If you have at least some experience with a single stage press, you can (should!) go with any of the Dillon progressives. If you're going to go progressive you might as well get the very best available! The thing to keep in mind is that the nicer (faster) you go, the longer the learning curve is going to be. My advice is get the best one you can afford and get all the goodies you can afford as well. Just remember the learning curve and don't expect to be cranking out rounds the day after it arrives. You should spend at a minimum of a couple of days reading (or whatever time it takes), watching and learning about what each stage of the press does before you ever put any powder or primers in the machine. Dillon will set the machine up for you in whatever caliber you want.
Just to mention my experience with progressives in general and Dillon in particular, I have loaded over a million rounds using two Dillon 1000 presses (one for small and one for large primers, the most difficult and time comsuming change on the Dillon 1000). This was in a comnercial operation, obviously many years ago, and I loaded a LOT of .223 ammo on them. I still use WW748 a lot, since it meters perfectly. Of course, Dillon's metering system is very, very nice to allow that.
Instead of a powder checker, which they didn't even have back then, I JB Welded a small inspection mirror to the frame so that I could actually look inside the case to check powder levels. A light specifically for that was next to the press.
I also used a cut down size die, turning it into a neck sizer, to "crimp" the bullets in place (between 1/16th and 1/8th inches on the neck), instead using an actual crimp die (usually a seating die), because I didn't trim the cases. Without the trim motor option, you will never get consistent crimps on any ammo using any progressive!
I tumbled the brass in an electric cement mixer using corn cob grit and Brasso. I did not clean primer pockets and never had a problem, although these days I decap then wet tumble all my brass in Boretech's brass cleaner. The brass comes out looking like factory and I like that! But then I'm not cranking out 30+ thousand rounds a month, either!
For powder, I would recommed you stick with ball powders for consistency, although I've done custom loads for people using stick powders. The mirror (or low powder warning system) came in handy although with the Dillon powder measure I never had any problems. The meter would simply cut any powder kernels that didn't fall into place nicely! As to bridging, while possible, I never experienced any problems with that particular problem. If a short cut version of your chosen powder is available, use it!
As to problems, the priming system gave me the most headaches, but then my machines were fairly old and often needed new parts - which Dillon provided free of charge! Their customer service is the absolute best in the industry! If you run into a problem that completely baffles you, a call to Dillon will get you parts or advice on how to fix the situation, usually within minutes!
Yes, Dillon prices are somewhat scary but then, as always, you get what you pay for. They are, without doubt, the absolute best you can get. Once you learn what each stage does, then how they operate in unison, you can start slowly and within a very short time (once you develop the muscle memory) everything will fall into place and you'll go from maybe 100 rounds an hour, to 8 or 9 hundred per hour! Yes, it's possible with an experienced user to hit that magic 1000 per hour but only after a year or more of use. Everything has to be perfect to achieve that goal! Using new brass, I could run 1200 rounds an hour of 9mm but that was well after I had learned all the ins and outs of the D 1000 and I could only maintain that pace for 2 or 3 hours. I will assume the presses are even better now, so the sky is the limit! But it is not an easy task to achieve, especially with the 1000 press, since I had to stop and fill the brass hopper, get more bullets, load more primer tubes and refill the powder measure. None of these things happened at the same time, of course! Plus I had customers coming in the door at odd intervals! I got most of my real work done after I closed up shop for the day and worked... when I should have been at home eating my dinner! Me and Jack in Box and Burger King were good buddies! Still, 8f you know someone who is an experienced progressive user, tgat could help a whole lot!
Reloading is a hobby for me now but I still enjoy it. I load for so many calibers it would take a while to list them all and my breakfast is about ready, so just take my word for it! I started out using a using a set of Lee "basher" dies (the ones where you use a hammer to do everything, including prime!) And after somewhere between 10 and 15 thousand rounds of 38, 357 and M1 Carbine, I finally bought a single stage press. Much later I bought the commercial operation and was introduced to progressives, virtually thrown into the lake, sink or swim! All in all it's been a fun (usually) experience & have loved nearly every minute of it!
Cheers,
crkckr
