Brithunter
Well-Known Member
US sales ONLY Bernie. Yep i took a look being nosey 
.
.Reloading on a Budget
- Thread starter Muir
- Start date
I looked hard at them both. The Target model is missing the scoop... no biggie. The other is "like new" but neither is returnable and both sellers are feigning ignorance of the units. This leaves vast areas of doubt on my part. The target models big seller is a fitted neck reamer that will uniform the necks while in the case is pressed into the sizer. If that reamer has been messed with the relative value of the set plummets. 
~Muir
~Muir
Brithunter
Well-Known Member
Ahhh Muir,
I just recieved a Lee Unitized Loader in .280 Rem. Supposedly new but it had some rust spotting which i have cleaned off. Seems to work but it does leave a few scratches on the neck. I need to look at that closely. Thought it might be handy as I am playing witht eh .280 AI. Oh it's complete with a priming tool.
I just recieved a Lee Unitized Loader in .280 Rem. Supposedly new but it had some rust spotting which i have cleaned off. Seems to work but it does leave a few scratches on the neck. I need to look at that closely. Thought it might be handy as I am playing witht eh .280 AI. Oh it's complete with a priming tool.
People have become gadgeteers, as I call them. How many people respond to newbies's questions by saying they should buy Comp Dies and a Rockchucker press, and a neck turner, etc, etal, when all the guy wants is some inexpensive hunting ammo?? People ignore that the principle of the Lee Loader is the same as what many BR shooters use. The truth is that it produces very uniform ammo. Those who speak badly of them never used them. Lee is being realistic, from their standpoint. They have seen the sales fall off and are responding to same.
Try this though... go to E-Bane and look at what some of these are selling for used. More than the current production models cost new. I told Lee that if they made them in precision models (like the Target Models of old) they would sell them to the more educated shooters. They didn't buy it.~Muir
Try this though... go to E-Bane and look at what some of these are selling for used. More than the current production models cost new. I told Lee that if they made them in precision models (like the Target Models of old) they would sell them to the more educated shooters. They didn't buy it.~Muir
bewsher500
Well-Known Member
just bought one on eBlag in 270Win.
didnt even know they existed until I read this, thanks
didnt even know they existed until I read this, thanks
Liamnjs: You will need no other book. The Lee set comes with a scoop that is proper for the set and a wide variety of bullet weights. The weights are generic for good reason: In very few cases are loads for one 95 grain bullet different from another maker's 95 grain bullet. I have never paid heed to makes. I load by bullet weight, the same way Lee lists most of their bullets. (not by maker)
The Lee set is very thorough and you will see that reloading, in it's simplest form, is quite easy.
A couple of items you will want: A Lee trimmer and lock stud for the caliber of choice and a deburring tool. Here these items would cost about $15 US. Other than that, a bit of #0000 grade steel wool for cleaning case necks is handy. You will find this endeavor rewarding. What caliber again?? ~Muir
The Lee set is very thorough and you will see that reloading, in it's simplest form, is quite easy.
A couple of items you will want: A Lee trimmer and lock stud for the caliber of choice and a deburring tool. Here these items would cost about $15 US. Other than that, a bit of #0000 grade steel wool for cleaning case necks is handy. You will find this endeavor rewarding. What caliber again?? ~Muir
bewsher500
Well-Known Member
Just my 6.5x55 at the moment. Although I will be after a pig rifle soon and if the Lee Classic delivers what I hope it will I may be guided by what calibres they cater for!
WHen you get comfortable with the Lee Loader, and the notion of loading cartridges by volume, you can get a manual (Lee) and a set of Lee Powder Scoops, and begin adjusting powder charges. Later for that tho... Have fun! I will expect some IMR 4350 is in your future.~Muir
I am awaiting my chamfer tool and primer pocket cleaner for my Lee Classic Loader kit. I also bought a £8 set of digital scales from Ebay, which measures in grains to 0.000. In addition, I got a set of digital calibers from Ebay for £12. I know cheap digital scales and calibers are recommended against, but it's whats do-able for me just now...and to be honest, they work GREAT! tested them with known size and weight objects, and they are both extremely accurate! makes me very confident in my loadings. I did a test with just using levelled dipper scoops, and the variance was large. The digital scales allow me to really knock it on the head. A rolled up post-it note with tape works as a powder funnell
ps. I will be keeping an eye on accuracy of these digital items by checking with known objects before a reloading session, just to make sure battery life isn't messing with them of course.
ps. I will be keeping an eye on accuracy of these digital items by checking with known objects before a reloading session, just to make sure battery life isn't messing with them of course.
