Who makes a good turret press? I know there are many out there. I'm kind of leaning toward an auto index style. I have a Dillon 650 but crap I dont want to buy all the stuff and do a change out for 40 rounds

As nearly as I can tell, you could walk into a store and pick out anything they have made of cast iron and be perfectly fine.

Now, if you have specific preferences....you reduce your variables. For instance, I have a friend who loads for pistol only using 3-die sets. So he got himself one with a removeable turret head with six holes. And an extra head. He has 500 S&W and .45 ACP on one head and the other head is awaiting his next caliber (or two). If you use a four-die set, you would probably want to find a turret with 8 holes (does anyone make one?) or 4 or 5 holes.

Of course, if a press manufacturer is having a sale where you can get 500 bullets along with the press, that could make a difference.

Sorry I could not be more help, but there are almost no bad choices, just good ones and ones you might just like to use more because it fits your particular needs, style or physical space better. But that's a matter of personal taste and circumstance.

Lost sheep.

go get a co-ax. the dies snap in and out as fast as you can revolve a turret, & then you'll have the best press made

You might check Hollywood Engineering---tele818-842-8376

The Hornady AP is the easiest and least involved changeover available. The dies twist out, and the lower assembly of the case-activated powder drop is replaced. The shell plate may or may not need changing, depending. You use the same powder measure, just change the micrometer setting; there is a separate metering assembly for pistol cartridges. People who have the piece seem well pleased.
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Goodness. For only loading a coule of boxes of rifle stuff, get a single stage and make it really easy.

I started off cheap with a Lee so I could figure out how to do this, then buy a press to keep for a few decades...

Are any of the turrets actually slop-free, or do you have to live with a little .001 here and there as a price for convenience?

My lyman turret you can adjust the nut on the top for play in the turret head. I don't know if there is an official procedure for it, I just tighten it down until the turret binds then loosen slightly.

In regards to your question of which press to buy, I think the previous answers of either buying any cast iron press is good for hunting/plinking rounds or getting a co-ax which will also load about as serious targe ammo as you can get if you want to take that path.

"Are any of the turrets actually slop-free, or do you have to live with a little .001 here and there..."

A turret with no slop can't rotate.

Among turret presses (not progressives), the Redding is probably the best. Lyman's is less money, but likely has a little more spring to it. I have two presses on my bench: A heavy single-stage which I use for serous resizing, and a Redding turret which I keep set up for neck-sizing some calibers and seating of others.

+1 for the Forster Co-Ax. Die changes are lickety-split, and it is the best designed, best built single stage press available.

Andy

By definition no turret presses are slop free-- there has to be some room for the turret to turn. Folks who hate turrets claim that they produce non-uniformly concentric ammo due to the flex in the system. These folks are usually talking about a press that revolves around a center bearing or a central axis of some sort. You never can tell exactly how much the pressure from the ram has flexed the turret. Lee's design being a captive cage with no central axis has the advantage of producing the same flex through the same slop every time, which if it does not produce perfectly concentric rounds, at least can produce uniformly nonconcentric rounds.

I have the Lee classic turret for handgun and plinking rounds. I like the 4 hole turrets. I have the Forster Bonanza Co-ax for match rounds. I don't think you can beat that combination.

Doesn't the Redding have a support arm at the rear of the turret? Does it lock down if so?

Seems that if a turret had a support at the rear and a fixed amount it could move upward at the turret center, you would have a consistent limit for vertical travel at the ram...

You could even adjust it so the ram was perpendicular to the two contact points...

quote:

Originally posted by Shibumi:
Doesn't the Redding have a support arm at the rear of the turret? Does it lock down if so?

Seems that if a turret had a support at the rear and a fixed amount it could move upward at the turret center, you would have a consistent limit for vertical travel at the ram...

You could even adjust it so the ram was perpendicular to the two contact points...

Yes, the Redding (as well as some others) has a rear support counter to the ram. This does limit flex of the turret. The amount that the Redding turret flexes is less than the normal misalignment of the die in the threads (just watch how much side-to-side play there is as you thread a die into a press!) My reason for using my Redding turret only for light neck sizing and seating is in order to save wear and tear on it, not to prevent introducing non-concentricity into my resized cases when doing heavy full-length sizing or case forming. Cases will be as concentric out of the turret press as out of any single-station model.

quote:

Originally posted by Stonecreek:

quote:

Originally posted by Shibumi:
Doesn't the Redding have a support arm at the rear of the turret? Does it lock down if so?

Seems that if a turret had a support at the rear and a fixed amount it could move upward at the turret center, you would have a consistent limit for vertical travel at the ram...

You could even adjust it so the ram was perpendicular to the two contact points...

Yes, the Redding (as well as some others) has a rear support counter to the ram. This does limit flex of the turret. The amount that the Redding turret flexes is less than the normal misalignment of the die in the threads (just watch how much side-to-side play there is as you thread a die into a press!) My reason for using my Redding turret only for light neck sizing and seating is in order to save wear and tear on it, not to prevent introducing non-concentricity into my resized cases when doing heavy full-length sizing or case forming. Cases will be as concentric out of the turret press as out of any single-station model.

So, to all intents and purposes, a turret press is slop-free?

P.S.- How much wear and tear can you give to that cast iron thing? Can you actually wear one out?!?