powder measures what you got? advise?

[sauer]

hi guys

 

im currently working a Lee perfect powder measure but its anything but perfect and throws anything up to or over a grain either side of what i want.

 

at best its half a grain out and i adjust manually with a powder dipper and its ok for that.......soooooo..

 

what do you have that works?!?!?!

 

its the only powder measure ive had. or worked......what others...manual or electronic etc

 

ANY advice welcome......

 

sauer / paul

[TonyH]

hi guys

 

im currently working a Lee perfect powder measure but its anything but perfect and throws anything up to or over a grain either side of what i want.

 

at best its half a grain out and i adjust manually with a powder dipper and its ok for that.......soooooo..

 

what do you have that works?!?!?!

 

its the only powder measure ive had. or worked......what others...manual or electronic etc

 

ANY advice welcome......

 

sauer / paul

Paul, I thought the Lee Perfect had a good reputation as an accurate measure at a very reasonable price... Sorry to hear yours is erratic. But except for competition/benchrest measures I don't believe any of them delivers powder with greater than a couple of tenths grain consistency, at best - my RCBS Uniflow, very widely used, long established etc, certainly doesn't, and being a fussy sort I set it low then top up each case individually using a trickler, OK since I never load lots of rounds at once. Owners of the RCBS Chargemaster (?name?) tend to be ecstatic about its accuracy and repeatability, if you want to spend lots of squid and/or if you load one hell of a lot of rounds; a cheaper compromise is the short-load technique I use, plus one of various basic electronic tricklers now available at roughly a hundred a go, to speed the process. Depends how much precision you need/want - for regular varminting or informal range shooting up to around 300 yards then dropping loads straight from a decent manual measure like the Uniflow is probably adequate.

Regards, Tony

[6.5shooter]

Sauer,

I agree with Tony, set it to throw the charge lower than needed and trickle the rest. I use a lyman thrower and i have to say it generally is fairly accurate as i asually have to trickle the same amount every time to top up with using powders like varget or reloader 15 but when i move to a longer grain powder like n160 my results vary alot and i crunch powder when turning the drum which is pribably a bad job.

As for electronic trickle chargers i wouldnt use them, had a lyman and its a piece of scrap, wouldnt use electrinic scales ever again from my experiences with them.

I use my rcbs 10/10 beam scales now and my technique now is very accurate and my ES has tightened up.

 

Garry.

[varmartin]

My RCBS Uniflow with micrometer adjustment screw consistently throws to within 3/10ths of a grain or better with the correct (consistent) technique...then i trickle the last few tenths..

[andybrock]

I used to have a RCBS powder measure (without the micrometer) and I used to struggle with it finding it was powder fussy and inaccurate, but I think fitting the micrometer has turned them from average into an excellent usable piece of kit as Varmartin confirms.I'm not sure if a micrometer can be fitted to a Lee but they seem to make a world of difference to performance.

I now use a Harrells culver which always throws an accurate measure and well worth the money I got mine from Sinclair's but I'm sure they are available in the UK, Reloading solutions maybe?

 

Andy

[sauer]

cheers guys

 

 

i up till now get it close with lee powder measure and trickle the rest but i just wanted summit quicker but accurate

 

maybe coz its vhit N160 im using i dunnoe, as its a coarser type pwoder but ive never tried anything else in it

 

guess ill keep going as is or think bout one of these Harels i keep hearing folk whisper in awe about!!!!

 

 

sauer

[Ronin]

I use a Harrell

 

 

but I dont trust it.....

 

 

An explanation - I load for numerous calibres (22-250 Ai thru to 338LM at present) - which means differing types of powder, not all meter well.

 

The Harrell, whilst good, isnt accurate enough for my liking, I want every load, to be the same weight, exactly the same before they get loaded.

 

So I throw light and then transfer the charge to an electronic Acculab scale and then trickle up to the given wieght - the acculab will read to two dp's.

 

 

Whilst this is excessive and nerd like, I prefer it to wondering if my charge is light, heavy or just so.

 

 

 

I would consider using beam scale and en electronic trickler linked to off switch (Targetmaster) I think is the name of this, as ive seen excellent results with it.

 

 

Had I not the Harrell and Acculab scale, I would look at getting the electronic trickler.

 

 

Well I may get one anyway....

[1967spud]

[1967spud]

[ds1]

Powder measuring is one of the parts I hate most about reloading. I like to reload in batches of 100-200 cases per time, but I want consistency from batch to batch. I tried and gave up on an RCBS Powder Master system - temperatue sensitive I think. In any event I was getting variation when checked against the beam scales.

 

Beam scales - with powder tricker and RCBS powder thrower with micrometer, OK but boringly slow and also some charge weight variation depending where the beam knives aligned themselves on latteraly in the agate bearings. The 10-10 RCBS scales seemed a little more repeatable than the 505 RCBS scales.

 

Then I bought a Prometheus. Accurate and repeatable yes but can be a PIA to set up for small batches, simple principle RCBS thrower and balance beam with electronic trickler and infra red cut off in one unit. Fairly fast.

 

David

[andybrock]

I use a Harrell

 

 

but I dont trust it.....

 

 

An explanation - I load for numerous calibres (22-250 Ai thru to 338LM at present) - which means differing types of powder, not all meter well.

 

The Harrell, whilst good, isnt accurate enough for my liking, I want every load, to be the same weight, exactly the same before they get loaded.

 

So I throw light and then transfer the charge to an electronic Acculab scale and then trickle up to the given wieght - the acculab will read to two dp's.