robbobsam
Well-Known Member
I am awaiting my chamfer tool and primer pocket cleaner for my Lee Classic Loader kit. I also bought a £8 set of digital scales from Ebay, which measures in grains to 0.000. In addition, I got a set of digital calibers from Ebay for £12. I know cheap digital scales and calibers are recommended against, but it's whats do-able for me just now...and to be honest, they work GREAT! tested them with known size and weight objects, and they are both extremely accurate! makes me very confident in my loadings. I did a test with just using levelled dipper scoops, and the variance was large. The digital scales allow me to really knock it on the head. A rolled up post-it note with tape works as a powder funnell
ps. I will be keeping an eye on accuracy of these digital items by checking with known objects before a reloading session, just to make sure battery life isn't messing with them of course.
Be careful with the digital scales, I purchase a set off of ebay myself, when I compare the loads measured with the digital scales to my redding beam scales they are anything up to +or- 0.5 grains out....
I use mine now to get me close to the desired load then use the trickler to get bang on the right weight.
Relying on digital scales would not work for me.
Obviously if you are measuring loads for a 50cal with digital scales will not be as bigger issue as if you are measuring for a .22hornet as the % difference is a lot smaller.
I work on the principle that if I want good consistent ammunition I need to make everything about the loads consistent and my digital scales just cannot achieve that to an acceptable standard.
I am awaiting my chamfer tool and primer pocket cleaner for my Lee Classic Loader kit. I also bought a £8 set of digital scales from Ebay, which measures in grains to 0.000. In addition, I got a set of digital calibers from Ebay for £12. I know cheap digital scales and calibers are recommended against, but it's whats do-able for me just now...and to be honest, they work GREAT! tested them with known size and weight objects, and they are both extremely accurate! makes me very confident in my loadings. I did a test with just using levelled dipper scoops, and the variance was large. The digital scales allow me to really knock it on the head. A rolled up post-it note with tape works as a powder funnell
ps. I will be keeping an eye on accuracy of these digital items by checking with known objects before a reloading session, just to make sure battery life isn't messing with them of course.
What was the variance with the dipper and what size dipper? If you can remember.
Bernie
Getting the most from the Lee loader
Health warning: I have a modern rifle. I used eye protection at all times and continually checked for pressure signs at every stage whilst also trying to double check figures as much as possible granted without the use of a set of reloading scales.
Health warning 2: Don’t read this if you’re about to operate heavy machinery.
This is a 3 shot group at 100 metres of a bench on a 6 inch bipod with a rear bag rest. The UK 2 pence coin represents 1 MOA at that range give or take a flake of mosquito’s dandruff. It is an indoor range and the ammunition was loaded with a lee loader, an improved powder dipper set, a primer pocket cleaner, a set of vernier callipers and nothing else.
I wanted to stick to the pure dipping method of the loader as I have fallen in love with the process. I thought long and hard about how I could work up a load to be as accurate as possible and with kit that I could carry in my pocket to reload in the field/at the range.
I took the general advice to get whatever gear I could easily put my hands on and, as a result, I started out with some once fired Norma brass, some Federal 210 large rifle primers, some Viht N160 and some 140 gn Sierra Game Kings. I then researched this and other forums about the one thing that I could accurately change without much effort; the OAL. I was given a set of vernier scale callipers that my dad had going spare and I was away.
Forgive the egg sucking bits, it’s intended as a guide for someone like me before I started this process….
1 I started out by loading a few (10) rounds using the starting dipper listed in the Lee manual. Lee lists a 2.8CC dipper as the start for a 140 gn round but right next to it lists the starting load volume as 3.1CC which is the next dipper up. I did however take him at his word and I started out with the 2.8CC and using a factory cartridge as the starting point for OAL. These were straight away in an inch group with 5 rounds and I was hooked. The overall feeling was of a slow round though and I wasn’t too sure about the deer legality if I wanted to use them in Scotland and the Muzzle energy was likely to be a bit close for England anyway so I decided to work up the load.
I got the improved powder measure kit and started to reference the tables in the back of the Lee manual for powder VMD (Volume Mass Density??) and the dipper capacities for N160. I was hoping to get the load up towards the 95-96% max that many people cite as a good aiming point for accuracy. The lee dippers increase in .3CC increments and that would equate to more than 4 grains each time I changed up which is of course, insane when you realise that is more than 10 percent of the total load at the time. Nevertheless the Lee manual listed right next to the 2.8 starter that the actual starting load was 3.1CC in volume i.e. the next dipper. I took some advice on this forum and found out that others went one up from the start dipper with success so I cracked on and loaded 3 rounds. I donned some ballistic eye protection and I let them rip, checking for pressure signs at each firing. No problems were seen and I was gaining on my 96% mark. By using the Lee dippers in combination you can achieve .1CC increases so I used a 2.5 and a .7 to get me up to the 3.2 that corresponded to just below the 96% mark according to the tables. Again I loaded a few and fired them to check for pressure.
