If you had to start over....

Forester Co-Ax press
Forester or Redding dies
Giraud trimmer
RCBS hand primer
Lyman brass smith powder thrower
RCBS scale
 
Buy good equipment the first time!
Buy the auto powder measure…whatever brand you like..love my RCBS.
 
Harrels powder dispenser is/was a game changer for me. Otherwise, my setup is pretty basic.
 
Dillon 550 press.
Forster honed FL sizing dies and micrometer seating dies
Frankford arsenal cheap vibratory tumblers (at least 2x) for tumbling with rice
Giraud or hendersons trimmer
Autotrickler powder dispenser
 
I wouldn't do much different. Rockchucker combo kit treated me well.

As far os the shotgun reloading, I would like to sell that Dillon SL900 12-gauge system I have. I don't use that nearly as much as I thought I would. Traded a guy a Knight UL ML for it. Wish I had kept the ML at this point.
 
I would have skipped a single stage press and got a turret instead. I took out the auto indexer and mostly use my turret like a single stage anyway, but I like having each set of dies on its own swappable plate, all set to the proper depth and ready to go. Even though I have a progressive press now, the turret still gets the most usage by far.
 
With components at ridiculous prices and no hope for the future, I typically don't recommend folks getting into reloading. I'm glad I stockpiled everything years ago, when we reloaded because it saved money and allowed us to produce more accurate loads than factory. Neither holds as much truth today.
 
Just now getting into shotshell reloading,,,,wish I had done it years ago.
As I get older I'm getting more into the birds/waterfowl.
 
Goodby Rockchucker press. It was gifted down the totem pole.

Hello Rebel press. It’s just slightly beefier (22%) than the Rockchucker, otherwise essentially a close relative. Now, I’ve never known anyone who has broke a Rockchucker forming cases let alone simple full length resizing, but I like bigger. Lol

So, to answer the original question, I’d get a RCBS Rebel kit, not the Rockchucker kit. Lol

IMG_0022.jpeg
 
....but you keep all the knowledge and experience you have gained:

What would your beginner reloading setup be?

Ill be reloading 6.5creed and some 308 to start, maybe 223/556 and 270 later.

I plan to do some LR comp with the 6.5, not serious so not thousands of rounds a year, so a single stage should be fine.
Glad I came across this thread before getting into reloading.
 
Only one post with love for a turret press is surprising.

I really like being able to just rotate the turret to switch between .223 or 6.5 and not have to thread dies into a single stage and mess with the depth each time. Maybe having better lock rings would have solved that problem for me though...
 
Only one post with love for a turret press is surprising.

I really like being able to just rotate the turret to switch between .223 or 6.5 and not have to thread dies into a single stage and mess with the depth each time. Maybe having better lock rings would have solved that problem for me though...
Yeah a set of hornady lock rings was my second purchase after dies. Lmk if you want a half dozen rcbs and lee locking rings for shipping costs ha
 
Redding Big Boss II or T7 Turret press. The Big Boss II will never leave you needing more unless you start forming big brass for big rounds, and I mean really big.
Redding dies are good. Whidden dies are good.
Decent calipers, digital is fine, though I use my dial caliper more than my digital caliper.

I had a Giraud. I got rid of it. I am using PMA & WFT trimmers.
 
Only one post with love for a turret press is surprising.

I really like being able to just rotate the turret to switch between .223 or 6.5 and not have to thread dies into a single stage and mess with the depth each time. Maybe having better lock rings would have solved that problem for me though...
I don’t see the appeal of the turret press, but I’ve been running Hornady lock and load die bushings on my rockchucker for ~15 years. Die changes are seconds. Otherwise, why wouldn’t you just go Dillon 550?
 
I just picked up a Redding turret press after using a Lee for a couple years. Nice thing about the Lee was it did everything including my 50 but the amount of time spent setting up the different dies likely justified the turret purchase a couple years ago, just stubborn about spending money on things sometimes.
 
Back
Top