Portable Reloading Press

[JEBar]

I remember reading about it in your reloading thread and spent a good bit of time considering one for our use .... the bottom line is, its a well designed, well made stand .... it simply isn't a good mix for what we need .... the next thing I have to work out is a bag of some sort to keep all of the paraphernalia needed to run the press

[RanchRoper]

Sometimes you can't beat a good tackle box for carrying stuff around.

[JEBar]

understood on a good tackle box and once I figure out just how much stuff I need to pack, I plan to look at what's available .... I also plan to take a look at soft side tool boxes from Home Depot / Lowe's

[RanchRoper]

For sure they will have a good selection.

[leverjc]

I use a Lee hand press a lot. I have a progressive but when I am developing loads I used my Lee hand press. I do not think I would want to load anything bigger than 30-30 with it. The Lee hand press has severed me well for over 15 years and thousands of rounds. It also has the option to set up your dies and just snap them in and out.

[JEBar]

per Hannibal, "I love it when a plan comes together !" .... as can be seen, it can accommodate both the press and RCBS Chargemaster ===> https://www.amazon.com/RCBS-98923-Charg ... 157&sr=8-3 .... time will tell if I keep it on the stand or on a TV tray beside where we are setup .... only remaining issue is there is plenty of wobble from the loose fit of the hitch in the receiver .... my hope is the Hitch Tightener ===> https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07B9 ... UTF8&psc=1 we have on order will take care of the wobble .... if not, I'll go with a heavier duty one

[JEBar]

first loads with our portable setup .... fitting the 300 WBY RCBS dies to Hornady's Lock-n-Load wasn't difficult but did take a bit of time .... 300 WBY brass is tough and requires a good bit of effort to resize .... I used some wooden wedges to take up the space between the hitch and the receiver's walls .... doing so helped but didn't fully stabilize stand .... as mentioned above, the Hitch Tightener is clearly a necessity .... all that being said, resizing the brass with the Hornady press was pretty much the same as doing so with our Rock Cruncher .... primer seating with the Hornady is different and took a bit of getting used to .... the spent primer catcher of the Classic works better than the one on our RCBS .... that's neither good nor bad, just the way it is .... when it comes to seating the bullet, no difference between the presses .... I decided to put together 10 rounds .... the 5 with the red primer were loaded with 84.5 grains of IMR7828 that was saved when I pulled the bullets to get rid of the nickle coated brass .... the other 5 are loaded with the same amount of new 7828 .... all bullets are Nosler 30 cal 180 gr Ballistic Tips that were first loaded in the nickle brass .... a ring where the bullet puller grabbed onto them can be seen .... my plan is to run these ten through our Chrony to see if the older powder has lost any of its Zip .... if it hasn't, I'll simply mix it in with the new powder .... I also want to make sure they cycle smoothly through our rifle .... once the testing is over, I plan to load 25 to 50 to have on hand

[JEBar]

the only optional piece of equipment that I plan to buy for our Hornady Classic Press arrived today ... it is a Hornady Auto Primer Feed ===> https://www.amazon.com/Hornady-070905-A ... 157&sr=8-2 ... saying that they price it high for what it is seems like a pretty strong understatement .... Cabala's charges $3 more and doesn't include shipping to our home .... OH well, that's the way it goes .... Cabala's still has one of our shell holders on back order, that being one made to handle 30-30 .... the next thing on tap is to find some sort of bag in which to pack and store everything while we are on the road

[JEBar]

Sometimes you can't beat a good tackle box for carrying stuff around.