2 I got the box of bullets and took 20 of them out. I measured each one with the callipers and worked out the average length. There was quite a large variation in the bullet lengths but any fool would realise that by looking at soft point bullets anyway. I then rooted through the box until I found a bullet that had this exact average length. I labelled it with a fine marker and kept it as my datum bullet. I then cut into the neck of a sized un-primed case so the bullet would go in and out with strong finger pressure. I just seated the datum bullet using the loader to keep it straight and I closed the bolt on it in my rifle. This sized the cartridge to my max chamber length and after careful handling I measured the case for my max OAL. I repeated the test a few times for average and to mitigate any handling errors when removing the cartridge.
I then made random adjustments to the length of the die and seated the datum bullet in the cut case each time. I took a series of cartridge measurements and die measurements before averaging them out and finding that by adding1.095 to my desired cartridge length when setting up the die I would achieve that length on my datum round.
I then loaded 33 rounds to give three rounds each at ten-thou intervals between ten-thou off max OAL at 3.102” and the published minimum OAL of 3.000”. I didn’t want to load one into or touching the lands as a friend has pulled the bullet before when out stalking on a cold day.
I have read on many forums that the Swede’s chamber length lends itself to 2 accuracy nodes in OAL when using bullets smaller than 160 gn. One usually close to the lands and one further back. My magazine length is longer than my chamber length so I can feed rounds at max OAL but there’s not much of the bullet in the neck and if I’m slamming them around when reloading with buck fever then I’d rather have them in deeper so I was hoping to find the second, shorter sweet spot.
I took these rounds to the range and worked through them allowing the barrel to cool between groups. The first three set at 10 thou off the lands were straight away in the region of .5MOA and I definitely squeezed one of them off with a very slightly low aiming point. Of note the zero was very similar to the 140 gn Normas I had been using. Here they are below:
After this from 10 to 40 though off max OAL the groups remained very tight before opening out to just over 1 inch. Here's the 10 and 30 for a look.
As I was firing the 70 thou off Max group I was realising how long this was taking when letting the barrel cool was factored in so I was considering skipping to the 90 and then the min length ones. I had already taken the masking tape off the three for 80 thou that I was using to label the batches with; so I ploughed on and got the magic group at the start of the post.
3 I wasn’t happy that I’d have to use the 2 dippers to keep putting this load together as I knew that sooner or later I’d forget to put one of them in a case and either drastically miss a deer or dangerously under-load a cartridge. I also wanted to try to see if I could get a hotter load that was still nice and tight so greedily I moved on. I have read the advice in Lee’s manual for using pieces of card in the bottom of the dippers to reduce their capacity in more refined doses so I found some stiff card and cut some circles to fit into the 3.4CC dipper. I measured the dipper’s diameter and it’s depth with the callipers before using some school maths to confirm that the volume was 3.4CC. I didn’t do this because I doubt Lee’s accuracy but to see if I could accurately measure it and model it as a cylinder (they don’t appear to be true cylinders but slightly tapered towards the bottom) I was within .02 of a CC with my measurements. I also measured the thickness of the cards and worked out that each card should give me a reduction of .05CC in volume (about .7 of a grain per card but the nature of the powder means that the volume mass relationship would have to become more scattered at these small volumes). So 6 placed in the 3.4CC should bring it down to around 3.1CC. I know that there is already a 3.1CC dipper but I wanted to go below the loads I had already worked up to cover any maths/measuring errors on my part. I labelled the pieces of card and I inserted them in order, re-measured the depth of the modified dipper and cross checked that with what I was expecting.
I had done all of this before going to the range and I was able to load some pre-prepped brass right there with the dipper. I fired 4 shots into a half-inch group checking for pressure signs after each shot before using a technical screwdriver that I got free in a cracker at Christmas to remove the number 6 card disk. I tamped all the cards down with the back of a pen and I loaded another four and so on un-fortunately time was tight and I elected to run the rounds through on a hot barrel ignoring the groups so I could at least check for pressure. This way and thanks to the simplicity of this kit; I was able to load and fire 20 rounds in 35 minutes checking for pressure before the range closed and eventually I got down to 2 card disks remaining in the bottom of the dipper with no pressure signs. The worst group even on a hot barrel and without much focus was .8 Moa. But of course I’m ignoring them for now.
