The why - Started loading 9mm again (I'll do a batch of 1K-2K every so often), and noticed I was getting annoyed handling little RN bullets. It's a bit tedious, and slow. Of course I read the threads on here about bullet feeders and whatnot, but I just can't justify the Dillon solution for 9mm or 380. So, one day I was searching out bullet feeder options, and came across a video of some guy running a Lee Feeder on his 550. Cool. Everything fits, and it seemed to work ok. He had drilled out the powder safety transfer bar (I apologize if that's not the right terminology for it) to mount his motion transfer bar to the Lee actuator. There were some other things going on to make it function right, but that just seemed like too much trouble to me.
Fast forward several weeks, and here I am starting on reloading 9mm, and thinking an auto bullet feeder sure would be nice. Also happened to be shopping on Midway for a couple items, and there's free shipping if I can put another $20 in the cart, which is a nice little discount. Look around, spot the Lee bullet feeder for $33, and figure what the heck. If it doesn't work out, I'm not out much.
That showed up yesterday evening, so I start fiddling around with it, and thinking about ways to make something work. Looked around to see what might be put to use and came up with an idea. Started with making a couple little clamps to see how feasible it was, looked promising, so fabbed up a transfer bar and put it to the test.
I can't say how long this is going to last. There's nothing industrial about that Lee feeder. But with a little lube that damn thing works pretty well. I just ran off 200 rounds like nothing - no hiccups whatsoever. Unreal how much quicker it was to load 200 rounds. If it holds up a couple years, I'll be perfectly happy replacing it with another.
So far, so good.
Fast forward several weeks, and here I am starting on reloading 9mm, and thinking an auto bullet feeder sure would be nice. Also happened to be shopping on Midway for a couple items, and there's free shipping if I can put another $20 in the cart, which is a nice little discount. Look around, spot the Lee bullet feeder for $33, and figure what the heck. If it doesn't work out, I'm not out much.
That showed up yesterday evening, so I start fiddling around with it, and thinking about ways to make something work. Looked around to see what might be put to use and came up with an idea. Started with making a couple little clamps to see how feasible it was, looked promising, so fabbed up a transfer bar and put it to the test.
I can't say how long this is going to last. There's nothing industrial about that Lee feeder. But with a little lube that damn thing works pretty well. I just ran off 200 rounds like nothing - no hiccups whatsoever. Unreal how much quicker it was to load 200 rounds. If it holds up a couple years, I'll be perfectly happy replacing it with another.
So far, so good.