The picture above, which includes my Dillon RL550, is my little corner of the reloading world. Actually, as much as I try to keep my reloading station clean and tidy, it ends up looking like the city dump. But that's another article. The Dillon RL550 was purchased to add speed and volume to my reloading, upgrading from my Lee Classic Turret press with auto indexing, which I still have and use for a couple of loads. After a couple months with the Dillon, how has it worked?

There are a million good videos on Youtube that show in detail how to set up and load with all Dillon machines. So, there's no reason for me to do that here. Consequently, just like with the gun reviews, I'm going to show you the basics of how it works, and give my evaluation on it based on how well mine works and what I've been able to do with it as of September 2008.

These are tool heads ready with dies of various calibers.

The primer alarm rod is added and the machine is ready to auto prime. It is worth noting that the weak spot in this machine as with most is in the primer system. More on that further down.

The Dillon RL550 at stage one: Bullet case at the first station. Here the case is resized and de-primed.

Stage 2: The case mouth is expanded and the case charged with powder.

Stage 3: Bullet is placed in the case mouth of the charged case. When the handle is pulled the bullet is seated.

Stage 4: The new bullet is final sized and crimped.

Finally the bullet is indexed out of the machine, down the chute and into the bullet tray, complete.

At this point, each time the handle is pulled, a bullet is completed. Theoretically, this should be greasy fast. The only flaw in the theory is that for it to be fast, it also has to be trouble free. Any problem stops the progress and hence slows down the speed of the process. And problems it does have. Problems where virtually every brand of reloading machine has. There are so many links in the primer system, and hence so many places something can and does go wrong are too numerous for me to have the endurance to list here.

The machine claims it can turn out 500-600 rounds per hour. Not if you're Superman on his best day with all machine accessory attachments in place. I have read real world reports of people making 400 per hour which if I was on Myth Busters would have to say is plausible, but not likely on a consistent basis.

So far, the best time I have logged moving at a pace that I would just not want to go much faster, I made 100 .45 ACP rounds in 17 minutes. Not too bad if I knew the machine could consistently run through 100 rounds at a time without the primer system failing. Again, theoretically, after set up I could make 300 rounds per hour including primer pickup. I just haven't had the machine run that long without problems somewhere in the priming system.

And they just happen all of a sudden. You go 25-30 rounds, get in the groove, and just when you think "ok, I'm movin now", squish, no primer feed. Every piece of the system has to be looked at to figure it out. And if it's internal, you have to take the primer system apart to fix it. And it generally messes up your bullet stages causing you to have to pull bullet casings.

Otherwise the only problem with the machine is that the hex screw that holds in the index sprocket has to be loosened every 4 bullets or so. Otherwise the sprocket begins to stick.

It is wise to use 2 hands to index the sprocket. Otherwise it sticks, and needs loosening even faster than it does using two hands.

At a price tag of around $400 for the machine, and a small fortune for tool heads, caliber conversion kits, dies, and spare parts for the primer pickup tubes (which you might as well go ahead and order with the machine. You'll need them), the machine comes in at nearly $700. And that means it should do what the manufacturer says it will do. But it won't. Even if some freak of nature speed monster could pull the handle that fast, the primer system would stop it far short of anything close to the claims.

I have to grudgingly say that the machine is still faster than the machine I've been using, in spite of the primer system, and I can reload all the ammo that I need in a reasonable amount of time. But for the price, Dillon would do well to take a look at the weak spots in this machine and do what they can to make sure it works smoothly at all stages. The price of the machine and necessary parts obligates them to do so, instead of acting like this thing is the God of all reloaders.

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