I plan to repeat the exercise with the card disks another time and to shoot on a cooled barrel to find the best accuracy with a single dipper before using a breath of super glue to hold the disks in place at my chosen load. In the mean time I have loaded 20 of the 80-thou cartridges using the 2 dipper method to get me through a few stalking outings before I can get back to the range and get some more Game Kings.
In summary: The kits are very accurate. I have only just got through my first box of primers so had loaded less than 80 round with it when I worked them up and already I know that if I prime all the cartridges at the same time then I get a feel for the sound of the primer when it hits a uniform depth. I have practiced my dipping intensively and I know that; if I use the same method, with the same sized container (a sawn off pineapple chunks tin) and I top up the powder regularly to keep a similar level in the tin so that the same weight of powder is above the dipper when I drag it backwards allowing it to fill by gravity: I can produce a .3MOA group without scales and for an initial equipment outlay of less than £50 pounds. In terms of actual POI shift in the group the centres of the bullet holes are sub .2 MOA. There’s a little luck and variance in every group, but that’s an accurate load.
Regards
Bernie
Health warning: I have a modern rifle. I used eye protection at all times and continually checked for pressure signs at every stage whilst also trying to double check figures as much as possible granted without the use of a set of reloading scales.
Health warning 2: Don’t read this if you’re about to operate heavy machinery.
This is a 3 shot group at 100 metres of a bench on a 6 inch bipod with a rear bag rest. The UK 2 pence coin represents 1 MOA at that range give or take a flake of mosquito’s dandruff. It is an indoor range and the ammunition was loaded with a lee loader, an improved powder dipper set, a primer pocket cleaner, a set of vernier callipers and nothing else.
I wanted to stick to the pure dipping method of the loader as I have fallen in love with the process. I thought long and hard about how I could work up a load to be as accurate as possible and with kit that I could carry in my pocket to reload in the field/at the range.
I took the general advice to get whatever gear I could easily put my hands on and, as a result, I started out with some once fired Norma brass, some Federal 210 large rifle primers, some Viht N160 and some 140 gn Sierra Game Kings. I then researched this and other forums about the one thing that I could accurately change without much effort; the OAL. I was given a set of vernier scale callipers that my dad had going spare and I was away.
Forgive the egg sucking bits, it’s intended as a guide for someone like me before I started this process….
1 I started out by loading a few (10) rounds using the starting dipper listed in the Lee manual. Lee lists a 2.8CC dipper as the start for a 140 gn round but right next to it lists the starting load volume as 3.1CC which is the next dipper up. I did however take him at his word and I started out with the 2.8CC and using a factory cartridge as the starting point for OAL. These were straight away in an inch group with 5 rounds and I was hooked. The overall feeling was of a slow round though and I wasn’t too sure about the deer legality if I wanted to use them in Scotland and the Muzzle energy was likely to be a bit close for England anyway so I decided to work up the load.
I got the improved powder measure kit and started to reference the tables in the back of the Lee manual for powder VMD (Volume Mass Density??) and the dipper capacities for N160. I was hoping to get the load up towards the 95-96% max that many people cite as a good aiming point for accuracy. The lee dippers increase in .3CC increments and that would equate to more than 4 grains each time I changed up which is of course, insane when you realise that is more than 10 percent of the total load at the time. Nevertheless the Lee manual listed right next to the 2.8 starter that the actual starting load was 3.1CC in volume i.e. the next dipper. I took some advice on this forum and found out that others went one up from the start dipper with success so I cracked on and loaded 3 rounds. I donned some ballistic eye protection and I let them rip, checking for pressure signs at each firing. No problems were seen and I was gaining on my 96% mark. By using the Lee dippers in combination you can achieve .1CC increases so I used a 2.5 and a .7 to get me up to the 3.2 that corresponded to just below the 96% mark according to the tables. Again I loaded a few and fired them to check for pressure.
2 I got the box of bullets and took 20 of them out. I measured each one with the callipers and worked out the average length. There was quite a large variation in the bullet lengths but any fool would realise that by looking at soft point bullets anyway. I then rooted through the box until I found a bullet that had this exact average length. I labelled it with a fine marker and kept it as my datum bullet. I then cut into the neck of a sized un-primed case so the bullet would go in and out with strong finger pressure. I just seated the datum bullet using the loader to keep it straight and I closed the bolt on it in my rifle. This sized the cartridge to my max chamber length and after careful handling I measured the case for my max OAL. I repeated the test a few times for average and to mitigate any handling errors when removing the cartridge.