 

 

Whilst this is excessive and nerd like, I prefer it to wondering if my charge is light, heavy or just so.

 

 

 

I would consider using beam scale and en electronic trickler linked to off switch (Targetmaster) I think is the name of this, as ive seen excellent results with it.

 

 

Had I not the Harrell and Acculab scale, I would look at getting the electronic trickler.

 

 

Well I may get one anyway....

 

 

Don't think it's nerd like in the slightest Ronin, consistency and accuracy with components will produce the best rifle accuracy in my opinion.

 

 

Andy

[Chris-NZ]

You've got to consider the type of powder you're using versus the volume of the case as to how significant your thrower's error is. I fancy I can throw Varget to within 0.2gr most of the time. For a .308 running 46grs, that error amounts to 0.4% which isn't a helluva lot. The error is near double of course with a .223 case. I generally run W748 in my .223s and being a fine ball powder, it meters extremely well, in my experience within 0.1gr if you pay even moderate attention to throwing technique.

 

I feel there are more important things than measuring powder to the last micrograin. Consistent neck tension is one variable I have found to be of major significance- if bullet seating feels quite variable between cases, I'm never happy. Case prep is an area worth putting effort into. I look at the way BR guys conventionally went about their loading- infinite attention to cases, then they threw their loads.

 

Chris-NZ

[Scotch_egg]

I almost bought a harrel powder thrower this year. However I hate the fact it cuts the powder. This sureley increases the total area of the powder and can't be consistant every throw. A cut kernal will effect the sirface area of the powder, not every throw will cut the same number of kernals. I have heard some BR shooters just throw with out trickle. If throwing technique is done consistently then all charge's should have little deviation, except for cutting kernals. I'll be honest I am no BR shooter.....

 

 

 

 

I have been using a lyman dps 2 with the dps 3 upgrade for 18 months now. I have never bothered with a beam scale and used a cheap digital scale before this. People will say you need an accurate scale. What I work to is a consistant scale. I can throw a charge and re-measure it and get the same weight an hour later. My scale may read 30.1gr and your's measure my charge at 30.3gr. As long as every charge is the same and you work up to the charge and are safe then consistency rules.

 

 

I have shot groups in the .1's. The RCBS thrower has a better rep than the lyman. But I bought my lyman secondhand so it was worth a punt.

 

This link goes into detail http://www.6mmbr.com/powderdispensers01.html

 

 

When loading a few hundred rounds at a time digital is great

[ds1]

I think Chris-NZ has it right in terms of considering the accuracy of charges in terms of percentage variation in relation to case capacity. Seems to make sense a 0.5 grain difference in charge weight will produce more ES variation in a 223 case than a 308 case.

 

It is splitting hairs but I wonder how the bullet diameter effect the ES variation for the same case capacity - eg would a 308 win case show more ES variation with a 0.5 grain difference in charge compared to a 243 win case - same case capacity but different size hole. I guess the answer is depends on too many variations to consider - bullet weight, shape, seating depth, neck tension, chamber lead.....and others.

 

 

David.

[brown dog]

I almost bought a harrel powder thrower this year. However I hate the fact it cuts the powder. This sureley increases the total area of the powder and can't be consistant every throw. A cut kernal will effect the sirface area of the powder, not every throw will cut the same number of kernals. I have heard some BR shooters just throw with out trickle. If throwing technique is done consistently then all charge's should have little deviation, except for cutting kernals. I'll be honest I am no BR shooter.....

 

I have been using a lyman dps 2 with the dps 3 upgrade for 18 months now. I have never bothered with a beam scale and used a cheap digital scale before this. People will say you need an accurate scale. What I work to is a consistant scale. I can throw a charge and re-measure it and get the same weight an hour later. My scale may read 30.1gr and your's measure my charge at 30.3gr. As long as every charge is the same and you work up to the charge and are safe then consistency rules.

 

Blimey, i'm in exactly the same boat. The lyman with the upgrade is spot on. I always check the first charge and a few random ones on a beam scale - I set the lyman to drop the weight the beam scale tells me regardless of what the digital scale says - so that it's 'calibrated' to 'truth' whenever I use it.

 

 

 

But, I hate reloading as an utter chore; and those harrells just tempt me.....I love the speed!

 

One pal fills a whole tray of 308 cases at a time so quickly that I look on with envy; and there's no noticeable negative effect on the target.

 

..I think a big part of this is that he uses the OCW concept; meaning that any tiny percentage variations either side of the Optimal Charge have no tangible target effect; even at long 308 range.

[terryh]

Interesting read.

 

I've a Harrel which, if I use it, is set to throw a bit low then onto a good beam balance and trickle up to the load.

 

I've also recently purchased a RCBS Chargmaster and once tuned for better speed (I was loading faster than it was weighing ) this has been giving good performance both speed and weight wise, I check ramdom charges on the beam balance. Not sure re. temperature sensitivity, mine resides in a cellar which remains constant(ish) temperature wise.

 

I've also a Lyman with a long drop tube for BP but as BP's not too inteligent so I drop straight into the case.

 

I suppose it's a balance (no pun!) on what you want to do? Go out and shoot more (using a faster possible less consitent method) to be able to read the wind better, as a wrong wind call will blow you further than the odd .1 of a g will improve your shot or on the other hand if you're at the upper levels of a sport then this consistency makes all the difference. Also, if you've a custom rifle then not making the last effort re. consistency of loads is a bit of a waste of money - yes?

 

Terry