What's the bloody point of progressive presses?
- Thread starter Astute Observer
- Start date
mmcintyre1220
CGN frequent flyer
- Location
- Tillsonburg, Ontario
LEE LEE LEE LEE LEE , Its always the fault of LEE. Listen guys. Lee makes decent products for the money but they do require a little bit of mechanical knowledge. IMO they are no more difficult to run than a Dillon. I have a lee classic cast, lee 4 hole turret, 4 lee pro 1000's and they all run like a top. I am not opposed to buying a better product (having just bought a decked out Mark 7 Revolution with a few other guys) however, if one cant troubleshoot and set up a lee press correctly, I question their ability to reload in the first place.
Many people on this board have slagged Lee and threatened to throw their press in the garbage. Yet not one has followed through when I offered to take it off their hands. One guy said it would cost too much to ship and when I offered to pay the shipping he mysteriously disappeared.
Many people on this board have slagged Lee and threatened to throw their press in the garbage. Yet not one has followed through when I offered to take it off their hands. One guy said it would cost too much to ship and when I offered to pay the shipping he mysteriously disappeared.
Yup, funny ain't it
Many people on this board have slagged Lee and threatened to throw their press in the garbage. Yet not one has followed through when I offered to take it off their hands. One guy said it would cost too much to ship and when I offered to pay the shipping he mysteriously disappeared.
Lee stuff works for everyone, and yes, you can use their dies in Dillon presses and Lee likely has the dies you want; not always does Dillon.
If the detractors are serious reloaders they should try two economical products from Lee; for Rifle the collet dies; brass seems to last forever, it keeps it's concentricity, and requires way less trimming. The Lee perfect powder measure for extruded rod shaped powder; not only the cheapest, ugliest and cheap feeling, but the most accurate powder measure I have ever use; regardless of the rifle powder I use, Never will vary more than 0.5 gr, and usually does not vary at all.
Yes, there are better progressives than the Lee Pro1000 out there, but there are none that are as good a value than a used Pro1000
RCBS has the reputation for great single stage presses... but running currently all Lee dies.
I started with a Lee Challenger press. I moved on to a Forster Co-Ax and both are still bolted to my bench.
What don’t you like about the Forster Co-Ax?
My Lee is mostly used to decap or prime these days.
Many people on this board have slagged Lee and threatened to throw their press in the garbage. Yet not one has followed through when I offered to take it off their hands. One guy said it would cost too much to ship and when I offered to pay the shipping he mysteriously disappeared.
I Sold an Lee explodemaster for the cost of the dies that went with it.
It was sold F2F with full disclosure and came with every accessory available as well as multiple spare parts and 2 sets of dies and multiple shell plates. I think i asked $100 for it.
Was shooting IPSC at the time and reloading for 2 so at minimum 1000 rounds a month.
Tried every fix I could find on youtube (there are a lot of videos on how to fix / improve that particular press) to deal with the primer feed system that was imho designed by a 3 year old who’s prior engineering experience was chewing on Lego blocks.
After several hundred primers seated upside down or crushed, and two very exciting primer detonation sessions that resulted in plastic shrapnel moving away from the press at high velocity after multiple primers had detonated, i had had enough excitement and moved on.
Not a newby to reloading as I have been doing so since the 1980’s and had multiple presses at the time.
That particular press is poorly designed. The 9mm shell plates are a joke and don’t properly center the cases correctly (there are a ton of youtube videos on how to fix this particular issue), it primes on the upstroke so there is very little “feel” when doing so, and it continually jams and crushes primers when it is not seating them upside down, and is an occasional and very temperamental IED.
YMMV but IMHO it is a pretty much useless, other than for entertainment and masochistic purposes.
Well, it's possible that you got a lemon but as I said I have used mine for at least 25 years and for me they have been very reliable with minimal primer loss. I did install the primer blast shields because I like my eyes but have never ever had a single detonation. I don't use Federal primers in either of them (Lee recommends you don't) as I hand seat my Federals for a light .38 Special PPC gun but every other type (Winchester, CCI, Tula, Wolf, Fiocchi, Dominion (Russian) have all fed with no issue. I also never muscle my way through a round. As soon as I feel any sort of unusual resistance I stop to find the reason why. Except in p0rn0 a bigger hammer is not always better.
While I don't keep a close count on my rounds I know I'm doing an average of 700-800 a month.
The best part is I bought these directly from Lee in the U.S. and they cost me $140 each. Both still working fine and I doubt that I will ever switch.
