Hornady Case feeder upgrades

Status
Not open for further replies.

Kaldor

Member
Joined
Feb 25, 2015
Messages
1,880
Location
Wisconsin
Ive had my LnL AP now for about about 8 years and in that time Ive run a few hundred thousand pieces of brass through it, prepping and loading. It has always had its issues, but lately its been struggling with feeding rifle cases with more than 50 cases in it. So I just recently 3d printed a new bullet feeder, and did a bunch of looking at motors for that, and started looking at motors for my case feeder.

I did some measuring and looking at model numbers and specs trying to figure out what the stock motor is but came up with pretty much nothing. I know that the Dillon motor is basically the same thing and found that the Dillon stock motor has about 12 in/lbs of torque. And because manufacturers arent likely to try and reinvent the wheel, I figured Hornady has be right around the same value. Those of you that dont know, Hornady and Dillon case feed plates are interchangeable between the feeders.

This is the link for the motor: https://www.grainger.com/product/DAYTON-DC-Gearmotor-12V-DC-52JE51
It has 40 in/lbs of torque at 12 RPM which is considerably more, but is a DC motor so you need this...
Power supply is a cheap laptop power brick: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07RGHBLGC
Good enough and has the connector you can wire up easily.
Speed controller is: https://www.amazon.com/RioRandTM-Upgraded-6V-90V-Motor-Controller/dp/B00F839VNQ
I wanted speed control so I can fine tune the feed rate slightly to help the feeder not be the Jam-O-Matic 1000 that it is sometimes. Just about any 12v speed controller will work, I just happened to have this one.
Other hardware needed: 4 1.5" 10/24 machine screws and nuts. 1 1/8x3/4 roll pin for the shaft to drive the plates. I got mine at the hardware store.

Qs5A6rg.jpg
LMdhbBF.jpg
Here is the stock vs the Dayton motor. The footprint is identical. Only difference is the Dayton has studs on it that have to be removed and then you drill out the holes to accept a 10/24 machine screw so you can bolt it in.

SqK2ODv.jpg
ei0jm2g.jpg
You do have to drill the motor both for the 1/8 roll pin thru the shaft, and them open the body holes up a hair to allow the 10/24 bolts to slip in. I could have measured the roll pin location, but I just eyeballed it and punched it. We arent building a church here! :)

FA7YsFo.jpg
Wiring is pretty simple. I re-used most of the factory stuff. Added a few jumper wires in that were needed, bolted down the speed controller, drilled a hole in the back for the power plug, and put a hole in the front for the knob. I just brought the positive from the PSU (blue wire) to the factory on/off switch, and then ran a longer jumper from the momentary switch to the speed controller + in terminal. Negative (white wire) comes off the PSU straight to the controller. Motor is just red/black wired into the appropriate locations on the controller. I could have used more appropriate colors, but I have alot of blue and white.

A few other improvements:

eMR5CCz.jpg
I made this ramp shortly after I got the case feeder. It helps prevent stackups and jamming.

I made this video 5 years ago when a few people asked me about it.
You can 3d print this part as well: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3173334
I havent printed it because my old one I made works just fine.

7VUrKuW.jpg
On my case feeder the loading gate wouldnt open all the way causing issues at times. I just cut the outside corner off at a 45 so it will open that last 1/4" on mine. You mileage may vary on this on as Hornady might have fixed it.

S92pEUb.jpg
QSY6d8o.jpg
I have run into issues where I wasnt getting quite enough time for 308 length cases wouldnt drop in time because the opening in the collator bowl was too small. I can see this effecting 30-06 length cases even more. I opened the opening up slightly with the Dremel. Gives me a little more adjustability and reduces jams.

mGIjvKM.jpg

And all done. Did it help? Well I can put 200 pieces of 308 into the feeder and it doesnt just sit there and angrily hum at you anymore. The Dayton motor has WAY more power, but it might be a little noisier. So I am happy with that. I have found that changing the speed on the feeder does reduce jams, especially with rifle cases, so there is a sweet spot. Total cost was probably $100 and 2 hours of my time.

For you Dillon guys, Im about 95% sure this would work in your feeders as well, and not cost you the $200 that Dillon charges for this upgrade. You may have to drill new holes to align the motor in your collator though as I think the hole pattern is different from the Hornady. Might even work better in the Dillon feeder because I can openly admit the Hornady feeder isnt nearly as nice.
 
If you take the old gear box apart, clean and add some fresh grease the old Hornady will be humming alone again. I had to clean mine up too (several years ago), started running slow then stopped. All it took was a little cleaning . Still running like a top.
 
If you take the old gear box apart, clean and add some fresh grease the old Hornady will be humming alone again. I had to clean mine up too (several years ago), started running slow then stopped. All it took was a little cleaning . Still running like a top.

I had considered that, but the motor has been hot more than a few times, so I dont think it is a lubrication issue. It just lacked, well, everything. Speed and power. The Dayton motor wins on both fronts.
I did want the speed control as well, so that was another win.
 
