Essential gear you never use

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But a stuck case remover is one of those tools you have on hand and hope to never use. I reloaded for over 25 years before I stuck a case on a Sunday afternoon. All reloading stopped and I spent the next three hours building a stuck case remover. Fortunately, I have a lathe to whittle out metal parts.
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If you can build a case puller in 3 hours, you're way ahead of the curve, compared to spending possibly days trying to find something you bought 25 years ago and have never needed to use, before. :)
 
Yup another stuck case tool sits unused
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I also have an as-yet unneeded stuck case remover. I have as yet unneeded renter's insurance as well.

I have pretty much stopped using universal "one size fits some" loading blocks for charging cases with powder. The diagonal arrangement makes my head spin. I have those blue FA blocks now and find them much easier to confirm. Cheap insurance and a real time saver.
 
GLOOB said:
If you can build a case puller in 3 hours, you're way ahead of the curve, compared to spending possibly days trying to find something you bought 25 years ago and have never needed to use, before. :)
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When it comes to tools, I am pretty organized. Plus, I have duplicated sets of common tools stored in multiple locations. Saves me from a "Ponce de Leon" type search.:)
 
When it comes to tools, I am pretty organized. Plus, I have duplicated sets of common tools stored in multiple locations. Saves me from a "Ponce de Leon" type search.
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No way I could manage that. I can barely keep the stuff I commonly use organized; there's a lot of it. The rest gets shuffled around in various storage boxes until I finally start randomly throwing stuff that "doesn't make the cut" away. I'd just as well have the ability to make a tool than to store it, if I expected to need it once every quarter century! :)
 
Bullet pullers (both press and hammer).
The press type I have had for several years never worked on anything. It was over 40 years before I bought a kinetic, for $17. Taking into account the brass and bullets I have saved with it, it will be about 200 more years before it pays for itself. I AM a retired CPA.:D
 
It was over 40 years before I bought a kinetic, for $17. Taking into account the brass and bullets I have saved with it, it will be about 200 more years before it pays for itself.
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The best reason for pulling apart bad reloads is not saving money but saving firearms, fingers, and eyes from being subjected to a known bad round that somehow got mixed up with normal ammo.

A disassembled bad round can't hurt anyone.
 
But if you toss them in a box labeled "Bad Rounds" until you can toss them into the bottom of a pond they aren't going to hurt anyone.
 
I really can't think of a thing I have on my bench that I don't use. Some things get used very rarely but are still handy when needed. I'll never get rid of my manuals. My reloading setup is in the garage and I can't hit my router from there. Besides I have the pages for the loads I used marked and I can access the information I need in seconds.
 
My stuck case remover is still new and hanging on the pegboard above my press. It isn't going anywhere, but unused...
 
dickttx,

If your bad rounds are going to the bottom of a pond, you have no chance of ever salvaging enough components to pay for your puller.
 
That was before I bought the kinetic and was less than a dozen rounds. Since, I have probably salvaged another dozen with the kinetic.
 
I'm surprised someone said tumbler. I love that thing, I think of all kinds of things to throw in it. I have a 20mm Vulcan shell casing and intact marking slug I picked up at an air force test range when I was a kid, thought it would be fun to set them on my desk at work, threw them in the tumbler first, PRETTY. :) And with the tumbler goes a media separator.

I bought a Lee hand trimmer set for .30 Carbine, because I read that that cartridge is particularly fussy about case length, but the fit is so tight I can't get it into a lot of the cases anyway.

Ever since I read RC's recommendation of using a ziploc bag and some spray case lube, I will never use my lube pad or mica case neck lube again. EVER.
 
The powder trickler's been in the attic for 30+ years. You can made a case puller in 5 minutes. 1/2" or 5/8" nut, 1x1" piece of 1/4" steel with a 1/4" hole in the middle; or a stack of washers. Drill and tap the primer pocket for a 1/4" bolt, course or fine thread. 7/16" wrench.
 
beatledog7 said:
I have found the most redundant and unneeded tool on my reloading bench is the ubiquitous powder tricker. Here's why:

They're not tall enough and don't have enough horizontal reach to trickle powder onto the pan of my scale. If the thing can't drop powder where I need it, what's it for?

They're unstable; you need one hand to steady them while the other is turning the spindle.

I use my scale to do two things: calibrate my powder drop for bigger batches (>30 or so), and weigh charges one by one for small lots (<20 or so). I almost never run 100s at a time on my SS press. For those small lots I use Lee dippers to measure powder into the pan, and I've learned that it's pretty easy to tap a couple of flakes/balls/sticks of powder into the pan while I watch the readout change. I can even use the dipper to remove flakes/balls/sticks two or three at a time, resulting in very accurate weights.

So the trickler serves no purpose and sits in a drawer. What supposedly essential piece of gear do you guys never use?
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I guess you haven't seen this yet?
Hornady-Quick-Trickle-300x270.jpg
http://www.hornady.com/store/Lock-N-Load-Quick-Trickle
 
Don't mean to be a jackass but why would a redundant and unneeded tool be on my reloading bench? Those tools live in the spare dies cabinet. Just say'n
 
My .38spl trimmer just resides w/ the more useful ones...

Hand trickler via 30-06 case here...

I'm with beatle, saved hand etc, as well as squib-removal by pulling, no regrets.
and improved my load notes as result :)

Tumbler??... Really?? LOL I even keep coins and cases I'm "improving" in the media for all cycles....
 
The priming tool on my rockchucker, I've always used a Lee Auto Prime. Don't have to handle the primers, and I can watch football while I'm priming.
 
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