Powder flakes on shell plate

scooter

scooter

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I have a Dillon 650 and get powder flakes that fall on the shell plate .They seem to be falling off the powder checker brass plunger.Is that normal or is there a way to stop or reduce it from happening? There is another minor nuisance with the old primer catcher, some don't make it in there and land on the floor. Solutions?
 
I'm running a 550 with no powder checker so I can't comment on how common this is but I know that with my setup you need to ground everything pretty well during the cooler months to ensure that you don't have "static cling" with the powder....

I do all my depriming/resizing on a single stage press so can't help with your depriming question... Found this helps keep my Dillon cleaner and helps my "feel" when seating the bullet.....
 
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I know this question is floating around with more answers on the BrianEnos forum. I don't use the powder check but I would look into static issues.

For the spent primer there are a couple different solutions using tubing.

http://www.brianenos.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=584&view=findpost&p=971803

That whole thread is on tips for the 650.

The unused primer chute could use some tweaking too.
 
Is there tons of powder or just a little?

I've noticed on my 550 there is some "leakage" with certain powders... Titegroup seems to "leak" a little on my 550, while PowerPistol does very little.

I keep a "can of air" near the press so I can blow out any brass shavings, loose powder, etc, off the shell plate after every couple of hundred rounds or so.

-Mike
 
scooter said:
I have a Dillon 650 and get powder flakes that fall on the shell plate .They seem to be falling off the powder checker brass plunger.Is that normal or is there a way to stop or reduce it from happening? There is another minor nuisance with the old primer catcher, some don't make it in there and land on the floor. Solutions?
Click to expand...

What caliber are you loading?
If I'm loading short casings such as 9mm I keep one finger on the charged case so when the shell plate indexes the propellant does'nt fly out. Basically I slow or buffer the positive click. Taller cases such as .357 no problems.
There's not much you can do about the spent primer catcher. All 650's I've seen have that issue. However you can help prevent the un inserted primers from falling out of the bottom of the catch chute by leaving a couple at the bottom.
 
drgrant said:
Is there tons of powder or just a little?

I've noticed on my 550 there is some "leakage" with certain powders... Titegroup seems to "leak" a little on my 550, while PowerPistol does very little.

I keep a "can of air" near the press so I can blow out any brass shavings, loose powder, etc, off the shell plate after every couple of hundred rounds or so.

-Mike
Click to expand...

No not a real mess but I could use one of those cans and its more frequent than a couple hundred. The other post about grounding sounds plausable since it has gotten worsre with the cold weather and that part of the basement it unisulated. How would one ground the 650 to try to see if that works?
 
scooter said:
No not a real mess but I could use one of those cans and its more frequent than a couple hundred. The other post about grounding sounds plausable since it has gotten worsre with the cold weather and that part of the basement it unisulated. How would one ground the 650 to try to see if that works?
Click to expand...

I used a 14 gauge wire connected to the base of the press to a copper water pipe.... Just make sure you get a good electrical connection to the metal of the press....
 
I don't have my 550b press grounded, nor do I really see any benefit in doing so (just my opinion)....

What I do know from previous years of reloading:

If you go too fast, and don't allow that extra smigeon of time for all of the powder to fall through the powder funnel...... you WILL get powder spilling as you lower the shell plate.

My advice: SLOW DOWN...... Allow the powder to fall completely. That's even more important in the rifle calibers... My 30-06 and .308 load require twice as much powder as the 5.56 rounds, and it takes twice as long for that powder to fall through the powder funnel. So, when I am doing my reloading, I pause just a bit at the top of the stroke.

Keep in mind that any and all powder that you see on your shell plate is powder that DIDN'T make it into a cartridge assembly...... when it was supposed to.......

Whether you have good eye/hand coordination, or are an old salty dog (for Bob's benefit! haha) like me, the press can only be operated at a given speed, mostly determined by how fast the powder will drop, and not any function of how fast you can place components.

So, slow down and see how that goes. Go for quality rather than quantity.
 
DukeInMaine said:
I don't have my 550b press grounded, nor do I really see any benefit in doing so (just my opinion)....

What I do know from previous years of reloading:

If you go too fast, and don't allow that extra smigeon of time for all of the powder to fall through the powder funnel...... you WILL get powder spilling as you lower the shell plate.

My advice: SLOW DOWN...... Allow the powder to fall completely. That's even more important in the rifle calibers... My 30-06 and .308 load require twice as much powder as the 5.56 rounds, and it takes twice as long for that powder to fall through the powder funnel. So, when I am doing my reloading, I pause just a bit at the top of the stroke.

Keep in mind that any and all powder that you see on your shell plate is powder that DIDN'T make it into a cartridge assembly...... when it was supposed to.......

