Reloading thoughts

[JBaum]

I've had more than a few people PM me about reloading, so I thought I'd post a detailed answer here for the benefit of all. These thoughts are mine and work for me. You decide what you think is the way to go.

My thoughts on reloading:

It seemed everyone had a used press they wanted to sell me when I started talking about reloading (Lyman, Redmond, Lee, Sears, etc). All were in good usable condition, and cheap. When I asked why they were selling them, they said they were going to get a Dillon.

I figured why not start by buying a Dillon, and then I wouldn't be trying to sell an old press after I bought it from someone else, like everyone else is trying to do to me now.

I bought a Dillon 550 press from ebay. Buy it new from Dillon if necessary. It's tops, and you can always sell it later very quickly, because that's what everyone who bought a lesser press really wants now that they know better.

Dillon presses come with a DVD showing you how to do everything. How to set up, how to adjust, how to how to. It's easy, really. The press has quick-change features that let you go from one caliber to another in 1 minute. Reloading 300 rounds an hour (or more) is not difficult when you get a little experience with it.

When I bought my press used, it was missing one small part. I called Dillon and asked how much for the little part, for the press I just bought used. The asked my name and address, and said it would be in the mail that day. They sent it to me free and told me to enjoy the press. That's the kind of company they are. If you need help, they go way beyond nice and helpful.

There are some reloading accessories you'll need besides the press, and they sell those too, or you can get them from a gun show, maybe at a cheaper price or from another company, or used. (A tumbler, powder scale, cartridge trimmer, primer pocket reamer, and calipers, come to mind.) Seriously: Dillon press, accessories can be from anyone else. Dillon dies are a step ahead of everyone else when using a Dillon press. Spend the extra few bucks and get Dillon dies. If you ever sell the press, Dillon dies, and accessories, you'll always get top buck out of them, therefore in the long run, they're cheaper. Mine came with Dillon dies and I bought a few sets of other brands later for other calibers. The Dillon dies are better. They fit better and they work better.

Reloading manuals (online or books), have a range of powder load that you can use for each caliber and bullet weight/style. Let's say it's from 40 to 45 grains of powder for bullet X. Load a belt with 10 or 20 shots of 40 grain powder loads. Load another belt with 10 or 20 shots of 41 grains. etc. up to a near max load. Shoot the reloads and see what the gun likes best, then load that for the entire belt and you're set. If it runs perfectly with 43 grains, and there's no change with running 44 grains, use 43. There's no sense wasting powder and beating the gun with an unnecessarily heavy load. My full auto MG42 likes 43.5 grains of Hodgdon BLC-2 powder. With 43 grains it runs a tiny bit slower, with 44 grains it doesn't run any faster than with 43.5. Once my Dillon press was set at 43.5 grains of powder, it stayed there and I don't have to weigh and adjust anything again for that set up. I have one press, and 5 powder dispensers/measurers, one for each caliber kits. I can swap to a different caliber in about a minute.

That's as hard as it gets. Figure out what makes the gun run right, and continue to do that. .308 brass is cheaper to buy than 8mm Mauser and easier to find. Get dies for whatever cartridges you'll be shooting.

Once you have the press, you can reload everything just by buying dies. Buying extra powder dispensers makes changing to a different caliber even faster.

Different cartridges may take different powder. .308, 8mm, .30-06 = same powder. 9mm and .45 = same powder, but different from the rifle. Read a little, watch the Dillon DVD and it's actually pretty simple.

Brass:

Most military surplus brass is Berdan primed, which is not easily reloadable. There are two little holes that are between the primer and the powder in Berdan primed brass, and it's difficult to press out the used primer without the proper (expensive and uncommon) tooling. Boxer primed brass has one flash hole in the center of the primer pocket, and that's what reloading presses are set up to handle.

I bought 500 rounds of boxer primed 8mm brass to get started with 8mm, but now I shoot mostly .308 because it's a little more gentle on the gun, and cheaper. At 25 shots a second, cheaper is good. Guys go out and pick empty brass up at gun ranges and sell it on gunbroker. It's a good deal. Buy bullets at gun shows, you don't have to pay shipping on lead that way. Getting a box of 500 or 1,000 brass that's only been shot once, and you have 2 to 3 reloads out of each one. Remember that the goal for an MG42 isn't tack driving accuracy at 800 yards. If the gun functions properly, I don't care if it's 6" low at 500 yards.

