Hello all, I am looking into buying an electronic powder dispenser. I have looked at the PACT, Lyman and the RCBS. The PACT and Lyman are around $250 and the RCBS is about $310. I would be dispensing Varget, X-Terminator, AA1680 and H110 to name a few. And for cartridges as small as 300 Whisper, 223, 6.8SPC, up to 30-06 at the largest.

Anybody have experience with any of these, or even better, anybody that has used more than one? Would like to hear what you like/dislike about them. I am leaning towards the Lyman. Thanks

I use the RCBS Powder Pro scale and Powder master dispenser. These are made by Pact I believe.

Mine is temperature sensitive – when the temps get down to about 40 degrees it requires about an hour to warm it up for reliable use.

With very light loads of powder – say 3.5 grains of Bullseye it requires about ten charges to get every thing together and throw consistent charges – these are small problems really. I use the unit to dispense 800X regularly and this is the answer to working with this light and flaky powder.

The powder bowl requires careful cleaning when using powders such as Hodgdon Lil’ Gun. Lil’ Gun sticks all over the bowl and I use a clean paint brush to clean around the tubes.

I like the unit but mine is an early effort – I wonder if the later models I see on the market now are better.

Throwing a few to get started isn't too big of a deal. I usually do that anyway with my manual scale. How long does it take to dispense a larger charge, say 30-40 grains. I have heard they take several seconds, which I do not think would be a big deal if you seat and crimp one bullet while waiting for the next charge. I think Lyman even recently updated theirs to make it a little faster than the older models.

Anything that will dispense oatmeal, I mean 800X, has to be good.

Bye
Jack

Same as William Iorg - RCBS Powder Pro Scale and Dispenser. Two separate units, the scale and dispenser, and they've since combined them into one common unit. Once you're into the loading process, anything around 50 grs or less, the loading process flows nicely. Seat the bullet from the previous case while the next one is dispensing, and wipe the lube off the loaded round. Times out just right.

With smaller powder charges, I've gone to the hand-dispenser once I've settled on a load. Larger cartridge loads, there is plenty of time for the mind to wander.

Has anyone else had issues with after the 'calibrate' cycle that you're off about 0.6 grains, and you have to hit the 'zero' button? Hasn't been an issue, but whenever I start a loading session, seems I have to hit the 'zero' button after calibration, to get it to read 0.00, and it's always right about 0.6 gr off.

I sometimes have the same problem. As you say it is no big deal but you need to stay alert and hit zero.

This was a good investment for me but has not replaced the mechanical measures for common loading operations.
For the fluffy powders and very light loads the powder dispenser if perfect.

I found I receive best performance with a one hour warm up on the scale.

Large charges can take a bit of time but if you occupy your time properly you develop a flow of work which speeds the loading process.

I forgot to add I switched to the Lyman pan with the built in funnel for most loading – except of course the 17 Hornet. I use the metal pan for calibrating the scale but admit if I could locate a pan just a bit larger I would use it for calibrating.

And, in view of the above, I would comment that the only "advantage" of expensive electonic powder dispensing systems it that they are supposed to "save time". ???

Anyone who finds the fancy rigs to be time savers has to have very poor working technique with a conventional measure and scale. IMHO, of course. ;)

I have the RCBS it saves a ton of time, and is also very accurate. For very large cases you can cheat it with a dipper. Ranger have you ever used one? Don't knock it till you try it.

I have used two. Previously, the Lyman 1200 DPS II and currently the RCBS ChargeMaster. I definitely prefer the RCBS, which drops a charge a little more quickly and seems to have less trouble with dropping heavy charges. The Lyman wanted to warm up for 20 minutes. Any vibration, jolt to the bench, or sometimes even dumping powder into the tray would cause it to complain and demand that you recalibrate. The Lyman is also more difficult to empty/clean, requiring you to remove the trickler tube each time using a special tool it came with. I bought the DPS III upgrade kit, which was supposed to make it dispense faster, which it did, but increased the problem of dropping heavy charges. The RCBS has none of these problems. It does drop heavy charges occasionally, depending on the powder used, but much less frequently.

I have a RCBS Chargemaster setup right now and have had not problems with it. It throws charges up to 96 Grs. in very little time. I just work on seating a bullet while its working. For small charge stuff I use a Harrell powder measure it's a sweet piece of equipment.

"Ranger have you ever used one? Don't knock it till you try it."

Yep. Once. That was enough. They ain't for me.

I don't trust electronic things, I made too good a living for too many years fixing that stuff. How long did your last computer/printer/modem/camera, etc. last? My Ohaus 1010 was new in '65 and it's still as precisely accurate as it was then, there's likely another 50 years of life left in it. Want to bet your expensive digital dumpster will still be chugging along that long? I'm often amazed at people who cheer (corectly) that their press will outlast their grandsons, but then say they use an electonic measuring system! Isn't there a logic disconnect somewhere in that?

For speed, I found my friend's shiney new digital dumpster very little faster than a proper scale-measure-trickler-press work flow set up, especially considering the required warm-up, need for steady line voltage, no stray electrical fields, watching for drifting zero and calibration, etc. I can be done with much of my reloading before those devices settle down!

I never weigh charges for large volumes of handgun ammo, that's totally pointless. Except for testing, I don't weigh for a lot of my rifle ammo anymore, that's largely pointless too. Especially so IF we have good technique with a decent measure. My old Redding measure IS decent. Few of my dropped charges are off more than +/- .2 gr. and that's plenty precise for me.

