Lee Loader

I bought a spare turret and a universal decapping die for my Loadmaster. I use it to decap before I wet tumble. I have spent a while tuning this press and it primes very well. One of the things that I found to be very helpful to successfully priming was to look down through an empty turret and using a piece of brass that I drilled out the primer pocket, adjust the retainer arm so the the brass is can drift out until it is exactly over the priming pin.

So here's my question. I want to decap a large amount of brass by just running it through with only the decapping die installed. Is there a way to remove the priming assembly or disable it so I can decap only? I don't want to move the retainer arm.

Leave the primer components in with no primers in the chute. Put the decapping die in station 3 so you won't have spent primer crud dropping onto the priming punch.

I didn't think about decapping in station 3. That makes sense. I have been pulling the primer tray and then manually feeding the primers through and picking them off the pin with tweezers. I was hoping for an easier way. What I probably should do is just get the C press and dedicate it for decapping. I just like the auto feed capabilities of the Loadmaster.

Stick with decapping on the loadmaster. Much faster.
http://www.lee-loader.com/viewtopic.php ... 364#p11304

I'd never again decap on a single stage. I used to decap on my pro1000, but the debris and dirt made intense cleaning necessary (I mainly shoot on an outdoor range with sand and dirt ground). So I switched to a specialized setup on my classic turret: reverse indexing rod and custom 4-way case kicker from InlineFabrication, and a turret with drilled out indexing hole. I can feed the cases with my left hand as fast as I can operate the lever with the right hand, and the press ejects the cases automatically. That way I'm abaout as fast as with the pro1000, but no dirt under any shellplate where there is none.

Fyodor wrote:I'd never again decap on a single stage. I used to decap on my pro1000, but the debris and dirt made intense cleaning necessary (I mainly shoot on an outdoor range with sand and dirt ground). So I switched to a specialized setup on my classic turret: reverse indexing rod and custom 4-way case kicker from InlineFabrication, and a turret with drilled out indexing hole. I can feed the cases with my left hand as fast as I can operate the lever with the right hand, and the press ejects the cases automatically. That way I'm abaout as fast as with the pro1000, but no dirt under any shellplate where there is none.

That sounds like a good method. If I still had a turret press I would give it a try for my rifle brass. Too much case handling for my pistol brass though.

Here's an idea, get a spare turret for $15 and place universal decupper in station 1.
Using universal decupper avoids resizing the case at this time and allows to use this setup for other calibers.
Then, remove the priming pin from your original decupper/resizer and move it station 2 (priming). This will perfectly align the case over the primer ram and resize the case in that station.
I used to get lots of flipped primers and doing this move fixed the issue (this is actually documented in the Lee manual for LoadMaster in section for Station 2.

jloader wrote:Here's an idea, get a spare turret for $15 and place universal decupper in station 1.
Using universal decupper avoids resizing the case at this time and allows to use this setup for other calibers.
Then, remove the priming pin from your original decupper/resizer and move it station 2 (priming). This will perfectly align the case over the primer ram and resize the case in that station.
I used to get lots of flipped primers and doing this move fixed the issue (this is actually documented in the Lee manual for LoadMaster in section for Station 2.

I do have a spare turret that my universal decapper is mounted in. I tried putting the resizing die without the pin in it in station 2, but I didn't have great success with it. I read a suggestion on Magic Mikes Reloading about modifying a case by drilling out the primer pocket so that you can see the primer pin through the case looking down through an empty turret hole. Adjust the case retainer so that when the case is rotated into position, it lines up over the pin. This method has dropped my primer issues to 1% or less. And thats part of my issue. I was looking for an easy way to stop the primers from feeding / seating when I'm in dedicated decapping mode. Removing the primer feed assembly would require moving the case retainer arm, which I don't want to do because it's aligning my cases perfectly now.