Monday, March 8, 2010

Reloading Update- Lee-2 / JD-1

Well the Lee is still kicking my butt, but I was able to load over 200+ cartridges the other day in less than 2 hours.

My press does not like flat point projectiles and I mangled more than a few cartridges, but other than that I seem to have most of the press problems worked out. I found that the indexer/flipper were not the correct length and that the press was not fully indexing. The flipper is screwed on to the idexer and can be adjusted my screwing/unscrewing the flipper, two full turns and it's indexing fully. The sad part is that I did manage to break another primer slider and stripped the threads on the carrier hole, but the press is still operating.

I loaded up a watered down batch of 230gr FMJ-RN to try out today to supplement my 200gr flat point and SWC loads.

I still need to snap some photos of my test targets, groups, and work area for kicks, but it's starting to become less frustrating and more fun now that I'm getting more than just broken parts in return for my efforts.

I'm still under $200 on the press, even with the replaced parts. I will replace the carrier and order up some more primer sliders (I have two spares left) so I can keep the press running should something else break but it seems that most of my troubles were from the primer trough cover being damaged, once I replaced that and resized the indexer/flipper the press ran much, much better...but still not perfect.

Remember that I bough the press used, I need to properly identify the dies being used and see if the powder die is also an expanding die as adjusting that will help with my seating issues with those 200gr flat points.


More to come later.

1 comment:

  1. Update-I took of the powder die and readjusted it, the previous owner had it set for absolutely ZERO expansion. Note to self, if you're going to tear down, clean etc, go through the whole process, not just the parts you "think" are messed up.

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