mec 700 salvage job

[sumyunggy]

Long time lurker, first time poster, and figured I would share my adventures in learning the art and science of shotshell reloading. To start with, pretty much everything I know about reloading I learned in the last couple weeks, so I may very well be talking outta my @$$ on a lot of this stuff. I leave it to you kind reader to correct me when actual knowledge is running thin.

I saw an ad on the local craigslist for what was advertised as a mec 700 versamec shotshell re-loader. From the pics it looked like the machine was in pretty rough shape, but after busting out some google-fu I read enough to convince myself that these mec's are built to last and with a little TLC I could probably get her into working condition. Yadda-yadda-yadda, it's in my garage.



I grab the mec 700 exploded parts view and start taking inventory of what I got and what I need. The unit came with a charge bar and the housing for said charge bar, but I noticed that one of the "caps" that the bottles screw into was crushed.



Since I don't see a way to replace just the cap, the first part in my gamaliel cart is the measuring unit. Next looking at the dies, it seems there is something missing from station 1.



The parts list calls this little guy the resize ring and seems pretty important if I want the brass part of the shell to be round. Station 2 is also not gonna work as is since the place that I think is supposed to hold the primer is filled with a whole lotta nothin! I take this to mean I'm gonna need a whole primer seating assembly to fill the space. Station 3 seemed okay until I noticed the gap between the measure unit and rammer tube. Gonna need a new drop tube to fix that up.

To sum up, the parts list looks like:
- Primer Seating Assembly
- Resize Ring
- Drop Tube
- Measuring Unit
- Bottles x2

Add to this a universal charge bar and I think I should be good to go.

The couple of questions I now have are, should I be worried about the rust and scratches on the dies?

None of it seems to deep, but after reading and re-reading about the emphasis on safety, I'm getting worried that these imperfections can lead to something very bad.

Also, I am hoping to work up some loads for duck and turkey hunting as well as HD. With that in mind, and since I need a new drop tube anyway, has anyone had success with the steel conversion kit? Seems like it might be the way to go for these bigger diameter shot.

Thanks for reading!

[BigBronco]

Station one is missing the sizing ring.

[anyracoon]

Where are you located? I may have some extra parts floating around.

[rsrocket1]

The rust on the depriming rod and seating/powder drop tube is only touching the inside of the hull which is plastic so it won't hurt anything. The only possible place a badly rusted/pitted/scratched die *might* make a difference is on the sizing die where it makes friction contact with the metal base of the hull. Even at that, what's a little scratch going to do to the base of a hull? Not much.

If you really want to spend time cleaning it up, you can use a penetrating fluid like Kroil, a 50/50 mix of Kerosene/ATF or some other penetrant like WD40 to get under the rust and polish/buff it off. If there are rusted chrome parts, Brasso works nicely, but this is all for cosmetics. After cleaning the metal parts, if you put a light coat of Nu Finish and thoroughly wipe it off, you should prevent rust from forming for a long time on the MEC parts.

[jglabe]

A couple of years ago I did a complete restoration of a 20 year old Mec Jr. My parents had it in a storage shed (that leaked) while I was in the Navy. It was completely rusted solid when I picked it up from them. I soaked the entire unit in WD-40 for a few days, then dissassembled the entire piece. I ended up having to replace 2 parts. I brushed all of the rust off with a metal brush then oiled everything up and re-assembled. It works good as new. I was so surprised that this thing came back to life. Can't go wrong with a Mec in my opinion.

[sumyunggy]

Where are you located? I may have some extra parts floating around.

I'm in Sacramento. Not sure if there is anyway to get those parts floating this way, but if your looking to reduce, I'm willing to reuse!

Also, I forgot about going at the thing with some wd40. I'll see how that works to get some of the rust off. I'm more concerned with function over form, so if it's not really gonna hurt anything I'm cool with it looking 'rustic'.