New to reloading, but I'm not sure it is practical for me...

[jparks54]

For an apartment id like to suggest the lee breach lock hand press.

http://leeprecision.com/breech-lock-hand-press.html

I almost baught this because of the price and i was in an apartment but than my wife agreed with letting me do what ever i wanted in the 2nd bedroom so i mounted a press to my desk. But i did alot of studying on this during that time and watched alot of videos. this may be the best thing when you are limited on space. I may just get one so i can fool around reloading in the living room with my wife while we watch tv.

 

[Enochwel]

For an apartment id like to suggest the lee breach lock hand press.

Breech Lock Hand Press - Lee Precision

I almost baught this because of the price and i was in an apartment

How quickly would you say one could load 100 rounds with this after maybe 500 rounds of experience? I'd like to shoot a couple hundred rounds per week.

Only as an aside: I'm about to purchase a second revolver for my wife to practice on, the convertible ruger .357/9mm 4.62". Any opinion on convertibles? It seems very practical to have that ability, but I have never used one before.

 

[jrbfishn]

I have a breach lock hand press. Works great. Just slow. You just need a collet and seating die for each bullet depth and type you will use in that caliber. I can keep it and everything but the powder and powder measure in a 50 cal can. Powder measure is mounted on a piece of 1x6 and can be clamped to a small folding table. I can store powder, can and boxes of bullets on a 10 inch by 3 foot shelf easy.
If you are going to use it a lot though, take some foam or tennis balls and attach to the end of the handles. Gets hard on the hands if you don't.
I also use the de-primeing rod and base from a Lee loader set to deprime and a Lee priming tool. Acsmall piece of 2x6 and a towel and de-prime cases watching tv in my recliner. Prime sitting in it too.
It all works great, just not very fast. But it is fun and relaxing. As well as giving you options for ammo you can't readily buy. Like 90 grain hollow points for 9mm.

 

[jparks54]

How quickly would you say one could load 100 rounds with this after maybe 500 rounds of experience? I'd like to shoot a couple hundred rounds per week.

Only as an aside: I'm about to purchase a second revolver for my wife to practice on, the convertible ruger .357/9mm 4.62". Any opinion on convertibles? It seems very practical to have that ability, but I have never used one before.

Guy bellow might be able to answer this i dont own one yet i just almost got one cause of size and price when i was in an apartment

I have a breach lock hand press. Works great. Just slow. You just need a collet and seating die for each bullet depth and type you will use in that caliber. I can keep it and everything but the powder and powder measure in a 50 cal can. Powder measure is mounted on a piece of 1x6 and can be clamped to a small folding table. I can store powder, can and boxes of bullets on a 10 inch by 3 foot shelf easy.
If you are going to use it a lot though, take some foam or tennis balls and attach to the end of the handles. Gets hard on the hands if you don't.
I also use the de-primeing rod and base from a Lee loader set to deprime and a Lee priming tool. Acsmall piece of 2x6 and a towel and de-prime cases watching tv in my recliner. Prime sitting in it too.
It all works great, just not very fast. But it is fun and relaxing. As well as giving you options for ammo you can't readily buy. Like 90 grain hollow points for 9mm.

 

[Dawico]

How quickly would you say one could load 100 rounds with this after maybe 500 rounds of experience? I'd like to shoot a couple hundred rounds per week.

Only as an aside: I'm about to purchase a second revolver for my wife to practice on, the convertible ruger .357/9mm 4.62". Any opinion on convertibles? It seems very practical to have that ability, but I have never used one before.

Ruger revolvers are always good to go. Buy with confidence.

As far as the hand press goes, they are very slow. You are going to spend a lot of free time loading a couple hundred rounds a week. I think you will want to upgrade in short time.

I loaded handgun rounds on a single stage when I started. It was slow.

Handgun rounds require three pulls for every round (or four if you crimp seperately).

If you ever plan on loading rifle rounds, you should start with a good single stage press. Lee makes good stuff for a great price. A single stage press is always handy.

 

[jrbfishn]

The breech lock hand press works, but slowly. Here's the process I use.
Night one, deprime 300-400 pistol cases.
Night 2, soak a couple hours in citric acid and hot water. Even cleans the primer pockets .
Night 3, resize what I am going to load, then expand the dase mouth. Then prime the cases. I keep everythind separated in 100 round lots in baggies. Primeing takes about 20 minutes per 100.
Night 4,,,, here's the slowest part. Set up and charge the cases 100 at a time, seat a bullet in the case, and do the next 100. When I have all I am doing seated, cleanup. If I have time, I will run them through the factory crimp die. Otherwise, I do that on the next night.

