ETA: 6/15/12
Since I posted this I can say this is a very good press and my concerns below have been alleviated by tips and suggestions in this thread and with experience by using the press.
I've loaded 200 rounds with my single stage in an afternoon. With the LnL Progressive I loaded 17 rounds yesterday in 5 hours.
Lots of little things; The Lee sizing/depriming die doesn’t line up and the case needs a touch to get to line-up on entry every time. I blame the die, not the press. It didn’t act right on my single stage either.
Powder Metering Insert would stick at the bottom of the throw in the Case Activated Powder Drop . I know you can have problems if you don't remove the lube that comes with the packing, but I did that. This was a manufacturing slip-up. It's cast aluminum, so I just put the Dremel to it and solved that problem. Although a minor problem, it did cut a big chunk of time out to correct the problem by being delicate not to remove too much material.
The Case Activated Powder Drop NEVER dropped the same charge twice.
The primer tube jammed with 96 primers in it. You know that once that tube is full there is no way to retrieve those primers? Unscrew the outer shield, lift the inner tube and primers go everywhere. This happened twice...ugh. I got clever with rolled up tape as a way to collect the dozen primers left in and around the stage area that were too small for my fingers to reach. Actually, there was third time, but that was when I decided 5 hours was enough time trying to make the press work.
But wait, there is more...
The box that came from Midway was a bit banged up and some lose parts were scattered in the bottom. The spring for the primer shuttle was there, but I hadn't noticed that it was stretched out of shape, so it rarely pulled the shuttle into position, thus not priming a case…and when you put powder in a case with a hole in the bottom you have a big ass mess. That happened twice, too. Then when I manually took care of that it loaded ok, but several primers were loaded upside down. Akkkk!
I want to stick with this to figure out the kinks. some of this is just breaking in a new piece of equipment, but how long before I pick it up and throw it all the way to Kansas (Midway) is anyone’s guess.
Oh, be careful when your finished and empty the Case Activated Powder Drop with the baffle in it. If you forget it's there it will come sliding down and spill powder all over the table.
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