Lee field reloaders for 308

redfish414

redfish414

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Looking to save money while I am watching the tube and the ODT Feed . Is the Lee Field reloader for 308 practical for reloading . I am not about to spend a lot of money on bigger equipment . If I can reload say about 20 cartridges in an hr and do it for half the price I would be happy.
Am I wasting $40 on one of these? How reliable are they ? what would an average cost per rd of 308 be just for target ? Best places to buy supplies . Help would be very appreciated.
Thanks
 
I have a .44mag set someone gave me. I also have regular reloading equip and dies for .44mag. I loaded a couple of rounds just for fun. Was pretty simple with the straight walled .44mag. I would however suspect the bottlenecked case might be a bit more of a pain. Be sure to read the manual thoroughly and search on youtube for a video of someone doing it. You can buy reload supplies at BassPro, but they are usually a bit higher than other stores. I live in Middle GA, so not familiar with stores in ATL that carry supplies. I believe the dies come with reload data so you can follow that or go online and look at Hodgdon, or Alliant's webpages for reload data.

I think you can buy a Lee single stage reload press for about $30 and up depending on the model, then a set of dies for about the same. The press will be much more user friendly than the "classic loader" you are looking at and safer. There is just something about whacking a loaded round with a hammer that the "classic loader" requires. But if it wasn't safe, they wouldn't sell it I guess.

By all means, be sure you lube the brass before sizing, or you will be fighting with a stuck piece of brass.

To answer your other questions. Practical? Sure, but is more time consuming for sure.
More expensive equipment usually increases your precision and efficiency. If you are loading for plinking and even hunting it will probably be fine, but if you want to precision shoot, I doubt you will get the consistency that you would with better equipment.
You can probably do 20 cartridges per hour with it.
Wasting $40? That is debatable. I started with a progressive press because of speed and still use it but ended up buying a single stage press for my resizing functions for rifle cartridges. But this kit can not be used for anything else. If you buy a single stage press, you can use it for any caliber and if you upgrade in the future to a progressive, you can still use the single stage for sizing etc if you desire.
Cost per round?
Roughly $30 per pound of powder, 7000 grains per lb, roughly 40 grains per round = $0.17 per round pwdr
$30 per 100 bullets = $0.30 per bullet, lower quality bullets may be closer to $0.20 per bullet.
$40 per 1000 primers = $0.04 per primer
Est $0.51 per round.

Powder comes in 1 lb containers, so you have to buy 1 lb.
Bullets are usually 100 per box.
Primers can be bought per 100.
So unless you have a buddy that will sell you partials, you will have to spend at least $64 just to start with on components.

But I can say, once I started loading rifle rounds, I was hooked. Now I load just about everything I have. If you shoot a lot, it will save you money. If you only shoot 20 rounds per year for hunting season, it will not save you anything.
 
Keep watch'n the ads and buy a used DILLON 550B, even though it may not be new DILLON, has a no BS GUARANTEE. Don't get in a hurry and you can find one it may take some searching however you will find and you will never regret it!!!!

We simply enjoy ours one is over 25 - 30 years old.

DILLON, buy it once and you are done..................

just a suggestion....

good luck on your Dillon equipment hunting quest.........................
 
Yep, I have the Dillon 550B, but I think getting it setup with everything might be more than $350 though. I bought it for pistol and then started loading rifles. Pistol ammo is a breeze to resize and I always do it when loading, but I found it is easier to resize the rifle brass separately so I use the Lee Challenger single stage press for all my resizing operations and then omit that die on the Dillon when loading the rifle ammo.

I only have experience with Dillon and Lee and both work well for what they are designed for. Any of the major manufactures make good stuff, I guess it boils down to whether you want to get a progressive or single stage. I use the Dillon for all loading and almost exclusively use Lee dies in my Dillon press. Don't get a Dillon Square Deal, it only does pistol and you have to have Dillon specific dies.
 
Are you referring to the lee loader that requires a hammer or a hand press?
I believe you are referring to the hand press which works very well for what you describe. Also very good for load workup at the range (If the wind aint blowing or you dont mind charging cases by volume)
Are you expecting to set up the press, thrower and scales, deprime and size, trim length, chamfer mouths, seat primers, charge cases and seat bullets in under 3 minutes each while watching TV? Pretty tall order to do it right.
If you have prepped primed brass then charging the cases and seating bullets in that time frame is no problem.
As far as cost goes, It really depends on which components you choose, but good target ammo is exacting and requires the most time and usually significant $$ to produce.
Maybe you were referring to blasting ammo?
Typically hand loaders don't save any money LOL, but they do shoot more and better ammo for the money they spend.
Best places for supplies will typically be found online for most things. Anything with a Haz mat fee such as primers and powder would best be picked up face to face at a shop. Dont get sticker shock at the local shop for powder and primers because though you'll see cheap prices for these items online, hazardous materials shipping fees can quickly make any price differences plus some disappear. ( Yeah the shops have to pay HAZ mat fees too but they just pay them once on bulk shipments)
Good luck and yes the Lee hand loader is a very good tool for seating bullets in front of the TV.
 
Yeah, I forgot about the hand press which still requires dies. I was thinking about the "classic loader". I guess he could mean either one.
 
Some more info. I mentioned single stage and progressive, I forgot the turret. Here is some differences.

A single stage requires you to change the die after each step in the reloading process.
Resize, prime, change die, add powder, change die, seat and crimp etc. So typically, you do several cartridges on each stage and then change your die for the next stage.

Turret allows you to install all dies and just rotate the dies with the same cartridge until it is complete. You complete 1 cartridge before moving on to the next one.

Progressive allows you to rotate the cartridges and leave the dies in place and may have 4 or more cartridges being processed at different stages of reloading at once.
 
Thanks to all I have decided on both the $38 lee field loader for when I'm bored at work and the Dillon 550b like you all said .i have looked at videos and reviews for this model and not one bad thing said.
Who has the best prices for brass and bullets?
 
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