What do you think?
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Have lee turret press, makes loading pistol rounds fairly easy. No knowledge of loadmaster. Hear good stuff about dillion products. But expensive. If you use the turret get a hand primer and Prime up about 4 or 5 hundred. my son and his friend can load that many 9mm in about two hours.
I'm not bashing Lee, but if want it to last & work well, look for a Dillon 450 or 550 press. You will not regret it.
Also expect to cough up about $1,700 or more. And a learning curve.
My bad, I was thinking about the auto loaders. The 550 is manual. Around $600. But much faster the turret press.
johnyee1
Member
I have the Lee progressive for loading 9mm with the auto bullet feeder and such. Every thing has a little bit of slop and has adjustments. Adding some wire ties in some places kept things from popping out. Sometimes the brass will crash into the sizing die and I cannot figure out why so I do go slow and will give it a poke to center if needed.
It requires a bit of tinkering but once everything is adjusted right and you find a rhythm then it loads ammo quick besides the quirk where the brass can miss the sizing die. Buy an extra bullet fingers if you go the bullet feeding route since I crushed one of those too.
I don't have any other progressive to compare with but expect to tinker with the Lee a bit. Overall, it does work and I don't shoot or use it enough to justify anything more expensive.
It requires a bit of tinkering but once everything is adjusted right and you find a rhythm then it loads ammo quick besides the quirk where the brass can miss the sizing die. Buy an extra bullet fingers if you go the bullet feeding route since I crushed one of those too.
I don't have any other progressive to compare with but expect to tinker with the Lee a bit. Overall, it does work and I don't shoot or use it enough to justify anything more expensive.
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Kendoist4162
Well-Known Member
I have had a Lee Pro 1000 for very long time and it takes some tinkering, but I love it. I wanted to upgrade though so bought a Loadmaster. Played with for a year and it never didn't glitch. It's still a the box on the shelf. If you want to try your hand at it, pm me. Selling cheap. Lots of extras.
crashlanding
Well-Known Member
Anyone remember when a Dillon square deal was $99. 
I punched 1000's of rounds through it with no issues. Sorry OP, your post made me reminisce back to the good old days when reloading was cheap
I punched 1000's of rounds through it with no issues. Sorry OP, your post made me reminisce back to the good old days when reloading was cheapWelderboy250
Well-Known Member
I've loaded thousands on a loadmaster. Mostly 9 and .223. It took some messing to get everything to work well. There was definitely a break-in period before it cycled smoothly. Some polishing on a few parts made a big difference. I never messed with a bullet feeder. The expense and setup never seemed justifiable. I focused on getting the cases and primers to feed well so that I can concentrate on the feel of the cycle and set another bullet with my left hand. There is definitely a learning curve but I've found it to be an excellent option overall. I never used a different progressive and for my personal use I can't see how I could justify the expense of any of the more expensive brands. This thing does what I expect. The frustrations that I did experience while learning how to get the results I wanted were very much worth it for the money savings.
erle
Member
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- Nov 7, 2015
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If you are mechanically inclined & like to tinker you could use a Lee Loadmaster, but be sure to buy one that is new & the latest model. Lee has made some improvements over the older ones you would probably get if you purchase a used one. I have 2 older models-one I leave set up for .223 & the other I use for pistol calibers. I have spent countless hours modifying & adjusting both of them. My biggest problems have been with the priming stage, but Lee has made some good priming improvements on their later models. You will still need to make sure the case is feeding correctly into the depriming/resizing die on each pull & GO SLOW. I have never used a Dillon but if I were you I would definitely look into one. You would probably be safe buying a used Dillon.
I have one that I bought about a year-year and a half ago. There are a couple of good youtube videos on setting up/polishing/lubing. I did all of that before I run a round through it. It's worked pretty flawless since. I can probably get 200-250 9mm an hour, with room to increase that if I care to. I don't prime on it though, that was a frustrating cause of hang ups so I do it with a hand primer while sitting in my chair watching a game. The case feeder works pretty well, get an upside down one every once in a while. I use the auto drum powder measure and every round I've checked has been spot on. I have used the auto bullet feeder with mixed results. It works great sometimes and drops bullets sometimes. When it drops the bullet, it seems to always hit the case full of powder, spilling powder everywhere and really messing up the rhythm. It's pretty fast still placing bullets by hand.
I had some issues in the beginning with a pretty large variance in oal. A little research led me to Mike's reloading bench website. I bought the billet turret and turret stabilizer from there and it helped tremendously. It's been cranking out solid, consistent ammo ever since.
I don't shoot a lot of pistol but for value - price vs convenience/operability - I would say it's a very good machine.
I had some issues in the beginning with a pretty large variance in oal. A little research led me to Mike's reloading bench website. I bought the billet turret and turret stabilizer from there and it helped tremendously. It's been cranking out solid, consistent ammo ever since.
I don't shoot a lot of pistol but for value - price vs convenience/operability - I would say it's a very good machine.
FrogFire7
Well-Known Member
I had a lee pro 1000 for about a year, my first progressive. You are limited in die slots but that's (probably) ok if your are only going to do 9mm. Mine was set up for 9mm as well.
I loaded maybe 2k on mine... It was an exercise in frustration. It worked most of the time... Lots of little, annoying issues with it. Mine was fairly old so maybe they fixed a bunch on it? Plus side is parts were cheap.
Again, for me, it "worked" with lots of tinkering and stoppages. I bought a Hornady progressive and never looked back.
I loaded maybe 2k on mine... It was an exercise in frustration. It worked most of the time... Lots of little, annoying issues with it. Mine was fairly old so maybe they fixed a bunch on it? Plus side is parts were cheap.
Again, for me, it "worked" with lots of tinkering and stoppages. I bought a Hornady progressive and never looked back.
I tried to PM and Norton said a security attack that locked up my computer.
A few things I need, would you sell parts?
