Here's my opinion, and it is worth everything you paid for it.
How much can you afford?
Do you want to buy one press and never upgrade?
All you need to get started is the little Lee Reloading Press, a set of Lee dies, and either the Ram Primer or the Hand Primer.
The dies come with a dipper and shell holder. The die instructions and Richard Lee's manual has a lot of data where all you need is the dipper. These loads are safe, starting loads. No balance is needed.
Of course, you will want to get a balance so you load warmer loads and be able to use all sorts of different powders that won't work with the supplied dipper.
You can get a beam or digital balance--plan to spend $70 or more. You should also get the RCBS powder trickler so you can adjust the weight to "exactly" what you want.
After some time, you will want a powder measure--if you can read directions and do exactly what the instructions say, you may be very happy with the Lee Perfect Powder Measure. Otherwise, you should look to Hornady, Lyman, or RCBS for a bench-mounted powder measure.
I have loaded up to .30-06 on my Lee Reloading Press.
Since you are loading for a couple of rifles, I would NOT consider a progressive. If I shot a lot of rifle rounds, I would have the Lee Classic Turret on my bench.
For rifle calibers, you will want a 6" caliper and a set of Lee case length trimmers (or a little lathe from Forster, RCBS, Hornady, et al).
If you are shooting a bolt action rifle, you will want to get both the full-length and neck-only sizing dies.
If you are shooting a semi-automatic, lever, pump, or single shot, you will only want the full-length sizing die.
Lee makes some GREAT dies for rifles (bottleneck cases) and very good dies for pistols.
You can look at the stickies in various forums for "What press should I buy" and work your way through their opinions.
|
Linear Mode