After a total of 3 shots (1 original firing, and 2 reloads, let's say), examine the brass carefully. Look at the sides of the casings. Anything with thin, dark lines running lengthwise down the brass is getting ready to rupture because extraction in an MG42 is violent because the brass is still under internal pressure when it is extracted. If the brass has a dark line on the side, toss it to the scrap pile. Scrap brass is recyclable, so get some money for it at a scrap yard when you accumulate a bucket full. There's no fun in having the cartridge rupture and blow the gun up just to save 20 cents on brass. I never shoot more than 4 bullets from 1 brass. I've seen people picking brass shrapnel out of their arms after 5 reloads on the same brass. It's not going to happen to me when it's something I can control.

[amafrank]

On the other hand....buy an electrical device from dillon and see how good the customer service is when it craps out 1 year and 1 day after you buy it. The super sized tumbler worked great til it didn't. When I talked to them about it the guarantee was no longer lifetime and they wanted as much to replace the motor as it cost to replace the tumbler. In addition I had to pay shipping both ways. I bought the dillon because it was supposed to be so much better and last longer than the crappy frankfort arsenal stuff midway sells. My midway tumbler lasted 3 years and did a lot more brass than the dillon and for what the dillon cost I can buy 3 or more of the cheapies. Should last a lot longer than the expensive stuff from them and I won't have to worry about the warranty being waffled on. I'll never buy anything from dillon again and I'm quite happy with my RCBS presses.


Just my counterpoint.....always someone with another opinion.


Frank

[JBaum]

Well it's nice to see you didn't have a problem with any of the rest of my reloading post

My tumbler is from another company.

[42rocker]

John
Thanks for taking the time to post that. It took a few minutes to get that together and share with us.

Later 424rocker

[shred]

Dillon's electrical warrantee has been 1 year for almost as long as I've been reloading. Still sucks when something breaks (and for some reason it's the tumblers that do it more than any), but the motors on my 1050 and 650 casefeeders and primer filler have loaded somewhere north of 180,000 rounds trouble-free for me over maybe the past 20 years.

The problem with buying the 550 Dillon is pretty soon you want the 650... and then the 1050...

Btw, I like Dillon dies, but they don't resize as far down as some other brands so if that's a problem (mostly pistol guys running dozens of loads per case), then look into some others.

[SturmHead]

Hey John, are you going to post pictures of your wire and radiator hose device to prevent dented case mouths that we talked about at the KCR MG shoot?
Oh, and after you walked away I told the lady that if I had a question, I go to you, and that you really know your stuff

[JBaum]

I didn't forget, I spent the day recovering from the long drive and long hours. I'll get to it in the next day or two.

[fjruple]

John--

I totally agree with you on the Dillion Press. Great company to deal with.

I would like to list several of observations on reloading for the semi-auto MG42. Unfortunately I am not allow to own the "dangerous" full auto MG42. I reload for both 8mm Mauser and 7.62mm NATO. The one thing thing I have noted about both calibers is the reloading that military brass runs better and lasts longer. I normally get about 5 or 6 reloads out of the lot of cases that I am using. I found it easy to tell how many times the case was shot from counting the number of extractor marks on the rim of the case from the violent ejection of the case found the gun. I use only military hard primers in reloading to reduce the problem of slam firing. For 8mm Mauser reloading I resize military surplus .30-06 cases usually HXP or new M1909 blanks which were given to me. I run through a 8mm Mauser resizing die and than trim them on a small lathe that I have. I have found no need to anneal the cases as some folks do. The problem with 8mm Mauser is finding FMJ bullets. I have been using 8mm Mauser spitzers from PPU. They seem to work well enough. For this reason I shoot mainly reloaded 7.62mm NATO M80 spec ammunition with fewer jams. The gun does bend the heck out of the neck of the cases. I use a piece of rubber hose around the front of the triggerguard to keep necks from being damaged.

I have move back to a single stage press as I feel I have better control over the quality control of the reloading I do especially for my match ammunition.

--fjruple

[JBaum]

I have now posted how to make a shell bumper in the Stickies section:

viewtopic.php?f=39&t=13335&p=95305#p95305