Lee turret presses?

dudley2112

dudley2112

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Are lee turret presses any good? Either model, are they a good buy in terms of quality for the price. Or would i be better off saving up and buying a RCBS, Redding or Lyman?

Thanks

Alex
 
I have a Lee Turret press and two Lee Pro 1000's. Good reliable stuff. The 1000's take some getting used to, but once you do you can really crank out the rounds. I'd recommend them to anyone.
 
I have the Lee turret press and I can hammer out 150-200 rounds of .38 special per hour. The actual quality of the cast aluminum press isn't bad, but it only took a week for the exposed mystery metal was rusting.

I would say you can't beat this press for the price, it pumps out quality ammo and it's easy to operate. You can pay for the thing in 2 hours of reloading.
 
I use an older Lee turret press for all my pistol ammunition. Manually rotate it.
FL size, decap. Tumble. Prime using a Lee priming tool. Expand and charge on press with Lee disc powder measure; rotate and seat.
Have turrets with 9mm, .38/357, and .45ACP. dies in place.
Have used it for years, works fine.
 
chise said:
I have the Lee turret press and I can hammer out 150-200 rounds of .38 special per hour. The actual quality of the cast aluminum press isn't bad, but it only took a week for the exposed mystery metal was rusting.

I would say you can't beat this press for the price, it pumps out quality ammo and it's easy to operate. You can pay for the thing in 2 hours of reloading.
Click to expand...

The rust is from the sweat/oils on your hands. A light coat of gun oil takes care of it.;)
 
I use a Classic Turret for loading 9mm and find it works ok. You have to do your own quality control and set it up for the play encountered when the turret plate rises in it's channel on the bullet seating stroke. Keep your calipers handy and you'll be fine. I also find my life is easier when I tumble, de-prime, clean pocket, de-burr and prime off the press, but that's just me. Can't beat Lee for budget reloading. However, as one old timer who really knows said to me, "you might as well buy a Dillon first, 'cause if you stay in this game long enough you buy one eventually anyway." If you've got the coin (I don't) buy a Square Deal or 550.
 
I have been doing great with me classic turret, very rigid construction. I'm going to be upgrading soon to a progressive though, just can't get enough rounds out fast enough.

My turret usually does about 175 rounds per hour, but thats on casings that have already been sized, cleaned and primed.
 
The lee turret press does the job for me. I load 9mm and 308.
I had it upgraded, so that it can fit the primer feeder. I also have a 4 hole kit - havent' converted yet. as I don't need it. Its kick ass value for what you get...
the only piece on there that ever fails is that plastic gasket looking thing that wears out. It makes the turret rotate.

Whenever my mother in law visits, I make her reload as penance for staying with us. But I tumble the brass for her first. She deprimes, primes,, resizes, load the charge, seats the bullet. no problem.
 
Bought a Lee turret press years ago and love it! It's paid for itself many, many times over with all the ammo I've loaded on it. Never had a problem with it yet <knocks on wood>.

(E) :cool:
 
I'm going to list the things I like and dislike about the Lee turret press:

Dislikes:

You do get some play from the floating turret when you're crimping and FL sizing.
I personally find it doesn't seat the primers as well as the auto-prime tool.
The plastic square that the indexing rod glides against worries me.
The safety prime attachment falls off when the trigger stays in the forward position during an up-stroke.
Mystery Metal.
The auto-disk measure uses a cavity system which can be static. I also find the load charts provided by Lee are way off. The .35 cavity was a whole grain off when I weighed my charge.
The auto-disk powder measure is a pain to take off and move to another turret if your seating die sits high (like all mine do)

Likes:

The entire set works out to $165.00 + tx you just need dies.
You're not constantly dicking around with primer systems, case feeders, bullet feeders, spilled powder, etc.
You get the sensitivity of a single stage press with three times the speed
[You can disable the indexing rod in under a minute and have a single stage press for rifle
It simply works, it's Lee's best product in my opinion. The only other press I like that they make is the breech lock challenger, but why bother if the Turret press can do just as much
 
My biggest dislikes (as Chise mentioned) is the plastic square that indexes and the "auto-disk" measure.

I just switched powders from W231 to Bluedot for .40 and 9mm...anyhow, the chart was only a few tenths off with the W231...but the .66 cavity was a little over a grain lighter than what the chart showed. It surprised me, so I checked the scale, checked the chart, checked the scale, checked the chart, disassembled and reassembled the powder measure a few times but always ended up with the same results.

Other than those two issues, I'm satisfied with the Lee Turret. :D
 
If I didn't have a Loadmaster. I'd go for the Classic Cast Turret.

if i buy the press, what does it come with and what do i need to buy for it other then dies. Im only using a single stage press at the moment
Click to expand...

You can buy the old style turret with powder measure and powder scale, as a kit. You can start loading with this basic set-up.
 
chise said:
Yeah the chart just tells you which cavity to start with.
Click to expand...

Same problem with me too, I compared the chart specs against my digital scale, wasn't all that close. I ended up sanding out the inside of one of the cavities to get it exactly where I want it.

I only load one caliber, so I didn't mind altering a disk.
 
OMG! The Dillon snoots haven't shown up yet! ;)

There may be better presses out there but value for the dollar Lee is still the best deal around. Makes great ammo at 1/2 to 1/4 the cost of others.

I may have upgraded to the Loadmaster but my Turret still cranks out my revolver, match 45 and lots of rifle ammo, too. :)

On a side note, if you can afford it and want to buy the pieces separately, the Classic Turret is much better. I'm going to change mine for the Classic one of these days. But if you want the whole kit (except dies and primer feeders), you can't beat starting off with the Turret Kit they have.

The great thing with Lee is that it leaves extra $ for extra dies, electronic scales, tumblers and other necessities.
 
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