RCBS Chargemaster 1500 vs A&D FX-120i

RangerPark

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Hello Everyone!

I recently decided to make the move to the FX-120i and Auto Trickler combo. I ordered both at the same time but the FX-120i got here first so I thought I'd try it out. I ordered the scale from Cambridge Environmental. They were good to deal with, no problems there.

First impression on the FX-120i is that it looks like a solid unit. Well packaged, easy to put together, as you can see from the photos it's fairly large. The FX-120i doesn't come with a calibration weight. I wish I had known, but it's my fault since I didn't look into it. Nothing Amazon couldn't solve.

Since I wanted to compare it to the Chargemaster, it then made sense to use the same calibration weights for both. The Chargemaster comes with 2x 50 gram weights, the FX-120i needs a 100 gram weight for calibration, so I calibrated both scales with the same weights.

I zeroed both scales with RCBS scale pan. I then used the Chargemaster to measure 20 charges of 44.0 grains of IMR 4064. Each charge read 44.0 on the Chargemaster and I used the FX-120i to re-measure each one. I got the following results:

44.12, 44.02, 44.04, 44.06, 43.98,
44.04, 44.10, 44.04, 44.02, 44.12,
44.06, 44.04, 44.12, 44.04, 44.06,
44.04, 44.02, 44.02, 44.04, 44.12.

I then used the FX-120i to confirm what weight range would result in a 44.0 reading on the Chargemaster. I determined that the Chargemaster would indicate 44.0 grains for charges between 43.92 and 44.12 grains as measured on the FX-120i.

That's a difference of 0.2 grains, which happens to be the Chargemaster's smallest weighing increment. That's about 10 granules of IMR 4064 or Varget. So the claim that the FX-120i measures to the granule seems to hold true.

That's all I have to report for now. For those of you that were wondering, the FX-120i definitely seems to be a step up in accuracy. When I get the Auto Trickler, I'll do a speed comparison between both.

Cheers! And fire away with the questions if you have any.

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Thats the setup i want.

I see the creator of the auto trickler just placed 9th overall at the nationals this year as well.
 
The test results of the OP are the same as ones I got. Now I use the Chargemaster to throw close (say 38.5 when I need 38.7 for example ) then trickle into the pan when it is on the FX 120i -which does, indeed, measure per granule of Varget at 0.2 :)
 
I did something similar a little bit ago.

The Chargemasters are pretty good considering how much they cost and how fast they dispense.

I went the A&D route as it is faster while being more accurate - A good investment IMO.
 
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