My first mods on collators was a Hornady pistol bullet feeder dedicated to my RCBS Pro 2000.....but I changed everything BUT the motor! That one used a one speed AC motor! What I wanted is to make it flip bullets and that was long before I bought a 3d Printer....and it only uses one plate for all size pistol bullets. Still works great so I haven't needed to replace it with a 3D printed one.;) Never had a case feeder until the 3D printer came. Now I enjoy three of those. One for the Pro 2000, one shared between the Pro Chucker 7 and Lee 6000, and one shared between the Lee APP and the Summit APP.

Always looks like Christmas at my house.....all that red and green! :)
 
I had considered that, but the motor has been hot more than a few times, so I dont think it is a lubrication issue. It just lacked, well, everything. Speed and power. The Dayton motor wins on both fronts.
I did want the speed control as well, so that was another win.

The motor is heating up due to excessive load in the gear box. If you just remove the drive gear you will find the motor is good. It's kind of like a clock motor very hard to burn out.
 
The motor is heating up due to excessive load in the gear box. If you just remove the drive gear you will find the motor is good. It's kind of like a clock motor very hard to burn out.
That's good to know, Mine probably has over 100k on it easily from when I used it to deprime all my 9mm for the last 13 years.
It's still running good and as far as jams in the plastic funnel up where the full switch is, I found that if I spray silicone down in there I don't get cases turning sideways and filling up the funnel and running over.
This is the link for the motor: https://www.grainger.com/product/DAYTON-DC-Gearmotor-12V-DC-52JE51
It has 40 in/lbs of torque at 12 RPM which is considerably more, but is a DC motor so you need this...
Power supply is a cheap laptop power brick: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07RGHBLGC
Good enough and has the connector you can wire up easily.
Speed controller is: https://www.amazon.com/RioRandTM-Upgraded-6V-90V-Motor-Controller/dp/B00F839VNQ
I wanted speed control so I can fine tune the feed rate slightly to help the feeder not be the Jam-O-Matic 1000 that it is sometimes. Just about any 12v speed controller will work, I just happened to have this one.
Thanks for posting this, I want to keep mine running as long as I can,
Mine will feed 9mm at just under 1800/hr and that's it's predominant use. It drops .41 Magnums well also.

I agree that speed control will help with making it drop more cases quicker instead of being a sit and spin with certain caliber cases.

I think I will put one of those speed controllers on mine now. I should buy the motor also while I can still get it.
While my case feeder only see's 9mm, and 41 magnums, and works very well with both, it can still be improved on.
I never tried to run rifle cases through it.
 
After I bought my Lee Ammo Processing Press, I added TylerR's caliber quickchange to it so I could feed cases to it with an electric collator. The interesting thing was, I only had Ammo Mikes's teeny tiny bullet collator (my first printed one) not being used elsewhere, so I printed a large pistol case plate for it and tested it using 9mm to 45 acp, and even .357 magnum, and all worked great using just that one big holed plate! I remember thinking that .223 wasn't that much taller than .357, so just for fun I tried collating .223 in that tiny thing....here's a video showing how that worked out .... for your entertainment: (I obviously prefer, and typically use lay down plates on a bigger collator for .223, but it will work in a pinch when one's too lazy to change collators.....;)

BTW, so you know the first case had a proud primer and it caught on the APP long enough to be sent flying....but that was a rarity. Normal cases with spent primers don't do that.



You guys ought to try holding a video camera in one hand and cranking in the other....the room won't state still! :)

Also you got to see how well the TylerR clutch system works! For the proximity switch to work for .223 cases I turn the switch in a few more threads.....and as this was a test on a whim, I didn't bother....no matter if you have a clutch!
 
Last edited:
That's good to know, Mine probably has over 100k on it easily from when I used it to deprime all my 9mm for the last 13 years.
It's still running good and as far as jams in the plastic funnel up where the full switch is, I found that if I spray silicone down in there I don't get cases turning sideways and filling up the funnel and running over.

Thanks for posting this, I want to keep mine running as long as I can,
Mine will feed 9mm at just under 1800/hr and that's it's predominant use. It drops .41 Magnums well also.

I agree that speed control will help with making it drop more cases quicker instead of being a sit and spin with certain caliber cases.

I think I will put one of those speed controllers on mine now. I should buy the motor also while I can still get it.
While my case feeder only see's 9mm, and 41 magnums, and works very well with both, it can still be improved on.
I never tried to run rifle cases through it.

Yeah, there is nothing worse than getting brass rain. :) Ive had it happen more times than I care to admit. But the Dillon case feeder has this same issue from time to as well.
The other annoyance is when you have brass in the collator and it just spins and doesnt want to pick up a case, or feeds every 10th slot. I did find some 3d printed collator plates, and I might change them up a bit to stir the brass a little more. A couple more 1/8" tall paddles on the plate couldnt hurt anything.
That ramp I made was one of the biggest early improvements. Really does help keep the brass from stacking up and jamming at the feed hole.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top