Who knew a Rock Chucker could break in half???

Rule3 said:

That event has been determined classified, top secret and any and all information has been deleted, scrubbed from any data sources.
Dillon has Govt contracts, they have excellent "damage control" methods

There is no knowledge of such a thing ever happening, All witnesses have disappeared.

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The compound leverage block broke on my Dillon 550B. I forget when, but I bought the thing in the middle 1980's and I have no idea how many hundreds of thousands of rounds that thing has made. My Dillon 550B press has an aluminum frame and leverage block, given enough load cycles, aluminum will always fatigue fracture. Dillion asked for my press back and they fixed it for free. Dillon has a great "NO BS" warranty: I am a happy customer. I am sure RCBS will do the same for the OP.

Slamfire said:

The compound leverage block broke on my Dillon 550B. I forget when, but I bought the thing in the middle 1980's and I have no idea how many hundreds of thousands of rounds that thing has made. My Dillon 550B press has an aluminum frame and leverage block, given enough load cycles, aluminum will always fatigue fracture. Dillion asked for my press back and they fixed it for free. Dillon has a great "NO BS" warranty: I am a happy customer. I am sure RCBS will do the same for the OP.

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Thou shall not say anything 'negative" about Dillon
Beware of black SUVs and helicopters
This post will disappear.

Rule3 said:

Thou shall not say anything 'negative" about Dillon
Beware of black SUVs and helicopters
This post will disappear.

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That's far from a negative. The press is 30 years old. A part wore out and they fixed it. I would consider that a positive review.

Rule3 said:

That event has been determined classified, top secret and any and all information has been deleted, scrubbed from any data sources.
Dillon has Govt contracts, they have excellent "damage control" methods

There is no knowledge of such a thing ever happening, All witnesses have disappeared.

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Oh, did I say Dillon? My mistake, I meant that other press made by the other guys.

I will now recite “Dillion is great” 50 times and paint my face blue for family Christmas photos

Thou shall not say anything 'negative" about Dillon
Beware of black SUVs and helicopters
This post will disappear.

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Oh, did I say Dillon? My mistake, I meant that other press made by the other guys.

I will now recite “Dillion is great” 50 times and paint my face blue for family Christmas photos

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All right guys, Let's not get any brand wars started here. We have been refreshingly absent from that for a few years now and I am grateful for that.
This is coming from a Hornady guy.
I remember the smurf,Hornady wars too,
There's nothing wrong with Dillon, Hornady, RCBS, Redding, Lyman, or Lee for that matter. They are all good for who's needs they are made to meet.

I keep wanting to hope that's all behind us now.

OP - Please report on closure with RCBS. I have nothing but good things to say about their customer service. They will do right by you.

If you said how old the press is I missed it. I am curious if it fell into the "Cast in China" time period.

someguy2800 said:

If I wanted a deprimiming press I would get one of the Lee’s with through ram primer handling.
.

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One reason why I went with the LCT.

"with the handle down and the ram all the way to the top, turn your resizing die in all the way until it just touches the shell holder, then lower the ram and turn your die 4/1 more turn"......

the above RCBS instruction was meant to say "1/4 more turn"..... oops...

While I would be surprised if the OP didn't get a new press out of this, my experience with RCBS customer service isn't that stellar. They have looked after me about 50% of the time and sometimes they needed nudging to do that.
I started a long time ago and all my stuff was green and all of my old stuff still works as well as the day I bought it.
Products of latter years, not so good, especially since they started sourcing out of China.
Latest experience of just a few weeks ago was an email to them regarding bent decapping rods in RS dies. These dies are known to have this fault where the rods bend rather than slide up through the collet like the Lee dies.
RCBS sent me a nice email with the part numbers I needed to get to upgrade the dies and told me not to get any berdan primed cases into the mix. No suggestion that they would make good on the faulty parts.
I just straightened and heat treated the rods like they should have come from RCBS.

Rant over.

Have a Merry Xmas. (Are we still allowed to say that?)

