Is a turret press much quicker?

At a comfortable rate (not rushing) I can easily get 200 rounds per hour out of my Lee Classic Turret with the auto-index feature. I know a lot of people say they get 250, but I'm not trying to set any speed records.

You get some time advantage over a single stage press if using Lee's turret press with its auto index feature. You perform all the operations to create a loaded round without touching the case albeit with four or so cycles of the ram.

With a turret press from Lyman or Redding, the advantage is having all dies set up in the press reducing the time to change dies. The turret needs to be indexed manually.

I've never used a Redding or Lyman turret press, but I feel that I would still batch process cases like I do on a single stage. Once all cases are resized, then expand the case mouth, and so forth. So, I do not see any time advantage.

Users of these turret presses will have a better insight.

I used to get about 200 hour as well, but I couldn't do that now. I had more energy back then! That was with the Lee Deluxe 3 hole turret.

Another vote for 200 rounds per hour on a LCT.

This is opposed to the 50/hour with a single stage and 400+ that you get with a progressive.

Here is a Recent Video on the Lee Classic Cast Turret Press.
He is doing about (4) per minute.
This puts him at 200-250 per hour.



So if a Single Stage does between 50-100 per hour it is considerable.

You also do not get more complex with a turret. It is still just a single case.

Another post to say that, yeah, the LCT is faster than a single-stage, but not as fast as a progressive. Ultimate speed will be dependent, to some extent, on your dexterity with your left hand... right hand is generally going to run the handle, while the left handles cases, seat bullets and, if you don't want to mess with the primer feed system, drop primers.

I agree. 200 rounds per hour on a LCT with auto index is a very reasonable estimate.

The Lee is faster than a single stage, but not less work. You still pull the handle 3-4 times for a loaded round since you are working one case at a time.

Whiterook808 said:

The Lee is faster than a single stage, but not less work. You still pull the handle 3-4 times for a loaded round since you are working one case at a time.

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Perfectly true. But you handle the case 75% fewer times if you use a case kicker. The time savings is real.

Not much, still the same number of strokes per round. The speed of a progressive comes from doing all of the operations simultaneously vs sequentially.

drband said:

Perfectly true. But you handle the case 75% fewer times if you use a case kicker. The time savings is real.

Click to expand...

Very true, and that is not insignificant even if you don't have a case kicker. Also if you are not charging cases while expanding on the single stage that is another savings.

Yep. Most (perhaps all) of the savings comes in not handling the case a bunch of times.

I like a single stage because I have many cases in several calibers that have many loadings on them. It lets me inspect the cases at every step , So I can discard any case that I find to be unsafe prior to the final loading process. I'm retired I have the time but it is slower. About 50 rounds per hr. is the best I can do.

jmorris said:

Not much, still the same number of strokes per round. The speed of a progressive comes from doing all of the operations simultaneously vs sequentially.

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Saying a turret is not much faster than a single stage is like saying a car is not much faster than a bicycle. That's sort of true, if you are looking at them from 10,000 feet in an F-22, which is what some progressive-users tend to do.

But it's not true if you're in the car passing a bicycle.

The LCT turned the reloading world on its ear. Their carbide dies worked as well as others. Lee dies cost less. I use my Lee turret turned by hand. I am loading 308's with a long cast bullets. The round was too long with indexing part in place. I don't use the auto feature. The four hole turret is a winner. Even with my Dillon there is no speed race. My suggestion is to focus on quality of your reloads. If you can do the fast have at it. To many reloaders a strong single stage is a necessity in addition to a progressive press for handgun rounds.

I use the LCT for pistol rounds, size and prime before "reloading". I can get 150-200 per hour that way. It is what it is, so I don't worry about speed, I do pay attention to powder charges, O/L and such.

Have a blessed day,

Leon

I used my single stage press (RCBS JR3) from the mid'70s until about 5 years ago when I bought an LCT.

With the stock LCT with a Lee Auto-Disk or -Drum incorporated I can easily produce 175-200 pistol rounds per hour.

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EDIT: The above process involves resizing & priming straight-side, unlubed, pistol cases using a carbide-ring die.

4 Stations: Resize/Prime, Propellant Drop, Seat Bullet, "Crimp"

Not hard for this old retired guy to turn out 175 to 200 pistol rounds per hour on the Lee Classic Turret Press. I do prime off the press, which could account for my production rate. My hands don't work as well as they used to, but I can still crank out a few rounds. I really don't try for speed, I have an led mounted light and check every round for powder. I also verify the powder drop every 10th round with a digital scale that has been checked with a beam scale. Check COL at the setup and validate every 20 rounds. When I move on to a progressive, it will have some kind of automated powder level verification device and I'll probably still check COL every 20 rounds. Yea, I'm overboard on the safety thing.

Been using a LCT for a long time. The 200 rounds per hour is stretching it. Not saying it can not be done but that is a HIGH limit. Maybe about 150 at a reasonable rate and no coffee!
Before that batch loading on a single stage. You gain a little bit of quantity with the turret but the real advantage is not handling the same piece of brass 3-4 times
If the dies are quick change on the single stage that saves having to screw them in and out (not a big deal but just something)

In a way I like single stage batch loading. You can do a lot of "mindless" routine and not worry bout things and stop when you want.

Deprime and size a few hundred, take a nap. Prime a few hundred, take a nap. etc etc.

I can easily load faster than 200 rounds an hour on an LCT... but I can't do it for an hour straight! Sort of like I can run ~10 miles per hour... but not for an hour. I'd rather hustle through 50 or 100 (at a rate faster than 200/hour) and then QC for a while. Sprint-and-drift, as the sub-hunters (used to?) say.

To answer to the OP question, "how much time a turret will save over a single stage press" a lot.
I use a Lee turret for small batches of ammo, 20 to 100 rounds. It works very well and it's convenient to have the extra turrets for each set of dies. For the quantities I load with it the time saved is mostly in setup. I don't use the auto index or prime on the press.
For batches of ammo over a couple hundred rounds I prefer a progressive press.

I have multiple turrets. So just being able to switch setups without changing setups is worth a to to me.

I don’t rush so I don’t worry about how fast I can load ammo. So I do about 100 rounds at a time. But I’d estimate I can do them at least two to four ties faster than with a single stage and that’s not rushing.

LCT lets me shoot a lot more! Every thing from .380 to 45-70. I started my reloading journey years ago using a Lyman 310 tool to reload 45-70 black powder cartridges. I bought a LCT and the flood gates opened. Very fast and it makes beautiful cartridges.

I use the Lee turret press, but do not do all 4 functions at once. I just don't trust powder drops anymore. First step is that I size clean brass then flare. From there on it goes in a can and I hand prime each (just like hand priming better). After that I run each charge thru a powder dispenser and set it in the tray, and when I have the number of trays filled I inspect by looking down at the cases and making sure each has powder (again) and doesn't look off. Then I seat the bullets in the tray, then press and taper crimp each round. After all rounds are done I use a color code I made up and a sharpie so that I know how many times the brass has been fired. After that I drop in a chamber checker just for S&G. If I'm reloading big rifle I don't even use the dispenser, I dip, weigh, and trickle. Not the fastest way and maybe not the best, but gives me peace of mind. Biggest fear is not a double charge but a squib load. YMMV