If you want extremely consistant loads, or vey specific loads. If time is not the issue. The hand press work fabulous. If you want anything close to bulk ammo, get a single stage breech lock press. They don't cost much more, take up very little more room and will mount on a small table with clamps. Fits easily in a closet somewhere. And MUCH faster. Not as fast as a turret, but faster than the hand press..
Mine is mostly for when I can't get ammo. Or I take it to show a noob or someone that is thinking about reloading what the process is. Or when I want things to be consistant or to work up loads I am not sure of. Plus it takes almost no room, and it is mobile. I can reload vertually anywhere.
Short notes: if you want speed, get a single stage, get the breech lock colletts, rig your measure and press to clamp on a table or counter with c-clamps and have at. Primeing the brass will be faster with a hand primer tool instead of the press though.

 

[Andy]

I loaded like this for decades - a single-stage press mounted to a 12x12 square bar-stool (portable and can shove it away in a closet):

 

[jrbfishn]

If it works for you,,, it works. All there is to it.

 

[Enochwel]

Well you guys again have given me a lot of food for thought. I'll let you know when I find the right solution for my situation

 

[Charlie]

Just saw this and thought it might be of interest.
http://images.natchezss.com/email/20150330_Mar_Lee.jpg

 

[benenglish]

...but the .38 special bullets are so expensive.
...I need to start reloading.
...
Is reloading too messy to do in the living room? Does it produce dust in the air or anything a pregnant woman should not be in the vicinity of? This will rule out reloading indoors at my apt., such as I 99% expect. Any thoughts on how I can make this work?

Which reloading machinery could work for me, if any?
Cost matters a lot.

Addendum: I will be storing everything either on a top shelf or in closet within the central air system. ...

There's always a way. What follows is just my opinion. There are other options.

First, reloading just one cartridge, the .38 Special, greatly simplifies things.

That said, if I were in your situation, I'd check a couple of things. Do you have a patio table, even a rickety one, to which you can run an extension cord? Do you have a reasonably sturdy dining room table or coffee table? Is it possible to carve out time when the folks in your home will respect your "Please don't disturb me for the next hour; I need to concentrate" request?

If that answer to each of those is yes, then I'd -

1. Get the smallest Lee single-stage press.
2. Get a press stand like this:

3. Mount the press.
4. Take the press and stand outside to decap your brass.
5. Clean the brass. You can just wipe them with a paper towel if you're short on funds. Otherwise, there are a number of no-name, small-capacity vibratory cleaners that work OK when you're just starting and can be had for just over $50 at, say, Harbor Freight. Finding something used is a better idea. While all the other equipment I'll list will still be useful to you no matter how advanced you become as a reloader, a small and cheap vibratory cleaner is the item most likely to eventually be viewed as wasted money. Still, I used one for years; you can just throw the brass in the cleaner with walnut media and let it work.
6. If you bothered to buy a cleaner, separate the brass and media. In the early years, I did it by hand and with a big slotted spoon. For a small cleaner with a 100 pieces of brass at a time, this is entirely workable. Then seal up the vibratory cleaner and put it away.
7. Inspect the brass. If you used a cleaner, look for media stuck in the flash holes. A straightened paper clip will fix any problems.
8. Move inside.
9. Select one bullet, one powder, and one primer to assemble all your loads. With the .38 Special, there has been so much research done for so long that it's hard to make a mistake. Any one of dozens of powders will work. Any one of a thousand bullets will work. In the beginning, you really don't need to experiment much to find a load that's more accurate than you are so don't get lost out in the tall grass trying to optimize loads. Just pick a classic and go with it.
10. Resize your cases. It's worth buying carbide dies but even if you do, you'll still need lube. Use this:

Once you go wax, you'll never go back.

11. Prime your cases using the press. This is a cost-saving measure and a separate hand-held primer will probably be the first upgrade you'll make.
12. Using a Lee dipper, charge your cases. You'll want a case block but there are a dozen ways to do without one, the easiest being to simply seat a bullet each time you charge a case. If you use that workflow to avoid buying case blocks, you'll find this little gizmo to be worth its weight in gold: Lyman Products Your Primary Source for Reloading Equipment

13. When you're done, you can put all your bits and pieces in a medium size tackle box that you pick up for a buck at a garage sale. There may also be a vibratory cleaner and the press on the stand. That's two or three pieces to put away on the top shelf of a closet, none of them particularly large. The press stand is a little awkward but it's likely things will fit together and save space. Think of it as playing Tetris with your reloading gear.

Costs?

