who is a reloader here?

[Mr.LaBella]

question posed for another prominent member NOT meself.

I need information

[swampwolf]

I reload, what kind of info do you need??

[Peter Lezard]

I've done some as well..Rifle? Pistol? Shotgun? All three????

[Tinysd]

I was talking to the little one about it and he decided to post for me.

I have decided to start reloading .45 and .44. I had no idea where to start, but called a buddy and he pointed me in the right direction. Then I see my neighbor and ask if he reloads. I hit the mother load! He has an entire room dedicated to reloading. We spent a couple of hours talking and I learned a lot.

I look forward to any tips and advice you guy's can provide.

[Peter Lezard]

....Sounds like your off to a good start! Just watching your neighboor do it will answer many of your questions, a thousand words and all that. First things first, have a place in your house just for your reloading. It dosent have to be a whole room, but someplace where ONLY reloading stuff goes.
Then we will talk about a press.............

[tmik]

get a dillon fully automatic progressive reloader, you can start your own armory...

[Tinysd]

get a dillon fully automatic progressive reloader, you can start your own armory...

I am going with the 550.

[TheBadGuy]

I used to reload allot when I was younger. I started off with the most standard press you get can. A single die press. That sucked, I switched to a Lee 3 turret press and was actually pretty happy with that one. After that, I got a fully automated kit/press and was not happy. I ended up going back to the 3 turret set up. That was not a Dillon and this was over 10 years ago so I am sure there have been advances. I am not familiar with the balls out automated style presses of today so I can't be of help there. The main things I learned were:

1-NEVER EVER skip crimping. It doesn't matter if the bullets seem "tight" in the brass, crimp anyway (blew up a Tec-9 this way)

2-Get carbide dies ONLY, most if not all hand gun dies usually are anyway, but when I reloaded 223, I had to lube the casings and that was messy and sucked. I also went through a couple sets of dies by getting some jammed. If I remember correctly, they had carbide bits for rifle dies but they were very expensive

3-Check you loads. I had tried both the type of automated powder set up with the plastic discs and the kind with a handle where you manually turn the handle to dispense powder and I would still weigh the powder every 10 round or so and do visual inspections

I am not sure if any of these even apply to the Dillon press your looking at or not. I miss reloading but don't have a garage in the house I am at now or no viable place to do it but when I move, I will defiantly set up a new station.

[SuperD]

I have toyed with the idea for a while. My dealer reloads and he is a friend of mine. I have reloaded for myself with him a good bit. Not sure if it is really worth it.

You do it either 1-to save money or 2- to improve accuracy.

1-Not sure once you calculate the initial investment and possibly more importently the time spent that you really save all that much money. If you are shooting some common calibers-.223, .45, .40- you can get them so damn cheap anymore. Not sure you are really saving.

2-Some of the better factory loads are so damn accurate, not sure I can do better.

[swampwolf]

I have a Dillon 550B, however, I only use it to load small batches and have never hooked all that other stuff to it. It's a great press.

Like TBG said, you MUST crimp auto pistol cartridges. But, I never crimp rifle cartridges that I load for a bolt rifle. I do however resize ALL my brand new brass before I load it so the bullets will fit consistantly.

When I first started loading, it was so confusing because there seemed to be so much equipment involved. After awhile I realized that you dont need one of everything in the Midway catalog to load fine ammo that is on par or better than the best factory ammo.

Good luck, have fun, and NO SMOKING!

[BigJim]

OH boy Tiny I would not get your reloading info here. The dangerous BS about crimping alone here should convince you of that.

Go the the Highroad and ask there.

1. Crimping 101. The answer is it depends!! The are different types of Crimp for different applications. Straight wall pistols cartridges for example 9mm, 45 auto and so on The bullet is held by neck tension PERIOD. The TAPER crimp die is solely to remove the bell from the case mouth that you put there in order to seat the bullet. PERIOD IN END OF STORY. Tight crimps will cause LOOSE BULLETS in straight walled cases.

2. Revolver ammo typically uses a different crimp. And the Bullets are different too! They will have a crimp Grove on the bullet and the ROLL crimp ( totaly different die) actually is to keep the bullet in place under the heavy recoil of Magnum class revolvers.

3. Rifle Loads are different yet again. You can just neck size for bolt guns. But not for lever or self loaders. How you apply a Crimp is different depending on application, caliber, weapon type, Bullet type.

So you see that there is much to learn. There are no EXPERTS in reloading. Just some with more experiance than others. Saddly there are many that have been practiceing crap for years and have become crap masters. Get THREE RELOADING BOOKS from different authors.

Read the how too section in each. Read the specs for the ammo you want to make. You will notice something right away! The books are in conflict!! Worse they will differ year to year! What you need to do is Start slowly on a single stage press with conservative loads and LEARN about what you are doing. Its not money wasted no matter what press you end up buying later. You will ALWAYS need your single stage press for load development and small batches.

Progressives are wonderful I run two Dillion 650's and another Dillion Square deal press. I used to shoot at my peak as many as 5000 rounds a month of 45 ACP.

And last this little bit of wisdom. Reloading is a complex process. Like all complex activities is it subject to failure and this failure can kill you. We have accidents normally not becuase of one error but because of a Stack of errors each make the next worse. Tolerance stacking in ammunition manufacture will KILL YOU DEAD DEAD DEAD.

How do we fight this? We don't compromise ANYTHING for speed or comfort. Fight the accident at the begining of the chian of failure not at the end.

So far your on the right track. Learn before your do. Kudos

[RXX]

I am going with the 550.

That is what I'm talking about! Get the 550 and don't look back. I still use a RCBS Rockchunker for my rifles.

[Slick]

I've been reloading for 24 years - but ONLY using single stage presses...

Post up, Ron - I'm sure one of us should be able to help.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

If this is your question - Tinysd, I can't help with progressives. I got into reloading for maximum potential accuracy and not volume.

[swampwolf]

Im still not sure about how the crimping info was bad. Maybe not detailed, but not bad. I assumed Tinysd was going to read a manual. Sorry for endagering your life Tiny.

Benign info:

-Start slow

-Read the directions

-Load mild and work up in tiny incriments and watch for preasure signs.

-Hotter does not mean better.

-Wear safty glasses.

[TheBadGuy]

I said what I said about "crimping=use of the crimping die" b/c after a couple years of reloading, I was doing a batch of about 300 9mm rounds for a day at the range and I did the following:

-Cleaned brass
-Ran brass through die #1: "resize and primer remover die"
-Reprimered brass
-charged brass with appropriate powder
-Ran brass through die #2: "seating the bullet die"
-skipped die #3 "crimping die" b/c the bullets looked seated fine and not loose at all

Well during the course of firing those 300 rounds several must have had the bullets come loose in the casings and some gun powder built up in the trigger assembly area. Enough that within the first 100 rounds or so it had ignited and I had a KaBoom!! It blew the magazine out and to the ground and the side of the polymer frame out. Luckly no one was injured

So let me rephraze what I said about crimping. B/C I know my rifle dies didn't even have a crimping die and different situations call for different actions but this stands true and I am far from a reloading expert myself.

1- DON'T SKIP ANY STEPS

there.. I should have said that the first time