Well, santa came early this year and brought me a nice gift from Reloader's bench, a brand shiny new Dillon 650. For 4 years now I've been trying to do 'mass' reloading for my 45ACP with a Lee 3 stations Turret press for my practice and competition needs. Loading 200 rounds per week with a Turret proved to be a long, long task (4 lever strokes for each bullet made, manual primer feed, manual case insertion, manual power measuring), giving an average production of maybe a box per hour (50 rounds). Withing 4 years, my patience worn down (after over 45,000 rounds on a semi-single stage, it's easy to justify I guess) and the savings I made by reloading that much with cheap equipment stacked high enough to get the big toy.
After opening the two Dillon Precision boxes and removed all the components from them, my first tought was : "Damn... this is BIG!... and HEAVY!. There's no way that my reloading 'bench', which is more a re-assigned home-made computer desk made from pressed wood, will take the weight and the torque necessary to run this machine.
So after 7 hours (6 to reinforce the bench, and 1 to setup the machine), 1 sheet of 3/4 plywood, 75 wood screws, 4 stripped squared screwdriver bits, alot of swearing and a nice bruise on my head (this desk is damned low), I was finally running. I was really surprised to see how easy it was to assemble and adjust a machine that is quite complicated. The instruction manual is one of the best I've seen on the market, alot of pictures to illustrate the different steps of the assembly.
I also got a set of Dillon 45ACP carbide dies, which I was reluctant to buy at first because I was thinking about switching my Lee dies to the Dillon, but since I got a nice price for a set, I just told myself 'Why not...?' and now I think that it is worth every penny. The large flared mouth on the seating and cimping dies makes them ideal for a high-speed progressive, because even if the case (or the bullet) is not perfectly aligned with the die, it will go in anyways and align itself on the way up. Also, the 'switchable' seating stem in the seating die is a nice touch that could be quite useful if I ever want to load SWCs, but for now it'll stay on the RN side.
I was really surprised to see how little force it takes operate the machine, I was expecting that loading 5 cases at once would require a greatly superior amount of force compared to my Lee Turret, but I was wrong : it was as easy, if not easier. This is probably due to the very long lever throw distance. On my Lee, I would estimate the throw angle from primer seating position (fully up) to the fully down position to be at a maximum of 100 degrees, with the dillon, I'd say it is at least 120 degrees, if not more. Add this to a much longer lever, and you've got extra torque for the same amount of force. A side note, I highly recomment any of the both kind of roller handles that Dillon offers, I've tried the standard handle (with a big ball on the top) then the roller one, and have noticed a big difference : you do not have to relocate your hand on roller one while you move like you would do with the ball one, but I have yet to find a way to tighten the roller handle enough to restrain it from twisting while pushing down (if anyone has tips, please let me know).
Then, the almighty casefeeder, what a great time saving device, pour the clean casings, flip the switch, voilà, you've got yourself a bunch of ready-to-be-loaded cases. My only rant is that it makes alot of noise when it is filled with cases, but aside that, everything worked perfectly. Would I still buy one after trying one, probably, but remember that it is a quite expensive accessory.
The only less impressive point : the powder measure. For the 4 last years, I've been measuring my powder manually at first, then with a Lyman DPSII, both method gave me right-on-the-tenth-O-grain accuracy with the powder I'm using (Hodgdon Titegroup), which I got used to. With the mechanical powder measure, I was looking for 4.5 grains, which I got for 10 cases in a row, so I started reloading, checking 1 on 5 cases, I had a deviation going from 4.2 grains to 4.9 grains. I was wondering if I did something wrong while adjusting the power bar, again, any tips on this matter will be greatly appreciated.
The bottom line :
I'm really happy that santa 'brought' me this machine for xmas, and I am very satistied with it, and with Dillon's "No B-S" warranty, I don't think I'll ever have to worry about anything going wrong with this machine. Also, this machine probably saved my marriage, since making 300 rounds is now a matter of 15-20 minutes instead of 3 hours.
Merry Xmas to all 'Nutz.
P.S. What was the point of this post you'll ask? I'm still trying to figure it out myself, but I think that sharing my experience would be constructive.
After opening the two Dillon Precision boxes and removed all the components from them, my first tought was : "Damn... this is BIG!... and HEAVY!. There's no way that my reloading 'bench', which is more a re-assigned home-made computer desk made from pressed wood, will take the weight and the torque necessary to run this machine.
So after 7 hours (6 to reinforce the bench, and 1 to setup the machine), 1 sheet of 3/4 plywood, 75 wood screws, 4 stripped squared screwdriver bits, alot of swearing and a nice bruise on my head (this desk is damned low), I was finally running. I was really surprised to see how easy it was to assemble and adjust a machine that is quite complicated. The instruction manual is one of the best I've seen on the market, alot of pictures to illustrate the different steps of the assembly.
I also got a set of Dillon 45ACP carbide dies, which I was reluctant to buy at first because I was thinking about switching my Lee dies to the Dillon, but since I got a nice price for a set, I just told myself 'Why not...?' and now I think that it is worth every penny. The large flared mouth on the seating and cimping dies makes them ideal for a high-speed progressive, because even if the case (or the bullet) is not perfectly aligned with the die, it will go in anyways and align itself on the way up. Also, the 'switchable' seating stem in the seating die is a nice touch that could be quite useful if I ever want to load SWCs, but for now it'll stay on the RN side.
I was really surprised to see how little force it takes operate the machine, I was expecting that loading 5 cases at once would require a greatly superior amount of force compared to my Lee Turret, but I was wrong : it was as easy, if not easier. This is probably due to the very long lever throw distance. On my Lee, I would estimate the throw angle from primer seating position (fully up) to the fully down position to be at a maximum of 100 degrees, with the dillon, I'd say it is at least 120 degrees, if not more. Add this to a much longer lever, and you've got extra torque for the same amount of force. A side note, I highly recomment any of the both kind of roller handles that Dillon offers, I've tried the standard handle (with a big ball on the top) then the roller one, and have noticed a big difference : you do not have to relocate your hand on roller one while you move like you would do with the ball one, but I have yet to find a way to tighten the roller handle enough to restrain it from twisting while pushing down (if anyone has tips, please let me know).
Then, the almighty casefeeder, what a great time saving device, pour the clean casings, flip the switch, voilà, you've got yourself a bunch of ready-to-be-loaded cases. My only rant is that it makes alot of noise when it is filled with cases, but aside that, everything worked perfectly. Would I still buy one after trying one, probably, but remember that it is a quite expensive accessory.
The only less impressive point : the powder measure. For the 4 last years, I've been measuring my powder manually at first, then with a Lyman DPSII, both method gave me right-on-the-tenth-O-grain accuracy with the powder I'm using (Hodgdon Titegroup), which I got used to. With the mechanical powder measure, I was looking for 4.5 grains, which I got for 10 cases in a row, so I started reloading, checking 1 on 5 cases, I had a deviation going from 4.2 grains to 4.9 grains. I was wondering if I did something wrong while adjusting the power bar, again, any tips on this matter will be greatly appreciated.
The bottom line :
I'm really happy that santa 'brought' me this machine for xmas, and I am very satistied with it, and with Dillon's "No B-S" warranty, I don't think I'll ever have to worry about anything going wrong with this machine. Also, this machine probably saved my marriage, since making 300 rounds is now a matter of 15-20 minutes instead of 3 hours.
Merry Xmas to all 'Nutz.
P.S. What was the point of this post you'll ask? I'm still trying to figure it out myself, but I think that sharing my experience would be constructive.
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Deal with the wife.
