Re: new to reloading, hornady or rcbs?
"Price wise they're the best,...there is a reason my uncle slowly progressed to using all RCBS dies."
I understand your opinion, and your uncle's, but saying they are the "best" in any price range tells us nothing; what is that "reason" you mention and how did you derive it?
I've been reloading for 47 years, now have some 50+ die sets of all brands for about 30 cartridges and have owned others that have been sold or given away. I've actually measured the output from all of my dies and, on average, have been unable to see any average advantage any brand has on 'better' or 'worse' dies - in fact, all of my dies are really quite good, IMHO, but I have found as much variation in specific dies of the same brand as between brands. I have found the costly Redding and Forster comp seater dies do have a consistant but small advantage over other brands of seaters but that's about it.
Therefore, I was wondering if your firm 'RCBS is the best" dies statement is based on valid measurements showing average differences on more than one or two examples of different brands you are comparing RCBS to, including Lee, Hornady, Lyman, etc. Or do you follow some other standard?