The disc has been 100% reliable for me. Yes you have to replace the priming parts as they little slider wears out. Yes you have to keep it clean. But for a very cheap press it actually makes excellent ammo. Priming on the upstroke is one of it's features as is the wide range of primer seat depth adjustment.

The dillon is a better made press and more reliable. No doubt about it. Once you get an RF100 or if you ignore the time it takes to put primers into a tube it's a faster press. The casefeeders for me are a wash. The dillon holds a little more, but it's noisy and needs power. Reliability in case feed I found the same. The primer system on the dillon is better executed. Having a metal disc carry the primers around is more reliable and doesn't need replacement every year like the lee does. The toolhead clamp system is better (but could be even better still) and overall the press is just a better piece. It's indexing system is more advanced and a little smoother once tuned right but the lee can be ok too.

If lee could strengthen up their primer feed parts and have finer tolerances overall it would be a contender. as it is I agree it has it's frustrations and for some it's just too much hassle.

[Jimk60]

Beerbaron,

Well written unbiased post. Plus and minuses of both presses.

This is what really attracted me to this forum.

[ScottyPotty]

The up stroke priming on the Dillon 1050 gets a lot of praise. I never used it so Ill have to take their word on it. But the up stroke priming on the LM is a disaster. No feel if you miss a primer, or if you get one sideways, or doesn't go in all the way. It got so bad on mine that I had to hand prime everything. The case feeder is neat, but requires lots of attention, lots of dropped brass but generally does what you expect for about 40 bucks.

I never understood the hatred for loading primers tubes. It only takes about 10 mins to keep me going for a few hours (I dont speed reload) its much faster than chasing the constant LM primer issues.

[habba8]

Any ex Loadmaster owners looking to sell their setup? Caliber doesn't matter.

[trek777]

I loved my Loadmaster for 40S&W and 45acp. It was when I went and tried to load 9mm that I had issues. The loadmaster uses the same shell plate for 9mm as it does for 40 cal. It didn't work very well and the solutions that I found online were hit or miss. I got so frustrated by it that I went out and bought a Dillon Square Deal in 9mm. That worked for my for a while the lack of case feeder really started bugging me. I then upgraded to the 650 with the intention of keeping my Loadmaster for 40s&w and 45acp. After using the 650 for a while I decided to sell the Loadmaster and buy conversion kits for the 650.

Selling the Loadmaster on ebay is a story all its own. Lets just say there are some people of questionable character out there.

[aviator41]

Hi guys. First post here. I, too, recently ditched the Loadmaster for a Dillon due to problems with primers and powder bridging leading to squibs. In short, I just couldn't rely on it to make competition ready ammo. It was a constant tinkering nightmare even after primer upgrades, powder hopper upgrades, replacement brass slider parts and on and on. At first, it ran fine. After about 500 rounds the problems started adding up. It got to the point to where I couldn't get 10 rounds out of the cursed thing before having to "tinker" with something. It took the fun out of reloading. I was having all the typical problems: no primer dispensed, flipped primers, crushed primers, good primers making it in with the bad primers, Jerky or incomplete brass feeding leading to crushed cases, ultra-light powder drops, failure of the disk to return to under the powder hopper to get another charge, no powder at all, lots of spilled powder from the disk unit - I could go on and on. I really was prepared to use the Loadaster as my long-term reloading press. I made the jump from a turret to a Progressive and chose to stay with lee after many years of Excellent service from my 4 hole turret press. I invested in Lee. I have 5 different turrets totally set up for the calibers I needed and individual powder disk units. I had the press mounted to a heavy-duty bench which was, itself, mounted to the wall. This was going to be the heart of my reloading station. Until the first time a squib made it to a competition match. . . then a second . . and a third. . . all in the same day.

I was done. I had caught a number of them on the press thinking it was just my technique, but with all the tinkering, jam fixing, primer malfunctions and everything else, these three squibs made it into the ammo box. It's not that I wasn't paying attention to what I was doing, it was that I had so many other press function related problems to contend with in order to make ammo. My attention should have been solely focused on making good ammo. Instead, it was split betwen making ammo and making this Rube Goldberg contraption run properly. It was rediculous! and unsafe in my opinion. My attention was stretched too thin.

The one thing Lee got right with the Loadmaster was the brass colator and feeding system. It's remarkably simple, inexpensive and works very well.

I bought my XL650 on the way home from the shooting match mentioned above. It took a considerable amount of time to set up, but right out of the box you can tell it's a better machine. Out of all the stuff from the loadmaster, the only things I kept in service were the dies and the brass feeding system. I machined a bracket that mates the colator and feeder with the XL650 - and it works beautifully (as do the dies. I've been very happy with my Lee carbide dies).

The Dillon does have it's down sides though. Not only was the press considerably more expensive - as we all the accessories - but caliber changes are much more involved and take 3-4 times as long as with the Loadmaster. However it makes excellent, reliable ammo without the constant tinkering. I can concentrate on the rounds being made instead of press problems. This was a big factor in the purchase.

But you know what made my mind up to go with the Dillon? Their powder check system. With the Lee, position two is taken up by priming on the up stroke - it's really not a 5 die progressive. It's a 4 die with a useless 2nd hole. It shouldn't take a seperate die to keep brass "aligned" with the primer system. If that was the intention by Lee, it should have been included with the die kits.

