Shot Show: RCBS 7 station Pro Chucker Progressive

[jmorris]

no parts are "free" you pay for them in the original retail price. Lee's prices are much cheaper, one of the reasons is you only have a 2 year warranty.

My two SD's cost $130 brand new ready to load 1 caliber. You can't even get a Lee pro 1000 for that price these days and a 30 year old SD will still load circles around a new Lee pro 1000.

Another benifit of buying decent equipment is that the presses that I have loaded 100,000's of thousands of rounds on over the last 30 years are worth more now than the day I bought them.

 

[Peter M. Eick]

I guess if they support my Pro2000 another 25 years (at most) I will likely be dead. Actuarial tables indicate that this is not a concern for me (sorry to say). My goal right now is to get my Pro2000 to a million rounds loaded. We are almost 4/10's of the way there so it is possible in the next say 15 years.

Now I have a bigger decision. Do I buy another Pro2000 and stick it on the shelf or get the 7 station and start trying to figure it out.

Also I see that my stash of APS strips is not going to get sold or given away anymore. Those things might be needed in a decade or two.

Bugger the choices....

 

[higgite]

Now I have a bigger decision. Do I buy another Pro2000 and stick it on the shelf or get the 7 station and start trying to figure it out.

Yes.

 

[GW Staar]

ROFL! The perfect answer! I might need to build me a new house with a full basement.....I already have 3 presses, sharing space with exercise equip. and weights in my heated, attached garage.....not nearly big enough!

Pete, you need some more colors......you have a 3 lifetime supply of white. Maybe you could find a trading partner. (or forget the color codes.....I already tried dying them in easter egg colors.....doesn't work.)

I was just thinking......these Pro Chuckers are the only new progressive presses since the Hornady AP. When did the AP come out? Or is the Pro 2000 younger?

 

[cfullgraf]

To Nashville, TN, and back is an easy day trip for me so a friend and I are planning to go over to the NRA National meeting in April and cruise the exhibits.

Maybe RCBS will be there along with a Pro Chucker to see. I might get to answer some of the details on the Pro Chucker not well covered so far.

 

[GW Staar]

Goody.....when the Summit came out they actually were selling them at that convention weren't they? Peter Eick saw the Summits in Texas at that gathering, maybe he will shed some light on the possibilities.

Tennessee is a little bit far from New Mexico .... already having planned a trip to Illinois in September. Not that it matters.....cooler jets make for wiser decisions. Waiting for your report.

 

[cfullgraf]

Goody.....when the Summit came out they actually were selling them at that convention weren't they?

Gee, I did not need to hear that. The last thing I need right now is another press. I am a sucker for new mechanical toys. I have a Dillon BL550 sitting on the floor waiting for mounting to see how I like manual indexing.

I will be sure to pass on what I see on the Pro Chucker if it is in Nashville.

 

[Beanie-Bean]

I am pretty interested in this one. Currently, I use Dillon (550, 650) and Hornady (LnL SS, AP) but would like to have a press which would basically merge some of the best features of the Blue and Red presses. RCBS Chargemaster and Trim Mate are really my only Green devices at this time, and both serve me well.

 

[vananni]

New to this. Preferred to wet tumble and wanted no part of primer tubes. Choice of a progressive had come down to hand deprime, FA wet tumble, hand prime, finally LNL press; OR hand deprime, wet tumble, Pro 2000 press. Then I read about new Pro Chucker Progressive. Wow! Seven stations. I can even bullet feed, powder cop, seat and taper crimp separately. My cake and eat it too.

But wait, no APS. They already had a conversion kit for the "brave at heart" to backward convert a Pro 2000 to primer tubes. They had already figured out how to offer both. Like I said I'm new to this. I'm probably missing something. Why would they not continue to offer the APS/primer tube choice in the new Pro Chucker Progressive press. They would have given their APS base something to graduate to and in the same time increase the customer base from primer tube traditionalists. Who knows, at some point they might have left the dark side of the force and tried APS.

Again, I apologize for probably missing something.

 

[GW Staar]

Why would they not continue to offer the APS/primer tube choice in the new Pro Chucker Progressive press. They would have given their APS base something to graduate to and in the same time increase the customer base from primer tube traditionalists. Who knows, at some point they might have left the dark side of the force and tried APS.