• Option 1 - Spend a little effort looking at garage or estate sales and get it all for $50. (Seriously. Do this if you can.)
• Option 2 - Buy it all new.
  • Sinclair press stand - $70
  • Lee Reloader press - $40 (MSRP; often found for less)
  • Lee Primer for press - $15 (MSRP)
  • 4-die Lee set with one scoop and shell holder - $60 (MSRP, direct from Lee)
  • Wax - $9
  • Lyman powder pan/funnel combo - $8
  • 5000 primers - $135 should get them anywhere but with careful shopping, lower prices can be found
  • 100 brass - free because you saved them from the factory ammo you shot
  • 1000 Ranier plated lead (because you want to keep lead out of the apartment) bullets - $90 on sale right now at Midway
  • 1 pound of powder - ~$30, but you'll have to be flexible. What's available right now is pretty random. It's a good thing the .38 can use so many different powders and you'll easily get over 1000 rounds from a pound of most powders in most practical loads.
    • Total - $457

If you want to save $70 off that, you may be able to omit the press stand. If your patio table is reasonably sturdy, be advised that many advanced reloaders who use portable setups never bother to secure their press to their table with anything more than a couple of c-clamps.

At this level (run the numbers for yourself; there are too many variables to list here), your cost per round is easily under $0.14. that's roughly half the price of the cheapest factory ammo out there. There are ways to cut the cost substantially once you're less worried about lead contamination.

Certain upgrades will suggest themselves rather quickly, such as a scale, a hand priming tool, a dedicated decapping die, a case chamfering tool, a primer pocket cleaner, and the tools necessary to check and correct case length (most likely in roughly that order, btw). However, with the .38 and sensible reloading practices (which includes case inspection while reloading), the acquisition of those things can be reasonably delayed for quite a while. Don't forget about them but don't think you need a bench full of tools to get started, either.

Anyway, that's my take on getting-started-on-a-shoestring reloading for the .38 Special.

 

[winchster]

There's always a way. What follows is just my opinion. There are other options.

First, reloading just one cartridge, the .38 Special, greatly simplifies things.

That said, if I were in your situation, I'd check a couple of things. Do you have a patio table, even a rickety one, to which you can run an extension cord? Do you have a reasonably sturdy dining room table or coffee table? Is it possible to carve out time when the folks in your home will respect your "Please don't disturb me for the next hour; I need to concentrate" request?

If that answer to each of those is yes, then I'd -

1. Get the smallest Lee single-stage press.
2. Get a press stand like this:

3. Mount the press.
4. Take the press and stand outside to decap your brass.
5. Clean the brass. You can just wipe them with a paper towel if you're short on funds. Otherwise, there are a number of no-name, small-capacity vibratory cleaners that work OK when you're just starting and can be had for just over $50 at, say, Harbor Freight. Finding something used is a better idea. While all the other equipment I'll list will still be useful to you no matter how advanced you become as a reloader, a small and cheap vibratory cleaner is the item most likely to eventually be viewed as wasted money. Still, I used one for years; you can just throw the brass in the cleaner with walnut media and let it work.
6. If you bothered to buy a cleaner, separate the brass and media. In the early years, I did it by hand and with a big slotted spoon. For a small cleaner with a 100 pieces of brass at a time, this is entirely workable. Then seal up the vibratory cleaner and put it away.
7. Inspect the brass. If you used a cleaner, look for media stuck in the flash holes. A straightened paper clip will fix any problems.
8. Move inside.
9. Select one bullet, one powder, and one primer to assemble all your loads. With the .38 Special, there has been so much research done for so long that it's hard to make a mistake. Any one of dozens of powders will work. Any one of a thousand bullets will work. In the beginning, you really don't need to experiment much to find a load that's more accurate than you are so don't get lost out in the tall grass trying to optimize loads. Just pick a classic and go with it.
10. Resize your cases. It's worth buying carbide dies but even if you do, you'll still need lube. Use this:

Once you go wax, you'll never go back.

11. Prime your cases using the press. This is a cost-saving measure and a separate hand-held primer will probably be the first upgrade you'll make.
12. Using a Lee dipper, charge your cases. You'll want a case block but there are a dozen ways to do without one, the easiest being to simply seat a bullet each time you charge a case. If you use that workflow to avoid buying case blocks, you'll find this little gizmo to be worth its weight in gold: Lyman Products Your Primary Source for Reloading Equipment

13. When you're done, you can put all your bits and pieces in a medium size tackle box that you pick up for a buck at a garage sale. There may also be a vibratory cleaner and the press on the stand. That's two or three pieces to put away on the top shelf of a closet, none of them particularly large. The press stand is a little awkward but it's likely things will fit together and save space. Think of it as playing Tetris with your reloading gear.

Costs?

