Has your Lee pro auto disk turned off by it's self?

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Crawlin

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I had my first reloading mishap tonight. I caught it after about 20 rounds but I am going to pull them all. Heres my issue, I measured my first 3 charges, all perfect, then I started production. I got to 10 and measured again, still good. At some point between 10 and 20 my auto disk moved to the off position. I'm not sure at what point and seeing as I was mixing my ammo, none of it is safe for me.

I can hear powder in all but a few but I'm not sure which ones got a partial charge and which ones got the full. Anyway, that being said, has your auto disk ever moved to the off spot? I'll be keeping a closer eye on mine either way.
 
There's a little screw on teh bottom that you can tighten to keep that from happening.


If you're worried about seriously under-charged cases, you can weigh the full cartridges, and any large variances should be obvious. Safer bet though, would be to pull them all and start over.


This is another reason why I shine a light down all my charged cases to visually make sure each case has a charge.
 
animator said:
If you're worried about seriously under-charged cases, you can weigh the full cartridges, and any large variances should be obvious.
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No, there's too much variations in the case/bullet weights to identify the under-charged cases (bullets vary by 1-5+ gr and cases vary much more than that). If you have any concerns, I would pull them or plan on doing a lot of single shot pistol shooting with a rod in hand to tap out the stuck bullet.


There's a little screw on teh bottom that you can tighten to keep that from happening.
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+1. Same thing happened to me. Loosen the two thumb nuts and lift the hopper off and turn it upside down. You'll see a Phillips head screw that applies the tension.
 
bds said:
No, there's too much variations in the case/bullet weights to identify the under-charged cases (bullets vary by 1-5+ gr and cases vary much more than that). If you have any concerns, I would pull them or plan on doing a lot of single shot pistol shooting with a rod in hand to tap out the stuck bullet.



+1. Same thing happened to me. Loosen the two thumb nuts and lift the hopper off and turn it upside down. You'll see a Phillips head screw that applies the tension.
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That's mainly why I said large variances, and not just variances. I know and agree that cases, as well as bullets, can be as far as a grain or two off. But an empty or half-charged cartridge's weight will differ greatly from a fully charged cartridge.
 
If you're reloading handgun calibers, load up 100 as you usually do, then load 1 case with only 1 gr. of powder, mark said case with a sharpie, now start weighing them to find the one with only 1 grain of powder. Let us know how it turns out.
 
Thanks guys, but just fyi, its rifle, and better safe than sorry for me so I'll pull all of them. If I had loaded 100 or more then I might be worried, but 20, eh not worth it.

Thanks for the tip on the screw. It was late last night and I just put everything away and figured I would deal with it tonight. I'll look at it when I get home.
 
Good call. I made "GM" in hammer use.

Mine did the same (a long time ago) and tightening the screw (a little) fixed it. Just monitor it and see if it needs a skosh more tightening.
 
animator said:
I know and agree that cases, as well as bullets, can be as far as a grain or two off.
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Case weights can vary quite a bit, even for same head stamp cases (6 -10+ gr) and with most bullets being off 1 - 5+ gr, the case/bullet weight variations make it nearly IMPOSSIBLE to tell whether you got no powder charge, partial charge or double charge in a pistol case.

I just weighed some cases and got over 10 gr swing on 45ACP cases and over 6 gr swing on 40S&W cases.

45ACP (grains):
94.6 PMC
94.0 CCI
93.8 PMC
93.6 WCC 93
93.3 PMC
93.2 WIN
92.9 WCC 99
92.9 SPEER
92.2 PMC
91.0 CCI
90.9 FiocchiUSA (Sm Primer)
89.7 CCI
88.2 RP
88.1 BLAZER
88.1 CBC
88.0 WIN
87.8 S&B
87.5 CCI
87.4 FEDERAL
87.0 BLAZER
86.9 WIN
86.4 FEDERAL
86.3 RP
86.0 FiocchiUSA (Lg Primer)
84.7 WCC 71
82.9 STARLINE
82.5 STARLINE
82.7 WCC 80


40S&W (grains):
74.7 CBC
73.0 WIN
72.4 SPEER
72.2 BLAZER
72.1 WIN
71.3 WIN
71.2 FEDERAL
70.2 WIN
70.1 FEDERAL
70.2 RP
69.2 PMC
68.5 PMC
 
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Tightened the screw, loaded around 100 rounds checking it every round and it's staying in place. Thanks again for thr tip. And yea, the weights are off so much theres no-good way to tell.
 
Also, you can put a strip of tape from the hopper to the frame. I have never needed to "turn off" the hopper, so I turn the screw down so it is TIGHT.
 
noylj said:
Also, you can put a strip of tape from the hopper to the frame. I have never needed to "turn off" the hopper, so I turn the screw down so it is TIGHT.
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Don't you turn off the hopper when removing it to change the disks or to dump the powder back into the jug?
 
I quick-change the disk by:

1. Turn off hopper
2. Drop 3-4 cycles of powder and toss back in the hopper or until no powder is dispensed
3. Push up on the Pro Auto Disk base to push the disk forward (like it's dropping a charge) - raising the shell plate carrier helps
4. Continue pulling the disk forward to remove
5. While holding the base up, insert another disk/hole in the reverse fashion (make sure the actuator rod goes in the right slot in the disk)
6. Turn on the hopper
7. Drop 3-4 cycles of powder and toss back in the hopper

Ta-da! No need to remove the hopper to change disks. :D

I could do a disk change in about 25-30 seconds.
 
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