Next Reloading Press - Turret?

[TimberHunter]

Currently use a single stage Lee classic. Works just fine but I can tell that I didn’t pay a lot for it and it’s slow reloading practice 223 ammo

I’m getting into shooting more 223 but still shoot my 6.5cm often. Not enough to justify a progressive press. To help speed up 223 loading, is a turret press the next step? Certain manufacture recommendation?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Oldffemt]

When I started reloading I thought a turret press would be much faster. I have a Lee 4 hole turret and the thing that speeds it up the most is being able to leave my dies set and change calibers any time I want without the need to adjust dies. I’m doing pretty good to load 50-75 rnds/hr, though I don’t really try to be fast, as that’s when mistakes tend to happen. My buddy has a Dillon 550 and he can easily double my output but it seems like a fairly complicated and expensive setup. I tend to use the turret like a single stage now for rifles with hard to come by ammo/bullets that aren’t common and just buy factory 223 in bulk when it’s cheap. FYI, I wouldn’t get the Lee budget turret press with the cast aluminum arm. It’s a total pos. The Lee classic turret press with the black steel arm is much better for the couple additional dollars.

 

[NorthIdahoDude]

If you're not going to go progressive, then yes, a Turret press would be the logical next thing. Austin Buschman (champion PRS shooter dude) claims he just runs a Lee Classic Cast turret for his press. Basically, not having to screw/unscrew dies is the biggest benefit - you still have to pull the handle the same number of times as you would if single-stage loading like you do now.

I do a lot of progressive reloading for pistol cartridges, and love it for that, but not rifle. Bottleneck cartridges are more complicated since you have to trim them (or at least check the trim length) post sizing. For those, I do use the progressive press as a one-step decap+size+prime in one pull of the lever, which speeds things up a fair bit, but not nearly to the rate I can go with handgun stuff (I can kick out 600+ rounds an hour of 9mm/40/etc, but I'd say at best, I touch about 150, maybe 200 rounds tops in an hour of 223/other bottle neck rifle).

On the subject of progressive presses, a Lee Six Pack Pro is actually one hell of a great machine, I love mine. The older Pro 1000 and 4000's were NOT that great to me, LOL. My only caveat, is that the priming system is the main drawback of the older ones, and there is a new Pro 1000 that has the same priming system as the SixPackPro, and that one might not suck, but I've never used it to know.