Lee Pro 6000 Press

[9mmepiphany]

The new clear bottle is tiny.

The only advantage of the new powder measure/hopper is that it is designed to fit a 1lb powder bottle...of course, then you can't see how much powder you have left

[Cowboy T]

The auto drum is fantastic. You can get exactly the charge you want, swap drums easily, and lose the leaks.

You can also swap the old large red powder hopper on it. The new clear bottle is tiny.

That's good news, because I like the old large red powder hopper. I'll give the Auto-Drum a try with my remaining WC820. Thanks for the tip!

[Flouncer]

Rifle

Will this new 6000 load rifle cartridges ? i.e. 5.56, 308, 30-06 ?

- thanks

[Cowboy T]

It looks like it will reload .308 Win, but not quite .30-06, similar to the Loadmaster. For the .30-06, I would suggest the Classic Turret Press.

[mikeyr]

snip... I can't see any reason anyone would buy a Dillon Square Deal...other than to be able to say that they own "Blue"...snip

The color is irrelevant to me as is the manufacturer, I will say I own 3 Square Deals, only because its so convenient to have a press set up for one caliber and only one caliber, never need to change anything, although I do check before each reloading session just to make sure nothing moved. I don't see myself moving away from that system and on this press to change calibers you have to change the plates just like the Dillon 650, I also have 2 650's and several quick change kits but when changing calibers, its never perfect and I have to fine tune the setup, so one is 9mm only with small primer and one is 45ACP only with Large Primer, I rarely setup the 45ACP to load 45Colt since I have a Square Deal for that. That is the beauty of the Square Deal, set it up once and never touch it again (but please do check it sometimes). So while this may be a better press, I don't think Dillon will lose any sleep over it.

[Flouncer]

It looks like it will reload .308 Win, but not quite .30-06, similar to the Loadmaster. For the .30-06, I would suggest the Classic Turret Press.

Found it right here on the Lee website -

" Maximum cartridge overall length 30/06 3.340" C.O.A.L."

https://leeprecision.com/pro-6000-six-pack-reloading-press

[Cowboy T]

Found it right here on the Lee website -

" Maximum cartridge overall length 30/06 3.340" C.O.A.L."

https://leeprecision.com/pro-6000-si...eloading-press

Good catch, and I stand corrected. Based on your post, I looked further through the Pro 6000 instruction manual. It includes accommodations for the 7mm Rem Mag and .300 Win Mag as well, so .30-06 definitely will not be a problem.

Hey...that means progressive reloading of M1 Garand ammo! Ohhhh...that's gonna ROCK.

[BrassCase]

A very interesting press, especially for the money and that 6th station that I wish my 750 had.

[9mmepiphany]

The color is irrelevant to me as is the manufacturer, I will say I own 3 Square Deals, only because its so convenient to have a press set up for one caliber and only one caliber, never need to change anything,
...That is the beauty of the Square Deal, set it up once and never touch it again (but please do check it sometimes).

You can get three(3) Lee Pro-6k for less, about $200 less, than two (2) Square Deals and set them up the same way

Another way to look at it is you can get two (2) Pro-6k for only $50 more than a single Square Deal.

You get six die stations to play with to add a powder check or a bullet feeder. It comes with a case feeder

[9mmepiphany]

A very interesting press, especially for the money and that 6th station that I wish my 750 had.

My Lee Pro-6k replaced a Dillon 750 on my bench.

On the other end of my bench is a Hornady LNL AP

[Cowboy T]

Here's the output from a little leisurely session with the Pro 6000 today, before heading to the range.

Thumbnail (rather large, I know) is clickable.




Took just over an hour. The load is Rainier Plated 230gr round-nose (standard ball) on top of 5.3gr Bullseye, the max charge listed in Lyman's 49th and 51st, and corroborated in Lee's Modern Reloading. This is basically the standard military load, and it shoots quite nicely out of the 1911.

This is what the press can do when you get it dialed in. And I was not rushing. I could've gone faster, but reloading isn't a race.

[9mmepiphany]

This is what the press can do when you get it dialed in. And I was not rushing. I could've gone faster, but reloading isn't a race.

Having come from a Hornady LNL AP, I expected my transition to be slower. I was surprised at how easy the Pro-6k was to set up and get running.

The hardest transitions was the smaller die deck (not much room between dies) to install the bushings and the counter clockwise rotation of the shell plate.

The single choke point in speed of loading is placing the bullet in the case mouth at the 10 o'clock position (reaching around the support column). I can see picking up one of the Lee in-line bullet feeders/magazines when they start shipping in March

[Cowboy T]

Well, the feat mentioned above is repeatable. Here's what I did at lunchtime today. The reloading session started at 12:00 high noon, on the dot. I stopped at 1:00pm, again on the dot. Then it took me 12 more minutes to box them up like you see here.




That's 350 rounds there. There were actually 351, but one of them, I didn't fully seat the primer, so I didn't count that one.

So, total time is 1 hour and 12 minutes to get ammo made, boxed up, and ready for the range. Note that this includes the following steps during that hour.

- Four restockings of the primer feed tray
- One restocking of the bullets (plated round-nose, 230gr), and yes, I'm seating the bullets old-school, i. e. by hand
- One restocking of the powder hopper
- Several (I forgot to count) restockings of the case feeder--it was probably about 6 or so, given its capacity

Also, as with any progressive press, including my Dillon XL650, I did run into a few glitches here and there, two with the priming system of my own causing (not the press's fault), and a few cases with slightly bent rims didn't fully feed without a little help, so I had to watch that. Again, normal with any progressive press. None of these issues were difficult to deal with; I just adjusted and kept right on going. The reason for not having any actual, serious problems? It's called, "paying attention". And even with those few glitches, I got this output in one hour. Again.

This thing is worth the money. Dillon Precision had better be looking over its shoulder at this Pro 6000...especially given its price. For the cost of my .38 Special XL650 or today's XL750, you can buy *THREE* of these Pro 6000's, fully kitted out like mine is.

As Gazelle said in the movie Zootopia....

https://youtu.be/NAKZsjJa6Nw?t=27

[bigbossman]

That's 350 rounds there. There were actually 351, but one of them, I didn't fully seat the primer, so I didn't count that one.

350 rounds in an hour? Pffftt...... I can do that with my lowly Lee Pro 1000.

[tabascoz28]

Welcome to the world of the mostly progressive presses. I was very happy once I got my breechlock pro 4 station working smoothly, about the same as yours but I manually insert everything. I still use my turret and single stage but for the money making bulk 223 or 9mm, fugetaboutit uh?

Just one tip, reloading is not a race. I should take my own advice.... If you don't double check your first few meticulously, even though you didn't change anything you could end up with more mistakes to fix later. Just take the time and don't push the limits of the powder. I refill or top off everything with a new sleeve of primers.