Three progressive presses

[Ian M]

Right now I am comparing three progressive presses, the Dillon 550B, RCBS Pro-2000 and the Hornad Lock n Load. Damned if they don't all make excellent three oh ate ammo

Ending up with a whole bunch of ammo, 168 A-Max is the test bullet, new Hornady match brass, Varget and Win. primers. Now we will just have to go out and shoot this stuff.

Hornady is fastest, because it is auto-indexing and a real nice press.

Each has it warts and good points. Manuals could be better on the average. Going to end up making several hundred rounds by the time I am through. Right now a newbie appears to be able to load 25 rounds in about 7-8 minutes from scratch, faster with the Hornady.

 

[chris matthews]

Not to throw in another but the Dillon 650 beats the snot out of the 550s.

 

[malkor]

I have a PRO2000 and love it, loaded some 3/4ish MOA ammo with it (.223rem and .243win) with extruded powder (IMR4320, IMR4831) in the measure (was throwing within 1/4gr as long as you worked the press consistantly).

I really like it, all steel unit except for the die plate, and plan to use it for all my normal ammo (.380 acp up to .416 Rigby) that I am not trying to suck a lot of accuracy out of. There is some flex with the way the shell and die plates are set up, but I think it could be tightened up easily. If you are reloading pistol ammo or mass quanities of a rifle cart. I think it is really worth the money.

I have never been able to get past the aluminum on the Dillon or Hornady, and the primer strip system on the RCBS beats the hell out of primer tubes.....

 

[johnny k.]

Ian,
I have the Hornady also. I bought it used ($100.00) from a fellow shooter who didn't like it or realize what he had. He was going to use it for .270 Win, but couldn't get consistent ammo from it. The press needed adjusting to get the indexing and timing right and the dies needed to be disassembled and cleaned. He loaded less than 50 rds with it.
I have since used it to load several hundred .270's for a cousin's husband. It produced .5" hunting ammo using the 130gr NBT and H4831SC. That is definately DMOA! (Deer Minute of Angle) and it took approximately 45 minutes.
I use it mostly for pistol and revolver ammo now and it does a fine job. Just one thing; make sure you got plenty of components on hand before you start! Johnny K.

 

[Shootin4fun]

Right now I am comparing three progressive presses, the Dillon 550B, RCBS Pro-2000 and the Hornad Lock n Load. Damned if they don't all make excellent three oh ate ammo

Ending up with a whole bunch of ammo, 168 A-Max is the test bullet, new Hornady match brass, Varget and Win. primers. Now we will just have to go out and shoot this stuff.

Hornady is fastest, because it is auto-indexing and a real nice press.

Each has it warts and good points. Manuals could be better on the average. Going to end up making several hundred rounds by the time I am through. Right now a newbie appears to be able to load 25 rounds in about 7-8 minutes from scratch, faster with the Hornady.

Though this is an 8 year old thread, Ian, how did the ammo you produced with these presses perform? I have always been under the impression that progressives don't give you the same level of control, therefore quality/consistency of a single stage press.

The auto powder drop is what really concerns me the most. I weigh every charge to within +/- .05 grains or less. The .1 gr hashmarks on my old 20-10 scale are 1/16" apart, several times the width of the beam's pointer line. My charges never vary the width of the line. 1 kernel of Varget makes it move.

I see other users' comments where they say they are producing .5 MOA rifle ammo with the progressives, yet someone said that theirs throws powder with .25 gr variance. Not sure how that is possible.

I'm sure using one for the volume of pistol rounds is justified, but I'm really wondering about long range rifle ammo.

 

[Dr. Vette]

Though this is an 8 year old thread, Ian, how did the ammo you produced with these presses perform?

Unfortunately Ian passed away over 3 1/2 years ago, so I suspect you'll be waiting a long time for a response.

http://www.longrangehunting.com/forums/f22/ian-mcmurchy-has-passed-away-36907/

 

[Bughole]

I run the Hornady. It's really the latest mods and additions that make this thing really work. The earlier ones were more problematic. One thing about Hornady if you do have trouble they are 100% into customer satisfaction, dont have experience with the other guys, I run Redding stuff on all single stage projects.