Lee Precision Adjustable Charge Bar.....Thoughts?

[Rule3]

Well I guess we'll find out in a few days how this little thing works. I found one on Amazon and bundled it with something else that the wife needed for free shipping.

For now I'll cast up a few hundred .429 SWC's for 44-40 & 44 Special and by the time the charge bar shows up I should have 'em lubed and ready to go. Hopefully since I've got all my loads referenced to the Auto-Disk numbers I won't have to pull my hair out spending hours dialing in volumes to the correct weights. I should be able to set it using the disk numbers and adjust from there.

All it is a adjustable hole or semi circle. It just makes the semi hole larger or smaller. Still a volumetric measure,
In theory you should be able to write down the setting but that will only get you close.

As mentioned forget flake powder like Unique. It has the same quirks as the regular discs.

 

[JRWhit]

Haven't seen it mention unless I skimmed over it, if nothing else the kit is worth it for the hopper. You can shut powder flow off and remove the hopper with thumb screws if you get the full upgrade kit. I assume that's what ur refereeing to for 20$. It also screws into the expander die without rotating the whole hopper so u don't have to remove the seating die to take it off. It hate flake powder but I have found great use for it.

 

[Foto Joe]

That's one of those items that I would put in one of my wife's C.R.A.P. (Collectables, Rare and Precious) sales that she has once or twice per year.

 

[Foto Joe]

So the Lee Adjustable Charge Bar showed up on Saturday. Today the wind is blowing like crazy and being outside sucks so I figured I'd finally set up a turret for 44 S&W Special to feed to my '94 Marlin, a great excuse to set up the ACB.

I can see why these things don't cost a ton of fun tickets, there ain't much to 'em is there? On the other hand, after getting the charge dialed in, the thing is extremely consistent. It took me probably 5 minutes of fiddling around with it to dial in for 5.0 gr of TrailBoss (1.15cc btw) before I trusted it to start loading. The first 20 rounds I weighed each and every one of them simply because I wasn't real trusting yet. Every one that I weighed was spot on at 5.0, no +/- .01 etc., just dead on 5.0 which is more than I can say for the disks which are usually +/- .01 on a good day. After weighing the first 20 I slacked off and only weighed every 5th one and still the thing never dropped anything other than what I had originally set it for.

Obviously I haven't tried 700X, AutoComp or Universal in it yet but it looks like this little gizmo might just come in kind of handy.

 

[hentown]

I never tried the adjustable charge bar for small charges, but for 6-10 grains, I found them to be accurate. Of course, that was back when I was loading tediously on a Toadmaster. I even adapted an adjustable charge bar to stack in a double-disc kit, for loading .223s.

The design of the Loadmaster is so poor, that I found it impossible to approriately bump the shoulders of my .223 cases.

I'm drinking the blue koolaid now, so things are going a lot smoother for my reloading efforts.

 

[Potatohead]

there ain't much to 'em is there?

Nope

 

[kostner]

Got one years ago but have never used it. Have good results with the disk on most powders. Never could get the double-disk to work for rifle some use a Hornidy off press powder dispenser.

 

[TrueTexan]

Something's I do to get a consistent charge first wipe down the inside with a used dryer sheet. Tap the hopper gently after each drop, some people have setup a way to vibrate it. Consistent pull on the handle and don't short stroke. Keep the hopper over half full. Clean the drop tube after each frequently or at least before a heavy reload session.