The why is simple. Tube users are the majority. Because RCBS wouldn't share the APS technology, all the competition, blue & red, pooh-poohed the technology. Most new progressive customers listened, rather than trying out the new system for themselves. No matter how much APS customers raved, the numbers weren't enough to create the sales & market share that RCBS wanted for it. The blame is totally on RCBS! They refused to put serious money into marketing a new technology....word of mouth is not enough....nor did it help to alienate all the competition..

So....they let their engineers loose to build a new progressive system. When they looked up, they found that they were designed to be tube-fed only. Only then did RCBS brass ask the engineers to make an APS option. Engineering said no, they'd have to start over. You see, you can make an APS design feed tubes, but not the other way around. On the new presses, the primer shuttle is aimed directly at the ram. With APS it needs to be aimed beside the ram so the empties come out the other end. Pure and simple......and stupid on their part.

So if you want nothing to do with tube priming you have two choices, hand prime or buy the Pro 2000 and APS primers and/or strips while you still can. The only cast iron progressive other than the Dillon 1050 will last 2 lifetimes at least. APS strips too if you take care of them.

APS strip longevity tricks: Store strips flat so they don't get a bend, and don't force them to feed and end up mangling them. When the occasional high primer anvil happens to protrude enough to stop advancement in the press, just pushing the high primer down a tad with a primer-sized rod, dowel, allen wrench or whatever, puts it back on line. You won't have that problem if you rub or roll something over all your stips, several strips at a time, (anvil up) before you mount them to the press. I used a wall paper roller before I modded my strip loader to do it automatically.

 

[vananni]

Thank you GW for the scenario on how they got to where they are. It sounds unbelievable that the decision makers didn't include APS capability when giving the marching orders to their engineers. It's more unbelievable that marketing didn't say BTW we still want to target both primer camps with the Pro Chucker.

They will regret this misstep. Their competition dodged a bullet. This opens the door for prospective progressive press buyers who wanted APS and would not consider Red or Blue, to now consider them especially if they cease production of the Pro 2000. Some near sighted people in RCBS need to be fired.

 

[geist262]

I was in the market for a progressive press. I ended up getting a RCBS Pro 2000 because APS is not an option on the new Chucker presses. Pro Chuckers cannot be retrofitted either.

 

[Motek]

Any news when will it hit the market?

 

[geist262]

End of March

 

[GW Staar]

Whoa.....that'd be now. Still don't see catalog listings in Midway, or Grafs. Rechecked this morning, nothing on Midway.

This morning on grafs doing a search for "RCBS Pro Chucker" returned a page showing a non-illustrated Pro Chucker 5 page, listed under "Turret Presses. " with nothing in stock of course. I'd say they were hiding it......but at least its something......Pro Chucker 7....nothing. Oh, they did list a price for the 5.....$575. not cheap for a 5 station press with no feeders included.

Weird.

 

[geist262]

I was told end of March. Supposedly there was a design or packaging issue that had to be rectified; or it would have been released already. I was excited until I saw primer tube systems without APS capability.

 

[Motek]

Maybe they will add an option with with aps.

 

[RealGun]

I am interested because it has 7 stations and because it DOES NOT have APS priming. I am already well equipped to deal with primers and mentally acclimated to any small fuss involved. Even that boring part about loading primer tubes I expect to be mitigated by the arrival of my new Hornady 1911 auto primer tube loader, due out shortly as a new product for 2015.

Those who think the lack of APS is a deal breaker are fussing about minor details IMO. I don't need the supply issues of locating APS strips and paying a premium for primers.

 

[geist262]

IMHO, I think the indexing looks great. Looks to be smooth from the video I have seen. Not a fan of aluminum construction, but I think that's here to stay with all manufacturers. Supposedly a case feeder will be available by summer. That's all I have considering I've never had my hands on the new press. I was only passing along some info I obtained from RCBS.

 

[Walkalong]

I made some posts go away. If y'all can't continue to talk about the subject at hand without talking about each other, this will soon be closed. It's had posts deleted, then been closed, then re-opened, then posts deleted again. I am not going to put any more effort into it after this.

 

[Motek]

i think we all need to wait until we could actually touch the press and read some proper review.

 

[GW Staar]

I agree. We can always start a new thread. Good time to close this IMO.

 

[Walkalong]

Closed at OP's request.