Too much time to reload,is this normal.

[diego-ted]

Listed below is my current process. It takes me two hours to load twenty rounds. The most time consuming is trimming the cases and seating the bullets. I have a Lyman universal case trimmer, and no matter how I set it up, I cannot just set it and cut. Every case comes out slightly different. I have tried everything and can not get any consistency, so I end up cutting long, and trimming to what every I need. This usually involves removing the case and measuring three times per case. The same with seating the bullet. I have an RCBS competition die set. No matter what I cannot get it to seat the same every time so I end up seating long and measuring at least twice but usually three times?? I know I need to add inner and outer neck trimming and bullet sorting which will add even more time to the process. Is there anything I can do to add consistency to the process without all the redundant steps?

1. Tumble brass ___
2. Deprime ___
3. Lube/Resize FL/NK ___
4. Trim case ___
5. Primer Pocket ___
6. Sonic clean ___
7. Prime case ___
8. Load Powder ___
9. Seat bullet ___


Thx Diego

 

[2Shots]

Re: Too much time to reload,is this normal.

There are those on here that know way more than me, but in my opinion you are trying way to hard. First you throw the cases into your polisher while your sleeping and polish. When your ready to load, lube and size, assuming length is within spec clean the primer pocket, chamfer the mouth inside and out and your ready to prime. Even if you only have hand tools you should be able to load 100 rounds an hour, maybe faster if you have an automatic dispenser. And faster yet if you have a rcbs or similar prep station. If you are doing the sonic thing, decap the cases and clean them. Then the cases are clean inside and out including the primer pocket, that should save more time. If I had to take that long to load 20, I'd never be able to shoot! Good luck

 

[Tripwire]

Re: Too much time to reload,is this normal.

If your looking for "fast" then just buy the ammo....

Half the fun for most of us serious reloaders is all the fiddlin' with stuff that makes great ammo.

That's why a lot of us keep on fiddlin', even if we get something figured out that works there's a lot more we ain't tried yet.

As far as your varying dimensions, I'm betting you're not doing something right; and without being there hands on, very few of us are going to be able to help, much. I know with my Forster trimmer it matters a lot how tight I clamp the collet on the case head, regarding trim length. My Redding doesn't have that problem.

I'm suspecting with your seating problem that you're measuring base to tip? If so, that's a rookie mistake.......

 

[CardiacKid]

Re: Too much time to reload,is this normal.

1. Tumble brass: I decap and then tumble - either way, it only takes 10 minutes to decap 100 rounds or so. I then dump them in the tumbler and leave it on while I am at work or sleeping as others mentioned. Separating the brass from the media is a more time intensive portion for me since I have a whole jug of Lyman Corn Cob to go through and it's the perfect size to get gummed up in the flash hole and not easily pour out of the bottle neck cases. I switched to stainless and it's much faster with better results, but I still need to check all the flash holes for rods. I don't use a media separator - I do it by hand for each way. For some reason I have just never purchased a media separator. I use stainless for the first major cleaning since the results are ridiculously good and 90% of the time I'm doing range pickup .223, 9mm, .45 and .40 that can be pretty nasty. It really helps keep the Dillon 550 clean when I decap on my single stage and then do SS cleaning because there's no primer residue and any carbon flaking that would happen during resizing is taken care of before hand by it.

2. Deprime: Already covered for me, but if you choose to just tumble and then decap/resize on a single die it shouldn't take more than 15 minutes to lube and resize/decap. I cut the top off of a 9mm plastic bullet case (holds .223 for lubing perfectly. A .45 case will hold .308 the same way.) I then put the cases in and spray RCBS spray lube over all of them.

4. Trim case: About 5-10 seconds per case, including hand cranking each one and loading/removing it from the RCBS trimmer. Once I have the trimmer set it holds a constant measurement no matter how many cases I need to do. I keep a scrap case for each rifle caliber at the desired trim-to length to quickly adjust the cutter depth after changing calibers.

5. Primer Pocket: Varies based on whether or not I'm using new brass or previously prepped by me since I use a primer pocket uniformer on .308. Uniformer uniforms in addition to cleaning. Could take up to 20 seconds per case using an RCBS power case prep center if it's new winchester brass. With once/previously fired and prepped by me it's usually a 2-3 second process. With .223 I skip this step since it's for bulk loading and the stainless media cleans out the primer pockets (hence why I decap prior to tumbling).

6. Sonic clean: I did away with US cleaning as soon as I got a stainless setup. Here I would throw all cases back in the corn cob vibratory tumbler - anywhere from 15 to 45 mins or so depending on how many cases I have to take off the lube, but usually depends on what I have going on - you'll never find me sitting in front of the tumbler waiting for it. I find the vibratory corn cob method to take off lube is quicker for a final polish/lube removal than using the stainless unit again.

7. Prime case: With the RCBS hand primer set up for .308, maybe 2 seconds per case. I use a Dillon 550 for .223 and pistol, so it's only however long it takes to load the primer tube since it's part of the progressive process on that.

8. Load Powder: About 20-30 seconds per case for precision loading. I throw about a consistent couple of grains shy and then trickle each charge up. Definitely one of the more time consuming parts behind removing tumbling media.

9. Seat bullet: I use the same RCBS micrometer seating die you mentioned. I'll seat the first round a little long, fine tune it with the micrometer until it's at desired ogive depth (using a comparator to check each bullet) and then note where the hask mark is. Before seating the next bullet, I will back the micrometer off a couple of hashes to seat the next bullet long, measure it, fine tune the micrometer, measure again. It's usually only a seat, measure, adjust and seat a hair deeper, measure, good to go process. No more than 20 seconds per round or so and that's being nit-picky.

