Replacing my Lee Pro 1000 with a Six Pack Pro 6000? Good? Bad? Ugly?

ranbur

ranbur

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Hi all. My many year old Lee 1000 Pro is on it's last legs ... loaded tons of rounds ... thinking of replacing it with the newer Lee Six Pack Pro 6000 ...

Those of you that have the 6000 or transitioned from a previous Lee model ... are you happy? Pros and Cons of the switch?

Thanks for your help.
 
I have and use both, as well as a Loadmaster and 40 year old turret press and Classic Cast single stage.

The 1000 is for. 38 Special and .357, Magnum, the Loadmaster does my .40, and I now do 9mm on the 6000.

I don't have a bullet feeder on it. My set up is size and deprime in station one, Lyman M neck expander in station two, powder drop in station three, powder cop die in station four, seat in station five and crimp in station six. I have only loaded about 3000 rounds on it so far. I find I am slower with it than the Loadmaster. There is an extra station to keep an eye on as you go. I kinked the spring on the primer system shortly after I got it, so now I have a few spares on hand. I'm still not sure how that happened. Slow and smooth is what I found works best. This winter I sat down and did two batches of my 9mm loads. First one was 600 rounds, then came back and did another 700. Total time was about 2 and a half hours. Maybe a little more. One issue I want to address on mine is that the mechanism for shaking the primer tray doesn't work very well, so I have to manually give the tray a flick to make sure the primers slide down into the feed chute to keep it full.

My 1000 works well (it has loaded A LOT of revolver ammo), but the three extra stations on the 6000 sure are nice.

If you want the bullet feeder you can eliminate the powder check die, or the neck expander.

Also, the 6000 has a different footprint than the other four presses, so I had to drill new mounting holes in my bench for it.

Auggie D.
 
Even though I have two perfectly functioning Loadmasters, about two years ago I got a great deal ($290 US) on the new 6 Pack Pro so I picked one up in 9mm. So far I have been very satisfied with it. Since it has 6 stations you have a lot of flexibility as to how you configure it.

Mine is set up as:
Station 1 - size & deprime
Station 2 - prime, flare & powder drop
Station 3 - powder checker
Station 4 - bullet feeder
Station 5 - bullet seater
Station 6 - bullet crimper

The only real complaint I have had so far is the priming system. It's not a deal breaker but as Auggie noted, it has its quirks. The main one is that if the primer supply drops too low primers don't completely enter the feed slot from the primer trough and they jam up the works. Unlike on the Loadmaster the primer agitator does not do a very good job of shaking the primer tray so this happens occasionally. I found a low primer warning system on ebay which alerts me when the primer supply drops so that has rectified the problem.

Another issue arose when I bought the Lee Inline Bullet Feed system (not the old Loadmaster system which was total crap). The system itself is excellent but I noticed that because the shell plate rotated quickly the bullets would sometimes tip during rotation, especially with powder coated bullets (for some reason plated/FMJ bullets didn't seem to have this problem). I contacted Lee and they suggested I try two things: install their new Soft Twist Index Rod which slowed down the 'jerky' plate movement and replace the regular case flare insert with their new 'M" style insert. I added these two parts and the problem went away.

With those issues taken care of the press now runs very smoothly. There are also several simple improvements on YouTube that make it even better. I have since added a electronic bullet feeder so basically all I have to do now is pull the handle and out pops a fresh round.
And before anyone starts saying I should have bought a Dillon I should point out that even with all my upgrades including the electronic feeder I have less than $1000 into this whereas a similarly equipped Dillon 750 would run me twice that.

Overall l'm very happy with it.
 
Thanks to you both for the excellent and detailed comments. From reviews the 6000 sounds like quite an improvement over the 1000 ... sure hope so cause mine apparently arrives tomorrow!

Watching YouTubes it seems the fix for that spring crimping issue is either the coat hanger inside trick or the old arrow shaft on the outside ... to start I think I'll do the coat hanger version. Also fashion one of the rotating gates to stop the case feed jumping issue. Funny eh, all Lee's seem to come with quirks altho this one seems to have less.

Next question .. where did you order your extra springs, I prob should get a cpl ...
 
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I'll add too that the Pro 1000 was a good press as well at the time, it has loaded a ton of handgun ammo so it owes me nothing ... just getting worn out so rather than rebuild I'd rather sink the money into a newer version. Looking forward to the mail truck tomorrow ...
 
ranbur said:
Thanks to you both for the excellent and detailed comments. From reviews the 6000 sounds like quite an improvement over the 1000 ... sure hope so cause mine apparently arrives tomorrow!

Watching YouTubes it seems the fix for that spring crimping issue is either the coat hanger inside trick or the old arrow shaft on the outside ... to start I think I'll do the coat hanger version. Also fashion one of the rotating gates to stop the case feed jumping issue. Funny eh, all Lee's seem to come with quirks altho this one seems to have less.

Next question .. where did you order your extra springs, I prob should get a cpl ...
Click to expand...
I have used both the coat hanger and arrow shaft methods (in my case a metal straw from the dollar store) and they both worked well to prevent spring kinking. A couple of tips. Make them as long as possible and still be able to use the hooks at the ends of the spring. Also, if you use the tube method get the smallest inside diameter tube you can find that still allows you to insert the entire spring into it including the ends.

Luckily I live near the US border so I just order my replacement parts directly from Lee and have them sent to a shipping depot where I pick them up.
 
I gotta ask, curious and all…
What’s worn out on the Pro1000?
I’ve loaded tens of thousands of rounds on mine in a bunch of cartridges over 20+ years and burned out my share of parts but I’ve yet to get to the point where any meaningfully expensive part is tipping the scales to full replacement.
I’ve found replacement parts are dirt cheap and even the upgraded parts are very affordable and work well.
Or is this just that you want to buy a new press or have the extra stations?
I get that but for me the Pro1000 always was, and still is the best value to generate the cheapest acceptable ammo quickly and to deviate from that just drives up the cost per round for the same equivalent ammunition (for my needs, yours could be different) and after figuring out all the Pro1000 quirks and cadence I’m not sure I’d want to deviate from it for likely a few inexpensive parts.
 
Wasrupzuk ... frankly I just finally got sick and tired of all the little idiosyncrasies of the thing. It worked great when it was new, loaded tens of thousands of rounds but in spite of replacing parts and maintaining over the years it just seems to have gotten worse and worse. Priming issues were forefront ... I even started using it as a single stage press where I'd de-prime everything, tumble then prime only ... still even then I'd get 5-10% culls where primers were in sideways, partially, not at all. or otherwise just not good. Yes I adjusted, cleaned and farted around tons over the years trying to get it right but never got it to a point of acceptable. I'm the kind of guy that just likes stuff to work when I use it, I don't want to have to tinker ... so it's not about price, it's about having something that just works. And yes, part of it is the "I want" factor ... I like new stuff :)
 
Nothing wrong with that.
No history with the newer Lee progressives but had a Hornady LNL with the electric case feeder for awhile and is was very smooth, a quality bit of kit.
Not sure if I’d want to drop the coin on a “higher end” Lee press though, if I was stepping up I’d look at brands known for good results with progressives.
Nothing against the Lee 1000 but I never liked the priming system on the loadmaster and their progressives are quirky at best. For $300 you can put up with it and get by, pretty well once you’re used to it as well, but if I parted with $700 or $800 and I got “quirky” I’d be a little hot under the collar…
I’d take a look at a Hornady or Dillon, I’d rather complain about the money spent than an aggravating press that’s quirky…
 
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