Dillon 550 Advice & Reccomendation

[banik]

Looking to pick up a Dillon 550. Looking for advice between the RL 550C and BL550. Which would you pick and how has it been with using them? Good consistency, ease of use, and maintenance? Looking to mostly speed up precision reloading for 6.5 Creedmoore bolt gun. Appreciate any help and feedback, especially first hand experience.

 

[Hoser]

Get the RL and skip the BL.

The Dillon powder measures are ok, but marginal on a good day for what we need. I use a Prometheus or an Autotrickler.

I load everything from 17 Mach IV to 338 Lapua on my 550s.

 

[RegionRat]

I would push you towards the RL and skip the BL, but get yourself a powder funnel set-up too.

Dillon stuff is a baseline against which all other brands of turret and progressive consumer grade stuff is measured, so you won't be making a mistake. That is not to say this is perfect, but you will be getting what you pay for.

If you don't mind handling the primers, then there is nothing wrong with the BL version. If you ever think you will want to use a drop for anything else, or if you want to avoid handling individual primers, then you get the RL version and still use an external powder dispenser with a funnel and use the automatic drop for other things down the road.

 

[6DasherImpact]

I have a BL550 I use for rifle loads and low-volume pistol. I use an AutoTrickler or a Redding 10x to manually drop powder using the Dillon manual powder die. In my process I resize exclusively on a Redding T7, so the 550 is for manual powder dropping and bullet seating/crimping. I often prime on my T7, but sometimes use the manual priming system on the 550. (Manual priming works just fine for me)

I'm very happy with the setup and I feel my efficiency improved from doing everything on a T7. If I could go back, I might go the RL route as I could still use it like the BL w/ manual drops for precision loads but like the RL for plinking loads. Upgrading a BL to an RL is almost certainly more expensive than the initial cost difference.

If you do go the BL route, be sure to buy the finished case ejection wire (sold separately) -- it pairs nicely with the Inline Fab mount which has the built-in ejection chute and bins.