 

[Jeffvn]

Re: Too much time to reload,is this normal.

I do all my case prep as far as cleaning and depriming in large batches, well in advance. I only trim my cases every other firing or so. I prime clean, "prepped" cases in advance in bulk also, 100-200 at a time. When I go to load my ammo, I lube and size with Imperial wax, wipe off the wax and load. done. I can load, like I did last night 50 rounds of 7 WSM and 35 rounds of 6x47 Lapua (for continued load development with RL-17) in about 90 minutes, with a single-stage Rockcrusher II.

JeffVN

 

[Rookie]

Re: Too much time to reload,is this normal.

Couple of suggestions.

First regarding trimming. You gotta figure out whats going on with your trimmer. I've used the Lyman universal trimmer for thousands of rounds and it functions perfectly. Take Cardiackid's advice and keep a properly trimmed case around for setting up the trimmer. After that, it should trim within a couple of thousanths or better every time. Trimming does seem to take a long time and I find it tedious and thats why I bought a Giraud. Now I love to trim. There may still be a variance of a couple of thousanths but trim length has little impact on accurancy anyway.

Second, regarding seating. Measuring COAL and trying to keep it dead on every time is an excercise in futility because bullet tips will always vary. The barrel does not care how far the bullet sticks into it. Measure from the Ogive and forget about the length of the tips. Seating dies seat off the ogive not the tip so dont sweat it!

Until I got the Giraud, it would take me 4 hours to load 50 rounds, which is about what its taking you. The Giraud is a huge time saver and reloading is much more enjoyable. Spend the time weighing powder charges, which have a bigger impact on accuracy.

 

[MitchAlsup]

Re: Too much time to reload,is this normal.

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: diego-ted</div><div class="ubbcode-body">No matter what I cannot get it to seat the same every time so I end up seating long and measuring at least twice but usually three times?? I know I need to add inner and outer neck trimming and bullet sorting which will add even more time to the process. Is there anything I can do to add consistency to the process without all the redundant steps? </div></div>

I actually DO seat my bullets twice. I set the Competition seater die to 3.000 (308) and press all the bullets into the primered powdered cases. I then dial the micrometer to 2.943 (0.015 from my lands) and seat them a second time. I have measured enough of these seatings to know that when a slow long press is used on the lever arm, all the cartriges come out at +/- 0.0015.

1. Tumble brass ___ This is the last step after brass prep before inserting the primer
2. Deprime ___ I use a universal depriming die on diry cases (step 1)
2.9 MEASURE ___ I use RCBS case micrometer to determin if I can Neck Only size the case
3. Lube/Resize FL/NK ___ Neck Only size with a 0.338 bushing and then NO size a second time with a 0.332 bushing
4. Trim case ___ I trim my cases between the 0.338 bushing and the 0.332 bushing
5. Primer Pocket ___ I uniform the primer pocket (and they come out clean)
5.1 Case trim ___
5.2 Chamfer ___
5.3 Deburr ___
5.4 COAL ___ verify each case for OAL and inspect chamfer and debur
6. Sonic clean ___ I tumble at this point
7. Prime case ___ RCBS hand primer
8. Load Powder ___ Throw, weigh, trickle, drop
9. Seat bullet ___ Slow, even, light pressure on lever arm

 

[diego-ted]

Re: Too much time to reload,is this normal.

Thx, guys, I guess it's the trimming that is kicking my butt. I just reloaded 20 that did not need case trimming and it took about and hour. I took my time and was double checking measurments.

Diego

 

[gunsnjeeps]

Re: Too much time to reload,is this normal.

Diego,
Do you do brass in large lots or 20 at a time? I do almost the same list as you. I have copied yours below and added notes. I prep 200 to 300 cases at a time.

1. Tumble brass ___
I tumble for an hour. Just to get dust and dirt off. I've never polished brass over night. My prep lot size is based on what I can tumble.
2. Deprime ___
3. Lube/Resize FL/NK ___
I size and deprime in one step. Put 50 to 100 casses in a ziplock and spray lube. I have a lanolin alcohol mix in a trigger spray, one spray then spread it around.
4. Trim case ___
5. Primer Pocket ___
Either order for most of my ammo I don't do anything except remove crimps in primers.
6. Sonic clean ___
Remove lube no media left in case/flash hole.
7. Prime case ___
8. Load Powder ___
9. Seat bullet ___

Agree that you need to get the trimmer worked out. Sorry I can't help with the Lyman Trimmer.

 

[WDL]

Re: Too much time to reload,is this normal.

I am not a Lee fan EXCEPT for their case trimmers. You do need one for each caliber but they are only a few dollars. Chuck the trimmer in a drill or cordless screwdriver, spin the case for a couple seconds and you're done.

 

[scotharr]

Re: Too much time to reload,is this normal.

It also helps to have teenage boys to do your work for you: cut my reloading time way down

I do this:
deprime
stainless tumble
size
trim (giraud)
prime, weigh, seat

I'll ream the primer pocket and anneal every 4th firing or so.

Didn't used to trim every firing but I learned the hard way that accuracy is less without trimming: little burrs that get in the way.

 

[MitchAlsup]

Re: Too much time to reload,is this normal.

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: CamoWildcat</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I am not a Lee fan EXCEPT for their case trimmers. You do need one for each caliber but they are only a few dollars. Chuck the trimmer in a drill or cordless screwdriver, spin the case for a couple seconds and you're done. </div></div>

I chuck up my Lee trimmer in my lathe, turn it on (medium-slow) and it takes more time to grab a case, put it in the case holder, tighten holder, untighten holder, and remove case than to do the trimming. But realistically, the major trim only needs done once (first time), from there on in, the trim distances are only a (couple) thou anyway.