Do I want to start reloading?

[Toprudder]

Well, my wonderful wife has been checking on this. Turns out, Amazon had the Lee Challenger Breech Lock kit, $116, free Prime shipping, and $50 off your purchase when you sign up for a no-strings-attached, cancel-anytime Amazon credit card. Happy birthday to me. And so it begins. I thank each of you for the advice, and will be checking this forum frequently for tips.

Not a bad deal.

You will need a tumbler. The Frankford tumbler comes as a kit with the media and separator. It is a dry tumbler and is the quickest/easiest method. (I now wet tumble, but I did dry tumble for a long time with the Frankford).

I would recommend getting a digital scale, if for no other reason that to give you a quick correlation for your Lee scale. One I have found useful and inexpensive is the Gem 20 that you can find on Amazon.

I used to own a Lee Challenger press. The only thing I did not like about it was the way it handled spent primers. The primers eject from the side of the ram, right above the base of the press. The primer residue would get on the outside of the ram and it required cleaning often. BUT, I was decapping all of my brass with a universal decapper, before I wet tumbled. This was in large volume, most of which ended up being loaded in my progressive press. I ended up selling the Challenger and getting a Classic Turret which I am very happy with. (The spent primers drop out of the bottom of the ram). In your case, it does not sound like you are going to be doing near the volume I do, so it may not be an issue. If it is, you can consider getting something like the Frankford universal decapper and doing that off the press, maybe while watching TV.

If doing rifle rounds, you will need case lube. For small production, I like the Imperial sizing wax. For quantity production, I like Royal spray lube.

For semi-auto pistol brass, I don't bother trimming. For revolver brass (roll crimped) or rifle brass, you will need a way to trim. I think the Lee kit comes with the cutter, but you will need to buy the caliber specific stem/shellholder kit for each caliber. They are inexpensive.

And don't forget a good manual - or three.

Good luck.

 

[badkarmamib]

I found the Frankford tumbler, looks perfect, I intend to go with that one. No, I will probably only be doing 50-100 cases in a sitting, max. My next purchase planned is a Lyman's manual. Was figuring on a digital scale, but choices are vast, hadn't been able to narrow it down any. Thanks.

 

[1895gunner]

Jump in with both feet and multiple reloading manuals - it will be something you will absolutely be glad you did.

1895gunner

 

[sugarmaker]

If you are 45 min from a range, I suggest a portable powder charge/ bullet seat kit you can take and work up loads at the range. I use a Lee hand press, hornady gs1500 scale, powder funnel. Kept with bullets and powder in a plastic GI style ammo box. Size, prime, flare, etc. on the main press and bring the prepped brass to the range.

 

[wrangler5]

FWIW, I started with a Lee Turret press 25-30 years ago, a gift from a grateful client. When my handgun competition needs outran the (comfortable) production rate of the turret, I got a Loadmaster. I frequently used the turret press as a single stage with pre-adjusted dies, and frequently use the Loadmaster as a semi progressive (for example, deprime and size before doing neck work on rifle cases, or deprime, size, prime and flare a batch of revolver cases when I'm going to try a bunch of different powders or charge weights 10-cases-at-a-time for a new caliber or bullet weight.)

When I got a bolt rifle I wanted to work up for 600 yard F-class competition, where I'd only make 10-20 rounds to check out some new variable (seating depth, or neck tension, for example) I switched to a Lee breech lock single stage. It's a terrific tool for that purpose, and while the breech lock collars add a bit of expense to a caliber, they take all the frustration out of die changing once they are set up. If a round gets screwed up at the seat or crimp stage, it's no real hassle to pop those dies back in and out to do a single round to fill out the box. You'll use that press for a long time, even if you move on to a turret or progressive press for higher volume output in the future.

I've used mostly Lee equipment since I started, and have been fully satisfied with every one of their tools that I've tried except the scale and the drum powder measure. The disk measures are fabulously consistent devices IF you use ball powders (which includes W231/HP38), which meter like water. But I just never could warm up to using the drum measure. YMMV, of course, but I have never regretted whatever it was that I spent on a Redding bench mounted powder measure about 20 years ago.

As for scales, I started with the RCBS (Ohaus) 505, and later moved to a Dillon digital. Digital scales give a terrific sense of precision, and are far and away the easiest way to sort bullets or cases by weight - find your "standard," zero the scale, and it thereafter displays over/under on each item without having to do any subtraction in your head. But I don't do much of that kind of weighing, and found over time that the Dillon wasn't holding a zero for long, so unless I watched it between each load to see that it was going back to zero I couldn't be sure it was reading properly. For the last couple of years I've been digital scale free, and using a beam scale again (first the 505, now a Lyman #5) quite happily - either of them will move when a single granule of Varget powder is added to the pan, so sensitivity is not a problem. And I do have access to laboratory grade gravity, which takes care of a lot of the consistency concerns.

So welcome to the fun. Learn first, and be meticulous. Thousands of reloaders have made millions of rounds without mishap by being informed and meticulous. And the folks on this forum are among the most gracious you will find when it comes to sharing the information.