I then made random adjustments to the length of the die and seated the datum bullet in the cut case each time. I took a series of cartridge measurements and die measurements before averaging them out and finding that by adding1.095 to my desired cartridge length when setting up the die I would achieve that length on my datum round.
I then loaded 33 rounds to give three rounds each at ten-thou intervals between ten-thou off max OAL at 3.102” and the published minimum OAL of 3.000”. I didn’t want to load one into or touching the lands as a friend has pulled the bullet before when out stalking on a cold day.
I have read on many forums that the Swede’s chamber length lends itself to 2 accuracy nodes in OAL when using bullets smaller than 160 gn. One usually close to the lands and one further back. My magazine length is longer than my chamber length so I can feed rounds at max OAL but there’s not much of the bullet in the neck and if I’m slamming them around when reloading with buck fever then I’d rather have them in deeper so I was hoping to find the second, shorter sweet spot.
I took these rounds to the range and worked through them allowing the barrel to cool between groups. The first three set at 10 thou off the lands were straight away in the region of .5MOA and I definitely squeezed one of them off with a very slightly low aiming point. Of note the zero was very similar to the 140 gn Normas I had been using. Here they are below:
After this from 10 to 40 though off max OAL the groups remained very tight before opening out to just over 1 inch. Here's the 10 and 30 for a look.
As I was firing the 70 thou off Max group I was realising how long this was taking when letting the barrel cool was factored in so I was considering skipping to the 90 and then the min length ones. I had already taken the masking tape off the three for 80 thou that I was using to label the batches with; so I ploughed on and got the magic group at the start of the post.
3 I wasn’t happy that I’d have to use the 2 dippers to keep putting this load together as I knew that sooner or later I’d forget to put one of them in a case and either drastically miss a deer or dangerously under-load a cartridge. I also wanted to try to see if I could get a hotter load that was still nice and tight so greedily I moved on. I have read the advice in Lee’s manual for using pieces of card in the bottom of the dippers to reduce their capacity in more refined doses so I found some stiff card and cut some circles to fit into the 3.4CC dipper. I measured the dipper’s diameter and it’s depth with the callipers before using some school maths to confirm that the volume was 3.4CC. I didn’t do this because I doubt Lee’s accuracy but to see if I could accurately measure it and model it as a cylinder (they don’t appear to be true cylinders but slightly tapered towards the bottom) I was within .02 of a CC with my measurements. I also measured the thickness of the cards and worked out that each card should give me a reduction of .05CC in volume (about .7 of a grain per card but the nature of the powder means that the volume mass relationship would have to become more scattered at these small volumes). So 6 placed in the 3.4CC should bring it down to around 3.1CC. I know that there is already a 3.1CC dipper but I wanted to go below the loads I had already worked up to cover any maths/measuring errors on my part. I labelled the pieces of card and I inserted them in order, re-measured the depth of the modified dipper and cross checked that with what I was expecting.
I had done all of this before going to the range and I was able to load some pre-prepped brass right there with the dipper. I fired 4 shots into a half-inch group checking for pressure signs after each shot before using a technical screwdriver that I got free in a cracker at Christmas to remove the number 6 card disk. I tamped all the cards down with the back of a pen and I loaded another four and so on un-fortunately time was tight and I elected to run the rounds through on a hot barrel ignoring the groups so I could at least check for pressure. This way and thanks to the simplicity of this kit; I was able to load and fire 20 rounds in 35 minutes checking for pressure before the range closed and eventually I got down to 2 card disks remaining in the bottom of the dipper with no pressure signs. The worst group even on a hot barrel and without much focus was .8 Moa. But of course I’m ignoring them for now.
I plan to repeat the exercise with the card disks another time and to shoot on a cooled barrel to find the best accuracy with a single dipper before using a breath of super glue to hold the disks in place at my chosen load. In the mean time I have loaded 20 of the 80-thou cartridges using the 2 dipper method to get me through a few stalking outings before I can get back to the range and get some more Game Kings.
In summary: The kits are very accurate. I have only just got through my first box of primers so had loaded less than 80 round with it when I worked them up and already I know that if I prime all the cartridges at the same time then I get a feel for the sound of the primer when it hits a uniform depth. I have practiced my dipping intensively and I know that; if I use the same method, with the same sized container (a sawn off pineapple chunks tin) and I top up the powder regularly to keep a similar level in the tin so that the same weight of powder is above the dipper when I drag it backwards allowing it to fill by gravity: I can produce a .3MOA group without scales and for an initial equipment outlay of less than £50 pounds. In terms of actual POI shift in the group the centres of the bullet holes are sub .2 MOA. There’s a little luck and variance in every group, but that’s an accurate load.
Regards
Bernie
Similar threads
- Locked