I'll be the first to admit I'm prone to over think (AKA over complicate) many things that come up ..... I believe that's what I'm doing in trying to figure out how best to pack our portable reloading equipment .... the reality is all I really need is a container that I can put into the camper's storage are and get it back out as needed .... I already have a good number of things packed away that fall into that category .... most are in plastic storage bins .... in thinking about it, I don't see why one wouldn't work for the reloading equipment as well

[RanchRoper]

This is kinda cool...job box....nice deep storage pockets, unlike a tackle box. Some reviews say not that sturdy, maybe a heavier duty one available too.

https://www.homedepot.com/p/DEWALT-16-i ... /205533355

[JEBar]

interesting concept .... if I planned to move it around, I could see one of this type would really work well

[JEBar]

in my search for a container of some type to pack our portable loading equipment, I came across an old back pack/dolly/bag that has been in the camper for a while .... the hitch and board are stored in an area in our truck .... the electronic powder measure will be stored securely in our camper .... I believe that most of the rest of the equipment and supplies we will need to transport will go into the bag .... I'm unsure about where we will pack the gunpowder .... possibly in the bag with the press, possibly in a closet in the camper .... I tend to believe that our search will be ongoing and this bag should serve the purpose until something better comes along

[RanchRoper]

Just don't pull it through airport security....might have some 'splainin' to do.

[JEBar]

probably shouldn't even drive through the parking lot .. ..

[JEBar]

I did order an Automatic Primer Feed (mentioned above) for our press .... after it arrived, I disassembling our portable loading station and installed it .... simple enough, to be sure but there was a problem .... the wire spring that holds the primers in the tube is the key to the whole operation .... it is held by a single, small screw on the front of what they call the Primer Feeder Body and can be seen in the picture below .... in looking at the small spring it was easy to see that it was binding .... it was clear that when the screw was tightened, pressure and friction torqued the spring wire and bent it .... it took a while to delicately adjust that spring to get it working .... but I don't have much confidence that the fix is permanent .... now that I'm anticipating loading 50 300 WBY rounds within the next few days, I decided to call Hornady and talk with them about the spring .... as has been the case every time I've had to call them for assistance, the fellow I spoke with was great to work with .... after telling him about the spring, he immediately said he'd send a replacement right out ....

[JEBar]

for our portable press to be able to load shells for all of our center fire calibers we had to order 6 Hornady Shell Holders .... 5 arrived quickly, 1 (designed for loading 30-30 Winchester) was back ordered .... well, it arrived today .... the only thing we are waiting on is a hitch stabilizer that should be here in a couple of weeks .... once it gets here, we do plan to setup the press and start turning out some ammo

[JEBar]

the only thing we are waiting on is a hitch stabilizer that should be here in a couple of weeks .... once it gets here, we do plan to setup the press and start turning out some ammo

yesterday I received notice that 1 of the 2 hitch stabilizers (both not scheduled to arrive until next month) will be here on Tuesday of next week .. .. well, just received a revised, revision in which they now say both, in addition to two other orders, will arrive on Sunday .. .. kind of makes me wonder why the dam has broken so suddenly ...

[Grunt67]

the only thing we are waiting on is a hitch stabilizer that should be here in a couple of weeks .... once it gets here, we do plan to setup the press and start turning out some ammo

yesterday I received notice that 1 of the 2 hitch stabilizers (both not scheduled to arrive until next month) will be here on Tuesday of next week .. .. well, just received a revised, revision in which they now say both, in addition to two other orders, will arrive on Sunday .. .. kind of makes me wonder why the dam has broken so suddenly ...

Shipping is not an exact science, .

[JEBar]

while shipping has never been an exact science for the USPS, FedEx and UPS pretty much had it down pat .... hopefully as things return to normal, that will be the case again

[JEBar]

yesterday I received notice that 1 of the 2 hitch stabilizers (both not scheduled to arrive until next month) will be here on Tuesday of next week .. .. well, just received a revised, revision in which they now say both, in addition to two other orders, will arrive on Sunday

happy to report that I just checked .... the hitch stabilizers are the last remaining parts needed for our portable reloading station .... they were ordered back on March 31st and are still scheduled to be delivered tomorrow .... tomorrow's forecast is calling for a high of 75 with a 20% chance of rain .... my hope is the clamps will be delivered early so that I will be able to setup the station and begin working out a routine to follow .... my hope is to pull some 44 mag bullets and then begin resizing and loading 50 rounds of 300 WBY .... history has taught me that resizing the 300's requires more force than any of the other shells we load .... if our portable station can handle loading them, there is no doubt its design and construction is good to go