CMV
Member
SO taking a little break...this press has frustrated the bejeezus out of me today. If it can be disassembled, cleaned, lubed, reassembled, it had been done today. Ughhh....just one thing after another.....figure out why it's misbehaving.....load 50 rds....new problem.....tinker with that until it goes away....do 50 more....repeat.
Anyway, so far every problem has been resolved with something too tight or too loose, or something just needing taken apart, cleaned, & reassembled (although nothing was particularly dirty).
2 problems remain & I'm sort of at a loss. Dillon's call center hours are same as my work hours M-F, so don't have a chance to call & get their help until next Sat. I could call on lunch break or something but not being in front of machine would waste both our time...
Anyway, problem 1 I think is contributing to other issues. I get everything spotless, then in short order I have powder everywhere. Yeah, sometimes self-inflicted not noticing something didn't take a primer but getting better at the self-inflicted messes. Spent a lot of time tinkering with powder measure assuming that's what was making the mess. But it's coming from the shells moving to stations 3 & 4. The shellplate kind of snaps into position & stops abruptly which causes a little powder to bounce out of the case. Not much, but say 2-3 individual specs of powder (H335/WC844) but that adds up very quickly to powder everywhere. Charge is 24.6gr so not excessively high in the case.
Problem 2 is the priming system. Was real frustrated with it overall earlier today & thought about just selling the whole press - too much trouble and if I include problem solving time I'm faster on the LCT. Also thought long about just going back to hand prime off the press. Really liked the idea of getting away from that so tinkered on....I'm using mixed brass - probably 15 different HS in the mix. But every single one was checked for crimps yesterday as part of timming/deburring. So I'm 100% sure 0 crimps or poorly dealt with crimps are sneaking in. Some issues are from Hornady brass which never had a crimp & some LC that were done on super swage and this is probably their 4th or 5th time getting a new primer. So I'm getting the "feel" with experience but there is lot more variation between nothing (that felt like it didn't get a primer at all) to hard stop (something is really wrong). I wasn't expecting the middle ground between those 2 extremes to be so much (but sorted brass or not having 1x fired and 6+x fired in the mix - I'm probably to blame as much as primer system there. But the issue comes from the shell plate or the primer wheel (not sure which) not indexing just right. I've found the primer waiting to be inserted isn't perfectly centered under the shell plate - like the shell plate advanced a hair to far or the wheel not enough. This make the primer miss the pocket and jam. Happens enough to really disrupt rhythm and being new to it leads me to contribute my own stupid mistakes like not putting a bullet in place sending a charged case into the bin making yet another mess......
This happens only occasionally. Like 1 every 25-50 rounds, but here is an example of the primer being just far enough off it's not going to hit the pocket well and cause a hard stop.
Anyway, so far every problem has been resolved with something too tight or too loose, or something just needing taken apart, cleaned, & reassembled (although nothing was particularly dirty).
2 problems remain & I'm sort of at a loss. Dillon's call center hours are same as my work hours M-F, so don't have a chance to call & get their help until next Sat. I could call on lunch break or something but not being in front of machine would waste both our time...
Anyway, problem 1 I think is contributing to other issues. I get everything spotless, then in short order I have powder everywhere. Yeah, sometimes self-inflicted not noticing something didn't take a primer but getting better at the self-inflicted messes. Spent a lot of time tinkering with powder measure assuming that's what was making the mess. But it's coming from the shells moving to stations 3 & 4. The shellplate kind of snaps into position & stops abruptly which causes a little powder to bounce out of the case. Not much, but say 2-3 individual specs of powder (H335/WC844) but that adds up very quickly to powder everywhere. Charge is 24.6gr so not excessively high in the case.
Problem 2 is the priming system. Was real frustrated with it overall earlier today & thought about just selling the whole press - too much trouble and if I include problem solving time I'm faster on the LCT. Also thought long about just going back to hand prime off the press. Really liked the idea of getting away from that so tinkered on....I'm using mixed brass - probably 15 different HS in the mix. But every single one was checked for crimps yesterday as part of timming/deburring. So I'm 100% sure 0 crimps or poorly dealt with crimps are sneaking in. Some issues are from Hornady brass which never had a crimp & some LC that were done on super swage and this is probably their 4th or 5th time getting a new primer. So I'm getting the "feel" with experience but there is lot more variation between nothing (that felt like it didn't get a primer at all) to hard stop (something is really wrong). I wasn't expecting the middle ground between those 2 extremes to be so much (but sorted brass or not having 1x fired and 6+x fired in the mix - I'm probably to blame as much as primer system there. But the issue comes from the shell plate or the primer wheel (not sure which) not indexing just right. I've found the primer waiting to be inserted isn't perfectly centered under the shell plate - like the shell plate advanced a hair to far or the wheel not enough. This make the primer miss the pocket and jam. Happens enough to really disrupt rhythm and being new to it leads me to contribute my own stupid mistakes like not putting a bullet in place sending a charged case into the bin making yet another mess......
This happens only occasionally. Like 1 every 25-50 rounds, but here is an example of the primer being just far enough off it's not going to hit the pocket well and cause a hard stop.