40 Cal Reloading

Money Cop

Money Cop

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I'm new to the re-loading game, but it seems fairly easy, & well worth the time. I can't seem to get a straight story on what brand is the most effective & economical to start out with? I was going to order everything of Lee Precision? I don't care about automation if I save tons of cash.
Does anyone have use equipment they'd like to sell, or guidance/opinions on economy new equipment & supplies for 40 Cal reloads?
 
You would probably be served well enough with Lee equipment if you're on a budget. For reloading pistol cartridges, I've used the turret press a lot over the last 4 years, and it has worked well(although there is a plastic part that is know to wear, it's easy to swap out). Nothing wrong with their die sets either.
 
I started on a Lee singel stage press i bought used from my buddy. It has served me well and has lots of life left. I fyou are looking for a single stage press, they are all reliable because theres not too many moving parts. I think every think I have is Lee except for my RCBS hand priming tool.
 
I would consider a turret press to be an absolute bare minimum for handgun reloading, with a progressive preferred. The Lee turret press is OK, but stay away from their progressives. Dillon, RCBS, or Hornady are the ones you should be looking at if you are considering a progressive.

It boils down to how much you plan on shooting. I can load 100 rounds on my Dillon 550 in 10-12 minutes- an average of about 550 rounds/hr. A turret press is probably good for about 150 rounds/hr, which would take about 40 minutes for those same 100 rounds. Get a press that fits your consumption needs and you won't have to spend all of your spare time reloading.

There is no reason you can't learn to reload on a progressive. Start off by running one case at a time through the machine until you get the hang of it.
 
Dillon Square Deal B is what you want.

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Square deal is an excellent machine, I am very happy with mine.

The shell plate (the thing that you put the brass in to) auto indexes which means that it turns when you turn the handle. This helps reduce the chance of making a mistake significantly. Dillons are guaranteed for life. They seem to hold their value well - I paid $400 for mine used, but it came set up with 2 calibres. I may have saved a few bucks buying from someone else, but I know the guy I bought it from and that was worth something to me. One of the drawbacks to it is that you can only use Dillon square deal dies with the press, but this doesn't bother me. You certainly can learn on that machine, it is very easy to use.

When it is set up and running you put in 1 empty piece of brass in the first station, put a bullet in the third station, pull the handle and you have 1 completed round.
 
oneskilledshooter said:
If you want to do modest volumes single stage is fine.

If you want .40 for IPSC or other high volume shooting sports the single stage will be pretty tedious.
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+1 there

I started out with a Lee progressive ... Realized I needed to learn more before using progressive ... Went to a Lee single stage ... Then back to the Lee progressive until I realized how big of a POS it is ... Now I'm at the point where I shoot ipsc and need the ability to load 500 rds quickly ... Hornady LNL AP with case feeder and bullet feeder does it for me now ...

Like others have said, figure out how much you will be shooting and go from there ... No sense spending all sorts of money if you don't need to
 
Thanks Guys...lotsa valuable info! I appreciate it...
I'm starting to get involved with more IPSC & IDPA. So, it sounds like I'll need the higher capacity of a progressive & might outgrow the single pretty quickly.
 
If you're just doing pistol, I'd go Dillon or Horn. and you can load alot in a short time and it will be good quality ammo. If you decide instead to go single stage, I'd suggest Forster, Redding, Rcbs, or Horn., ABL(anything but Lee). Life's to short to try to make quality ammo with the cheapest, flimsiest equipment.
 
LEE only makes 2 good presses, their cast turret and cast single stage. The PRO1000 and Loadmaster are complete junk. Their dies however, are really good for pistol, and awesome for rifle neck sizing. I can't think of much else they offer that is worth spending money on, yup that's about it: LEE classic cast, turret, carbide pistol dies, and neck sizing rifle dies.

Everything else you should be getting from Redding, Forster, Lyman. RCBS is overpriced and overrated. Dillon stuff is top notch, along with their awesome warranty. I've heard good things about Hornady equipment, but I only use their bullets.

I own the LEE single stage and turret press, and I used to own a .40S&W pistol, so I know what I'm talking about. You will be able to reload 150-200 rounds per hour on the turret. The vinyl or nylon piece that turns the turret will wear out every 3000'ish rounds, but they cost $1.00 and take about 1 minute to swap out. You'll have to purchase a set of dies and a factory/taper crimp die along with the cavity hopper that goes on top. You're looking at $200'ish to get the equipment, and whatever you want to pay for components.

There is no point going with the LEE single stage press because the turret costs only a few dollars more. You could go fully blown precision if you plan on shooting more than 500 rounds / month, which is what I'd do.

Go on youtube and watch how these presses operate. You'll have to endure the brushcuts and their para-military vernacular, but it will give you a good idea of what's out there.
 
Also, here's the best advice I can give you for starting out. Zero your scale when you get it, so long as that's done, you can't go over the maximum load. Don't assume it's accurate at first, weigh something to find out.

When I first got my turret press, I assumed it was zeroed out of the box, and then churned out 500 rounds of max loads of 38spl. Turns out my scale was 1.1g over for that powder, so I was loading with 4.6g of bullseye.

Had that not been a Ruger, well, I may not be typing as fast as I can today.

EDIT: I still have 50 rounds of 30-30 and 60 rounds of 7.62x39 that I loaded with that scale. The question is, should I pull them all or wing it? They were all loaded to max!
 
Something else I just thought of (beer will do that to you!) :)

Start buying your equipment now. If you try to buy even just a cheap set up, it's still a bit of cash to get going. Buy your scale, calipers, case gauges for the calibers you need, get a bench built (if you don't have one already), start buying some components (primers, powder, bullets) just do a bit at a time so it doesn't break the bank all at once. HTH!
 
Rocket Surgery said:
Also, here's the best advice I can give you for starting out. Zero your scale when you get it, so long as that's done, you can't go over the maximum load. Don't assume it's accurate at first, weigh something to find out.

When I first got my turret press, I assumed it was zeroed out of the box, and then churned out 500 rounds of max loads of 38spl. Turns out my scale was 1.1g over for that powder, so I was loading with 4.6g of bullseye.

Had that not been a Ruger, well, I may not be typing as fast as I can today.
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Ouch! Forgot that one! Read the instructions! When I first got my scale I read the manual and it said to zero it before doing anything. Good tip!!
 
Money Cop said:
Thanks Guys...lotsa valuable info! I appreciate it...
I'm starting to get involved with more IPSC & IDPA. So, it sounds like I'll need the higher capacity of a progressive & might outgrow the single pretty quickly.
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So, if high volume shooting is in your future, at least go with a Dillon or Hornady's LNL....You will be glad that you spent the extra money rather than going cheap on a Lee...You also should determine the number of calibers you will possibly reload for, since the Dillon Square Deal only loads a small number of pistol calibers...If eventually reloading many different calibers is in your future, look at the Dillon 550...Can handle 160 different calibers...It's manual indexing is not a big problem, and as a matter of fact, it can reload like a single stage press....
 
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