• Option 1 - Spend a little effort looking at garage or estate sales and get it all for $50. (Seriously. Do this if you can.)
• Option 2 - Buy it all new.
  • Sinclair press stand - $70
  • Lee Reloader press - $40 (MSRP; often found for less)
  • Lee Primer for press - $15 (MSRP)
  • 4-die Lee set with one scoop and shell holder - $60 (MSRP, direct from Lee)
  • Wax - $9
  • Lyman powder pan/funnel combo - $8
  • 5000 primers - $135 should get them anywhere but with careful shopping, lower prices can be found
  • 100 brass - free because you saved them from the factory ammo you shot
  • 1000 Ranier plated lead (because you want to keep lead out of the apartment) bullets - $90 on sale right now at Midway
  • 1 pound of powder - ~$30, but you'll have to be flexible. What's available right now is pretty random. It's a good thing the .38 can use so many different powders and you'll easily get over 1000 rounds from a pound of most powders in most practical loads.
    • Total - $457

If you want to save $70 off that, you may be able to omit the press stand. If your patio table is reasonably sturdy, be advised that many advanced reloaders who use portable setups never bother to secure their press to their table with anything more than a couple of c-clamps.

At this level (run the numbers for yourself; there are too many variables to list here), your cost per round is easily under $0.14. that's roughly half the price of the cheapest factory ammo out there. There are ways to cut the cost substantially once you're less worried about lead contamination.

Certain upgrades will suggest themselves rather quickly, such as a scale, a hand priming tool, a dedicated decapping die, a case chamfering tool, a primer pocket cleaner, and the tools necessary to check and correct case length (most likely in roughly that order, btw). However, with the .38 and sensible reloading practices (which includes case inspection while reloading), the acquisition of those things can be reasonably delayed for quite a while. Don't forget about them but don't think you need a bench full of tools to get started, either.

Anyway, that's my take on getting-started-on-a-shoestring reloading for the .38 Special.

Thank you for this. You just convinced me to follow through with reloading for my 357 and 300black

 

[jrbfishn]

Reloading, especially for just one or two calibers, does not have to be expensive or take a whole room.

 

[Charlie]

Reloading, especially for just one or two calibers, does not have to be expensive or take a whole room.

This ^^^^. And don't buy something until you know you need it.

 

[benenglish]

Thank you for this. You just convinced me to follow through with reloading for my 357 and 300black

Everything I said was also applicable to the .357. The .300 BO is a bit more complicated. I strongly suggest you start with the .357 and when you feel comfortable with that, you'll realize that you probably want at least two or three more pieces of equipment before you begin loading for any bottleneck rifle cartridge.

 

[jparks54]

Everything I said was also applicable to the .357. The .300 BO is a bit more complicated. I strongly suggest you start with the .357 and when you feel comfortable with that, you'll realize that you probably want at least two or three more pieces of equipment before you begin loading for any bottleneck rifle cartridge.

I started reloading the 300blk converting casses and all. The only thing i can say if you do try your hand at converting make sure you use brass known to work some is to thick and will jam. But reloading it is no problem just take your time and pay atention to what you are doing. 300blk isnt hard to load just may take alittle time to be proficient at it. I starte with a lee single stage, lee dies, RCBS trimmer and lee dippers. Worked great other than the casses that were to thick.

 

[benenglish]

I started reloading the 300blk converting casses and all. The only thing i can say if you do try your hand at converting make sure you use brass known to work some is to thick and will jam. But reloading it is no problem just take your time and pay atention to what you are doing. 300blk isnt hard to load just may take alittle time to be proficient at it. I starte with a lee single stage, lee dies, RCBS trimmer and lee dippers. Worked great other than the casses that were to thick.

Thanks for that. I defer to your experience with a cartridge I have not reloaded.

 

[jparks54]

Thanks for that. I defer to your experience with a cartridge I have not reloaded.

I wish i could compare it to another rifle round or pistol round but so far it is all i have loaded. I have everything to start loading 308 but havnt had a chance to yet.

 

[winchster]

I started reloading the 300blk converting casses and all. The only thing i can say if you do try your hand at converting make sure you use brass known to work some is to thick and will jam. But reloading it is no problem just take your time and pay atention to what you are doing. 300blk isnt hard to load just may take alittle time to be proficient at it. I starte with a lee single stage, lee dies, RCBS trimmer and lee dippers. Worked great other than the casses that were to thick.

I have about 3000 pieces of Lake City that a friend gave me, patiently waiting to be cut up lol

 

[jparks54]

I have about 3000 pieces of Lake City that a friend gave me, patiently waiting to be cut up lol

Ya lack city is good lol just stay away from pmc thats what i had my problems with