Yep, that's what happens when you don't use case lube.....

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Or One Shot case lube

Hope RCBS makes it right for you.

This is why the USAF does not allow castings to be used for a primary load path for weapon carriage. Even the best USA made castings have internal flaws that cannot be found with standard detection methods.
Any casting will have inclusions. You can't get around it. The secret is to keep them from occurring near the surface.

They are superb presses but the primer catcher on the rock chucker sticks.

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There are a number of different catchers out there free to down load and 3D print.

Yeah, typical RCBS junk...

Thats true. And that one looks interesting. But just to be honest, I've used a RockChucker since the 70's and I miss catching very few primers. Sure, a few manage to escape but not enough to bother with. A hollow ram with a coke bottle under it would be great but..........

I have noticed a difference with the caliber of the case involved. A 20 or 223 caliber makes a better seal around the decapping rod and they seem to pop out with more enthusiasm than larger cases. All in all it seems to be an overstated problem.

jmorris said:

There are a number of different catchers out there free to down load and 3D print.

View attachment 817890

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Bfh_auto said:

In the past my best luck came from tacking, then bevelling it for welding. Epoxy melts at 900ish degrees and would contaminate the weld.

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Yea, that would be better. I don't weld, so I would need something to hold it together until I could bolt it up, then I would have to take it to a welder, so taking wouldn't work for me. I would only plan on epoxying the very center, and only welding the first 1/8 of the exterior. A tack would be better.

Welding cast iron is an iffy proposition at best. Even the best welder in the world will tell you this. You can make the pieces stick together again, but it will never be as strong as it originally was.

Brazing would be a much better process to repair this frame if you wanted to attempt it, but even the it would only be suitable for decapping, as it would still be too weak tor any high stress duty, and it is doubtful that it could be put back in perfect alignment well enough to be trusted for lighter duties such as bullet seating.

Cast metal can be finicky and most always not repairable back to original strength. As others have posted, please report back when you hear from customer service. If ever there was a valid warranty claim, this sure looks like one.

George P said:

Just call RCBS after Christmas and send them a pic; they will send you a new press. I have never found JB Weld to be worth a tinker's dam for holding anything that had any stress applied to it.

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Agree with calling RCBS. Mostly disagree on JB Weld. Surface prep is everything, but so is having the right surface area and volume of epoxy, and in some cases, re-enforcing materials. I have no idea how well it would work with a press - it might not last a cycle, but I have a few things that are stressed and hold together just fine with JB-Weld.

One example - I have an old Mauser that was repaired with JB, which has held up for years. Had a broken fore-stock, and replacements are non-existent. I'll admit to not having a lot of rounds through it since the repair, but it shows no signs of failure. I drilled the stock internally along it's length and used several ridged steel rods to re-enforce the weld.

Way back when, many years ago, we did not attempt to weld cast iron but only brazed it. I'm sure welding technology has improved, but I don't think the press would be strong enough (and the parts would have to be perfectly straight for ram to die alignment)..

WOW, next time use some case lube . bet ya RCBS will send you a new one !!!!! hdbiker

I've had the handle break off but nothing like that!

Day after Christmas is busy day for most consumer manufacturers. Brand new owners calling in asking how to use the thing, etc... Perhaps their busiest day of the year.
Patience, Grasshopper. Call again in a day or 2. I'd wager you have an improved response time.

So I called this morning when they opened and was on hold for 30 minutes. An operator came on and said they could call me back. Pretty sure they are on a skeleton crew the day after Christmas. Called back in just now and was on hold for 30 minutes again. Operator hopped on and I asked what their current wait time was. Her answer made me chuckle... "2 minutes to 24 hours." Well, okie dokey.

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This had to have happened to you at the worst possible time of the year for a quick response from anyone as others have said.
The next time you call and have to wait to get an operator, when she comes on tell her your press just broke completely in half for no reason.

See if it jogs them along any, she may move you up on the list. It's worth a try.