I was flipping through my MidwayUSA catalog this weekend and saw some Lee Handpresses. These accept the standard dies. I thought they would be good for Prairie Dog hunting

Has anybody used these before? Are they worth buying?

I have one they work well for small rifle and pistol reloading. Also work well for seating bullets to different depths at the rifle range when working up an OAL on small rifle cartridges such as .223

The only problem I had was the threads were not cut proper to screw in the dies. This was solved by purchasing a tap and cleaning out the threads.

They may have solved this problem since.

I am on my third Lee handpress. I broke one after many thousands of rounds and immediately replaced it. I finally gave the second one to my brother and ordered another one. Great press for the money and real good regardless of cost. One of the few Lee products I wouldn't do without.

By the way, Sede44mag's comments not withstanding, I have reloaded .375 H&H, .416 Rigby, .45-120 Sharps and done some moderate case forming with mine. Maybe that's why the first one broke!

I only use mine for, like swede44mag, bullet seating at the range. Bought it off eBay for <$20 in like new shape.

I would think it would work well for reloading varmint caliber cases in the field although slow for such a fast-paced sport as prairie dog hunting. I suppose it would go a bit faster if you only neck sized.

If you like the idea of a hand press, I strongly recommend the Huntington Compac hand press. It is stronger, more rigid, more accurate, and has more leverage than the Lee. It also has a built in primer seating punch, but I prime with a Lee autoprime. I mounted a 4" circle of wood to the bottom of it, so it can stand up on its own if I need both hands for something else.

I started with the Lee, and I still use it for depriming with a universal deprimer, since the hollow ram corrals spent primer debris very efficiently.