So here's my die setup with the Loadmaster: As you can see there is no way to set up a powder check using this die setup, and this die setup is what I need to run. (the FCD and sizer ensure my cast bullets chamber every time)

1. Size, Deprime

2. Prime

3. Powder Drop and flare

4. Bullet Seat

5. Factory Crimp Die (and sizer)

Here is my Dillon XL650 setup.

1. size, deprime

2. prime, powder drop and flare

3. POWDER CHECK

4. Bullet seat

5. Factory Crimp Die (and sizer)

So far, I've made 1,000 rounds on my Dillon. All 38, I have had zero issues. I feel like I've made the right choice. So what happens to the old Loadmaster? I've set it up to do nothing but deprime/size spent brass prior to running them through the brass cleaner. I may find another use for it eventually, but I will never make ammo on this press ever again.

Ironically, all of my hunting ammo is still made on that Lee 4-hole turret press - but all of those rounds receive a powder manually and are primed by hand as well so it's not a real fair comparison. I've taken many white-tails with ammo made on that press.

EDIT: I also kept the primer flip trays from Lee in service, as they seem to work pretty well. Makes filling the primer magazine tubes on the Dillon a snap. Simply fill the tray, shake until they are all upright, put the lid on, turn over and place tray on bench lid-side down, then pull the body of the flip tray up and away. presto! All the primers are face down and ready to gobble up with the Dillon Magazine filling tube.

Edited March 25, 2015 by aviator41

[fmj3]

IMO a squib is not the fault of a machine or powder drop or powder check.

[aviator41]

IMO a squib is not the fault of a machine or powder drop or powder check.

Agreed. It was certainly my fault in a kind of "It's not you, it's me" breakup sort of way . I was unable to keep up with the work load of babysitting an press that refused to function properly and I allowed the squibs to pass through unchecked. It's squarely my fault. The solution was to ditch a press that needed more attention than an insecure girlfriend so I could concentrate on the ammo I am supposed to be loading.

And wouldn't you know it? 1,000 rounds through the Dillon without a hiccup.

[nitrohuck]

IMO a squib is not the fault of a machine or powder drop or powder check.

Agreed. It was certainly my fault in a kind of "It's not you, it's me" breakup sort of way . I was unable to keep up with the work load of babysitting an press that refused to function properly and I allowed the squibs to pass through unchecked. It's squarely my fault. The solution was to ditch a press that needed more attention than an insecure girlfriend so I could concentrate on the ammo I am supposed to be loading.

And wouldn't you know it? 1,000 rounds through the Dillon without a hiccup.

my sentiments exactly,

[BeerBaron]

Holy shit! You had a nightmare loadmaster. I never suffered anything close to that but I've heard of others with a similar bad experience.

I have a 650 with case collator etc. it certainly is a much nicer quality piece of equipment. It does have its drawbacks though. Primer seating depth much harder to adjust and I prefer seating on the upstroke on the lee. I found if I replaced the $12 primer slide assy on the lee periodically it primed just fine. As soon as it would start playing up, chuck in a new slide.

I ran my lee:

1. Size/deprime (or just the universal deprimer)

2. Sizing die and prime (it definitely primed better with a die there and sizing each case twice didn't hurt anything)

3:powder and flare

4. Seat

5. Crimp (fcd)

I also liked that the lee would only feed a primer when a case arrived at station 2. On the dillon it keeps feeding (and then spitting out, often onto the floor) primers whether a case is present or not.

I like the expanding/flare insert in the lee powder die better than the dillon. The lee was very linear in adjustment. The Dillon is like a knife edge and goes from no flare/bell to massive bell in very little adjustment.

I didn't like that the lee indexing would periodically require resetting. The Dillon is more reliable but more complex than needed and by using a spring to rotate the plate and a spring detent ball to locate it you have no control over the speed of indexing that last little bit (hence the snap and powder spill). The lee system was a clever idea let down by too wide tolerances and plastic parts.

I also liked the lee case collator (no power needed, no noise, cost what $20 vs $200+). I practically never got an upsidedown case. My case feed/slide worked well too but I maintained it carefully to ensure that.

I liked that I could fill 100 primers into the machine in 20 seconds.

I actually had great success with the disc powder measure. I ditched the stupid chain system though and used the spring to cycle it. I tried their micrometer powder bar but found it was not working for me. It would light charge or no charge. I'm not sure why but I went back to the discs. The only drawback for me was with light 9mm minor loads. The jumps between disc holes were too big so in the end I filed one to the size I wanted.

I liked that it ejected cases out the front which meant I could mount any size bin I wanted. With the Dillon mounted directly to bench I can't really use anything larger than the stock bin.

Overall the Dillon is most definitely a better and (probably its biggest edge over the lee) more reliable than the lee. Most of its drawbacks are minor or even just personal preference. One thing it has way over the lee...fantastic warranty.

[Jbarila]

This is exactly what happened to me last week! I have done all the mods and tips you could do on the Loadmaster. I would get about 2 or three primer failures per 100 rounds after constant tinkering. Well the POS ran 20 rounds without primers and I snapped. Ordered a 650 from Brian also and can not believe how great a press it is. All I do now is pull the handle. Put in the shell plate upgrade, spent primer upgrade and ordered a Budget Reloaders case feeder too. The really amazing thing is I mentioned I had a loadmaster for sale at the club and a guy bought it on the spot. Doubt we will remain friends when he realizes how tough the Loadmaster is.