Good press for noob

I am going to save you a lot of time and money. You will get a lot of answers to your question and it has been ask about 100 times before you. My advice is free I won't even claim it is worth two cents.
Guys will go on and on about their choice of press for whatever reason. Turrets are faster than single stages and progressives are faster than turrets and so on and so on. So here is my advice buy a RCBS Rock Chucker and be done with it. No one will claim that they have a better press just more expensive or faster or whatever but not better.
 
sedancowboy said:
I am going to save you a lot of time and money. You will get a lot of answers to your question and it has been ask about 100 times before you. My advice is free I won't even claim it is worth two cents.
Guys will go on and on about their choice of press for whatever reason. Turrets are faster than single stages and progressives are faster than turrets and so on and so on. So here is my advice buy a RCBS Rock Chucker and be done with it. No one will claim that they have a better press just more expensive or faster or whatever but not better.
Click to expand...
Yeah I agree I don't need a whackmaster 3000, I just need something consistent and reliable! Thank you I'll check them out!
 
I bought a Lee Classic turret when I started because it was cheap and I shot a lot of action pistol and IDPA at the time so the semi-progressive feature was nice. A cheap press and available wheel weights was the only way I could afford to do it. If I had been primarily rifle loading as I am now I would have gotten a Rock Chucker.
I would look to buy a used press to save money. Not much you can do to hurt one or wear it out so you aren't going to be missing much of anything over new.
Other than a Rock Chucker I do like my buddies Lyman turret for not much more money. Especially if you only load one or two calibers you can leave all the dies in the head.
 
lee has a single stage steel press that is just over 100 bucks.
i use it as a resizing press for 338 edge and down.
very nice for the money
 
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RCBS kit. It's about $300 at bass pro. You'll still need dies, shell holders, trickler, trimmer, caliper, and tumbler. Looking at about $300-$400 extra for a full set up.
 
ar10ar15man said:
lee has a single stage steel press that is just over 100 bucks.
i us it as a resizing press for 338 edge and down.
very nice for the money
Click to expand...

Yep same here. The Lee Classic Cast I'm using for brass prep is strong and straight. I use it for body sizing in conjunction with Redding Body Die and Competition shell holder for true control over shoulder bump and then again for final neck tension with a mandrel (I run mandrel thru after partial neck sizing with Wilson Neck Die). I still seat with Wilson Micro and K&M Arbor Press and hand prime with K&M prime tool.

Very accurate process for low volume rifle loading.
 
I would recommend against a "kit" unless you have no other choice. Get the specific press you want and piece it together with the items you want/need. Kits give you a bunch of garbage to get started but 9/10 most of the extra stuff gets tossed or collects dust and you'll just end up spending more in the long run upgrading.
RCBS Rock Chucker Supreme is a tank and will last a lifetime. Build the rest of your setup around something like that.
 
I would skip the kits as well they will get you started though but some of the items end up collecting dust or in the trash. If you're going to use RCBS dies buy the rock chucker. I personally don't care for RCBS dies. I like Redding Dies but have an assortment and most dies are 7/8-14 the new Rock Chucker needs a bushing to accept 7/8-14 dies.

All of those presses will perform for years without major issue. I run a Redding Big Boss and its only 20.00 more than the Rock Chucker.

Just my opinion but if I had all this to do over again after reloading since I was a kid some 50 years I would go with Forster COAX they're not middle of the road though. Check out the reviews on Midway never hurts to get opinions.

Good luck and shoot straight y'all
 
My Rockchucker from the mid 60's has that bushing. AFAIK they all do. Mine also came to me with every primer box flap it had ever loaded. Over 50,000 .357/.38's alone! Can't tell to look at or operate it. I think that a key consideration is to buy a steel or iron frame in one of these big presses. My prior Pacific press was an aluminum frame and I could see it springing under the load of FL sizing .30-06 cases.

I bought a kit when I first started reloading, it served me well however the only piece of that kit that I still have is the Pacific .30-06 die set and the balance beam scale. So the above comments about kits held true for me.

I've been looking at buying this: http://harrellsprec.com/index.php/products/compact-reloading-press for taking to the range on load development days. If I didn't have the RC I'd be buying it for home use too.

Be careful with electronic scales in rooms with no temperature/climate control. A friend had some large variations in charge due to an RCBS electronic scale varying with the temperature in his garage. No idea if it was that particular scale, or is indicative of all such scales in that situation. So just be careful until you know how it will behave.
 
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