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Posted: 7/28/2011 6:26:14 PM EDT
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I have reloaded thousands upon thousands of rounds of .223 and 9mmx19 over the years, but am setting up a toolhead for 45ACP for the first time. I've got a couple powder measures, but I'm leaving the new one on the .223 head. The old measure I have uses the springs to return the charge bar instead of the failsafe rod.
I've got the powder die adjusted so that I get full travel of the "little white square" on the charge bar and start to get a bell of the case mouth. When it's at the optimum setting, the powder funnel is low enough so that the powder measure moves up and down slightly when the shell plate comes into contact with it. In other words, if there are no cases going 'round, the powder measure is raised by the shell plate and this in turn slides the charge bar about 1/4". Is this normal?  I don't remember it doing this on my 9mm toolhead, but it's been a while since I've loaded any of those.
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Too bad I'm away from home right now. I could look at my one 650 that I keep set up for 45 and take some pictures for you. It also has one of the old powder measures. I've never noticed it, but I'm not saying it doesn't happen. If you don't get an answer by next Wednesday, I'll be able to help you out!  |
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Quoted:
Mine is the same way, doesn't hurt a thing. Good to know. I didn't think it was traveling enough to move the charge cavity to the point where it would pick up powder, but I didn't have time to load it up and test it. In researching this I did come up with some mods that folks have made to the newer "failsafe" powder measures to smooth up the operation. I don't really need the failsafe feature since I have a powder check. I think I'll modify my newer measure to eliminate all the flopping around it does. http://www.ericwesselman.com/DillonPowderMeasure/ |
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I've got Dillon powder measures dating from 1985 to a couple of years back, they didn't have the fail safe in 85, it came along later, and although I never had any problems I did the conversion on my old 550. I have 4 or 5 Dillon powder measures for my convenience, all but one are the newer fail safe designs, a couple of them were a little clunky when they were new, they smoothed out quite nicely. I tried the modifications you linked to, and quite frankly they work a lot better without it. My advice, the only modifications I might recommend are the ones dealing with polishing the interior funnels, although I haven't found any need to do that to mine, leave the powder measures as Dillon designed them, they work just fine. The only modifications that I have done to mine, and left on them, is adding a larger knob to the adjustment bolt, that's pretty handy.  |
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