Whether you have good eye/hand coordination, or are an old salty dog (for Bob's benefit! haha) like me, the press can only be operated at a given speed, mostly determined by how fast the powder will drop, and not any function of how fast you can place components.

So, slow down and see how that goes. Go for quality rather than quantity.
Click to expand...

Point taken this maybe the case
 
Duke,

For the sake of comparison, how many pistol rounds would you load in an hour? I'm assuming here that the brass is all prepped. So time would include loading primers, running the ammo through the press, doing some QA on the finished ammo (case gauge and OAL checks), and then loading the ammo into those plastic ammo trays.

I did 300 tonight in just under an hour. I'm no speed demon. I generally spot check 10-20% of the rounds for OAL and case gauge. Just wondering how I compare, as I've heard folks talking about cranking out 500 rounds per hour.

Thanks,

Rich


DukeInMaine said:
I don't have my 550b press grounded, nor do I really see any benefit in doing so (just my opinion)....

What I do know from previous years of reloading:

If you go too fast, and don't allow that extra smigeon of time for all of the powder to fall through the powder funnel...... you WILL get powder spilling as you lower the shell plate.

My advice: SLOW DOWN...... Allow the powder to fall completely. That's even more important in the rifle calibers... My 30-06 and .308 load require twice as much powder as the 5.56 rounds, and it takes twice as long for that powder to fall through the powder funnel. So, when I am doing my reloading, I pause just a bit at the top of the stroke.

Keep in mind that any and all powder that you see on your shell plate is powder that DIDN'T make it into a cartridge assembly...... when it was supposed to.......

Whether you have good eye/hand coordination, or are an old salty dog (for Bob's benefit! haha) like me, the press can only be operated at a given speed, mostly determined by how fast the powder will drop, and not any function of how fast you can place components.

So, slow down and see how that goes. Go for quality rather than quantity.
Click to expand...
 
Try loading without the low powder sensor in place. Check visually, most people do anyways. If the powder was coming off there, it has nothing to with speed. That is a brass plunger that is being inserted into your cases full of powder, you have to expect that it will pick up some flakes now and then.

If the powder is jumping a little out of the cases as the shellpate rotates out of the powder drop position, you can take a half coil off the spring below the detent ball. That takes some snap out of the shellplate movement. Without the powder sensor, you can also place your bullet in the #3 position. These are things we do when loading compressed 8gr loads in 9mm to prevent spillage of the near full case.

It is unlikely, but if the powder is coming out the powder measure because it didn't fully drop, there's some posts on the BE forum about polishing the insides of the Dillon measures. It is really easy. They go from dull to mirror in a flash. They recommend that for stick powders like Varget. People get great results.

If the powder is sticking to the silver powder drop funnel, wipe it off. It could be sticking to built up case lube.
 
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Dunno, never ran for speed. I set the tool head up, and run until I need to do something else, or become sore (my shoulder is still recovering from some rotator cuff issues). I know I can go faster with the pistol rounds than with the rifle rounds. With the rifle rounds, I purposefully slow down, and hang a bit of a moment with the ram at the top of the stroke (handle full down) to allow the powder to finish falling. Especially and more important with any loads where the case gets pretty darn full of powder.

Examples:
5.56 = 25 grains of BLC(2), pretty full
30-06 = 48.3 grains BLC(2), very full
.40 S&W only 5 grains of Titegroup, barely any. Goes fast.

It's Dillon that professes that their models are named for the number of rounds per hour that they can do.

So, they say that their 550 press will do 550 rounds per hour, the 650 will do 650 rounds per hour, and the 1050 will do over 1,000 per hour. Not sure if that's pistol rounds, or what.

richc said:
Duke,

For the sake of comparison, how many pistol rounds would you load in an hour? I'm assuming here that the brass is all prepped. So time would include loading primers, running the ammo through the press, doing some QA on the finished ammo (case gauge and OAL checks), and then loading the ammo into those plastic ammo trays.

I did 300 tonight in just under an hour. I'm no speed demon. I generally spot check 10-20% of the rounds for OAL and case gauge. Just wondering how I compare, as I've heard folks talking about cranking out 500 rounds per hour.

Thanks,

Rich
Click to expand...
 
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Lots of good info here. Definately don't let the shellplate snap too hard, clean out the powder drop tube, polishing it and then cleaning it with somehting that will completely dry, like an electrical or brake cleaner. I'd like to add the following, wipe down as much of the powder measure and drop tube with a anti-static dryer sheet as you can. A little bit of static electricity will cause your problem and also cause a problem with consistant weights. I've never actually grounded my 550 but have done everything else!
 

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