Reloading and casting noob questions

ebay usually has good prices on the used dillon equipment if you don't mind watching an auction till the end

If you plan to do a fair bit of shooting with a handgun, you really need a progressive. The Lee 1000 is pretty cheap but it is pretty rickety. A Dillon will last longer than you will live and their warranty is forever, even if you aren't the original owner.

Lee molds work pretty well, but they will wear out eventually. They usually start getting kind of loose and sloppy after 10k rds or so. You don't necessarily have to size bullets from them, the way you do with bullets from an RCBS/Lyman iron mold, and they won't rust the way iron will if you don't take care of it. They are much cheaper than iron or brass, so it doesn't hurt to try them out. I usually use them in 9mm so I don't have to size the bullets.

The Lee furnace is by far the cheapest, but the one I have has lasted a very long time. You have to fool around with it sometimes when the handle gets stuck, but it's 40 dollars compared to a couple hundred dollars for an RCBS.

Thanks for the feedback/ideas so far. I've got good timing for picking up an interest in this since its gun show season so maybe I can find some books if I have anything left over from drooling over guns I can't afford.

Threeband, why be original and pick something off the wall when I can pick a round that people have been tinkering with for decades . Really it ended up being pure luck that I happened to find a used Taurus 617 at a good price and fell in love with it more then thinking about reloading.

As for what rounds I would expect to be reloading, right now only .357/.38 and .30-.30 but I'm going to be adding to my collection on a regular basis *coughSaturdaysGunShowcough*

Equipment (which I don't plan to start buying until after xmas depending on what santa drops off): I'm leaning towards a turret or even a single stage. I get kind of overwhelmed looking at the progressives considering I barely know more about reloading then an anti-gun nut. I know the progressives really crank out the reloads, but I don't know, the simpler ones just are more appealing to me.

Smart choices jtb, the progressives require allot more attention and though you think they are cranking them out, unless it is a fully calibrated dillon (built in safe guards) you run the danger of scuib rounds.

Castboolitsandhandloads.com for all things cast. Also I have used "range lead" for my 45 reloads. I get this from indoor range which is about 80% rim fire. It seems to work fine for my low velocity reloads.

squib rounds I meant

Read and watch YouTube and manufacturer's videos on the 'net.
Cast: getting cheap lead is getting almost impossible and things are just going to get worse.
I have looked at the price of lead in quantities I would want, and the lead costs as much as buying already cast bullets (they buy alloy lead by the tons!)
Molds: aluminum is easier to use and easier to damage. Steel holds the heat better and is easier to cast great bullets.
Pot: get a 20lb pot. Smelt in cast iron Dutch oven.
Sizing: I haven't done any sizing since I ran a series of tests back in the '80s and found that as-cast were more accurate and just as easy to load. Also, re-sizing down by more than 0.003" ALWAYS produced bullets that were hardly worth shooting and I ditched those molds or adjusted hardness to get a "better" bullet diameter.
Hardness: I found that by the time a 12-14BHN alloy was "too soft," it was time to go with a gas checks any way.
Lube: I have been using Lee Liquid Alox for at least 10 years (with ALL my molds, even for rifles), and I think more like 20 years. Never had a problem except breathing the smoke can occasionally choke me up.
Currently, I am almost out of lead and have been shooting commercial lead bullets for about 5 years. When I do cast again, I plan to use "Recluse" 45% JPW/45% LLA/10% mineral spirits.
Press: I have loaded lots of ammuntion of a Lee Reloading Press. This press usually costs about $35 and produces ammunition as good as any other press. Dies make the reloading. For pleasure loading, however, I would go with a Lee Classic Turret (buy a new turret for each cartridge).
For progressive, I will always recommend Hornady's L-N-L. This will irritate the blue boys, who love to re-tell every Hornady story they have ever heard, but the L-N-L is more "open" then Dillons and it is easy to learn on.
My wife decided that since I have three 1050s, I should give my son my L-N-L when he decided he wanted to learn to reload (he just enjoyed shooting my reloads growing up and never wanted to learn then). It took me maybe an hour to walk him through everything and then I watched him load for awhile. Then I had him switch calibers and set up the press again for the new caliber. It was all very easy.
However, I would recommend the Dillon 650 if, and only if, you know you need a case feeder/collator. The Dillon was pretty much designed for a case feeder/collator.
I have used a 550 and a 650 (about 15-20 years ago, I believe) without a case feeder and they are not a joy to use without one. Any one who says otherwise has probably NOT used the Hornady. The Hornady simply has much better ergonomics of loading cases and bullets by hand--all operations using the left hand and the right stays on the press handle.
With the Dillons, you are either feeding each case with your right hand into the "case feeder" that feeds a case into the shell plate or you load 20-25 cases into a plastic tube (with your right hand), load those, then get up and load another 20-25 cases. The operation of the L-N-L with the left hand is a lot more uniform and easy.
Regarding the 550: I decided back in the late '70s when progressive presses first became "affordable" that I wanted 5 stations. Thus, with only four stations and manual indexing, the 550 is NOT a machine I will spend money on It cost too much to be so restricted. Many are happy, but how many other presses have they used.
Note: I can not stand for more than a few moments with stabbing back pain, so I reload sitting down and will not jump up and down to load cases. YMMV.
Then, there is the 1050 and you will never look back. However, the 1050 isn't blue...
Squib loads: ALWAYS use an RCBS Lock-Out die. I love it. It is so sensitive, that it hangs up when a case with a different capacity hits it. You may want a Dillon powder check die, but I had the Lock-Out die first and see no reason to change. Whatever you do, don't waste your money on a "powder cop." If you can't remember to inspect each charged case (and the Hornady puts the charged case under you nose so you have to work hard NOT to inspect each case), you aren't going to remember to look at the powder cop. Most of the time, my attention is on the bullet seating and I "try" to always inspect the charged case.
Dillon are much harder to inspect without actually bending over the press, so I would REALLY recommend the Lock-Out or Powder Check dies.
Thus, if you want a powder check and want to separate seating from crimping, you NEED five station minimum.