There are many MUCH more important things to be picky about for accuracy than trivial differences in powder charges. BR shooters will agree, as they happily dump their charges. Yeah, they use different measures, and maybe powders, that the rest of us but...not all that much different..?

Well, both Lyman and RCBS are quite happy to feed the masses what they want, at very high cost, and they smile all the way to their banks. But, the only good use I can find for a digital scale of any kind is to weigh and select cases and I just don't do a lot of that...anymore. It's largely a pointess excercise too.

A lot of us kid ourselves about how precisely we reload but few of us have or use a concentricity gage to actually know what we are turning out. Most of us go by faith that we bought a "good brand" of dies and weigh every charge so our ammo must also be good. NOT!

A decent concentricty gage (Sinclair/NECO), a decent neck turner, a Lee collet neck die and a Foster/Redding seater die, all used correctly, will aid the pursuit of accuracy far more than weighting anything to +/- zero.<!-- / message -->

I have the original RCBS powdermaster set, and it was the worst loading equipment purchase I ever made. Exceptionally slow and every 3rd or 4th charge was out. I don't, and won't, use it anymore.

I use the scale for sorting bullets and cases, but it takes a good hour to warm up so I usually plug it in the night before I'm going to use it.

I could have bought one of the fancy, high-end measures the benchresters use for the cost of the electronic set, and I would have been considerably better off.

I have one of the early RCBS units too. I have found that it does a good job with ball powders but I am not at all happy over its performance with extruded powders other than short cuts like varget.

I'm starting to lean towards the RCBS Chargemaster now. As a previous poster mentioned it against the Lyman I have found several reviews online that suggest that the RCBS is easier and faster than the Lyman.

Isn't the design of the RCBS Chargemaster about 5 years newer than the Lyman Digital Powder System?

Bye
Jack

I have the Pact. Like said above , need to give plenty of warm up time, can be temperature sensitive too. I work in a 12x24 foot shop and a tiny window AC unit on the other end has to off or the scale will not read"0" to begin the calibration. The nearby fluorescent light needs to be off also or I get interference. I need to move mine to another bench as it is on the bench that I have one of my presses on. The movement of the press disrupts it. I use RCBS balance beam scale to verify and once the Pact is stable and calibrated it is good. I prefer to use my RCBS powder drop instead. It is much faster and when I verify with both the balance scale and Pact it is just as accurate. Other than that I like it.:confused: For the same money I could have the Pact Chrony or the CED chrony.:(

PS: if you don't have the chrony, get it first, it is more useful for load work up.

There's nothing wrong with having an electronic powder measure, even if it won't last as long. To say otherwise would mean you should also send letters via the USPS instead of getting a computer and using E-mail. You'll need to replace that computer every few years, you know!

You are paying for convenience, and that's allowed, even if the convenience requires more maintenance/replacement costs.

I've been wanting one ever since AMT first started selling one that looks a lot like the the Lyman. I'm sure Lyman bought it from them or their supplier.

I would have to agree with Ranger that there more trouble than there worth. The only thing I have found them to excel at is load development were you want to increase powder charge in succeeding blocks of cartridges. Just punch in the new charge weight and start loading. Great to do five cartridges at a time per powder charge weight then increase charge weight for next five cartridges.

I've had one for a dozen years-the RCBS scale bit the dirt in '97 from power fluctations and replaced with PACT scale. They also made the RCBS at that time but now RCBS's are made in China. As others have commented you have to plug them in hours before loading to stablize. Large dispensed amounts take forever. I set my uniflow powder measure to dump within .5 grain then use the dispenser to finish the charge. That really speeds thing up but even then the're slooooow!!!! I set up once and timed how long it took to load 50 rounds. After that experiment it went back in the box and only gets used for load development. Don't know about others but I have better things too do with my time than wait on that slow dispenser. Friends with the Lyman relate similar woes.

Because of this I started experimenting with the old uniflow powder measure. Found out that if I used three powder baffles instead of one it throws the most consistant charges right down to an empty hopper. Even did the same with my Redding measures and they responded nearly the same way although they were a little better dispensing originally.

I've had 2 Chargemasters, (the first I lost in a flood), the newest is about 3 years old.

I have zero problems ever. I check it with weights when I first turn it on, it rarely needs calibrating. It doesn't change as it warms up, it doesn't act up under different lights, no drifting, and it rarely overcharges. The overcharges are not a big deal since the scale clearly shows the pan is heavy. Like any other powder measure, some powders just have less problems than others. I really like that the newer ones can auto dispense the next charge by simply replacing the pan- no button to push and the finished 'beep' can be turned off.

The only way to get the benefits of any electronic dispenser is to make sure you are busy while it does it's thing. They work really well with turret presses or if you at least seat bullets as the cases are charged, wipe case, prime the next, etc... And make sure it's on a different surface than your press. Mine takes about 30 seconds to dispense 80 grains of ball powder. That's ok though, there's little or no wait if you just plan the loading session.

Well old habits die hard and I learned to reload by a simple process i.e. do one step at a time. I deprime/resize all cases as one operation, then throw them in the polisher, then check each case for length. If they need trimming then all get trimmed, then all are reprimed. The next step is charge all cases with powder in one operation. Final step is seating the bullets. I don't have duds without powder in them doing it this way. Too many times at the range I've had to loan my cleaning rod to another shooter who forgot to charge his reloads or had his progressive screw up. This is why I say it takes forever to load with the powder dispensers. I keep my mind focused on one task only. This is one area where multi-tasking is not acceptable. Anyone that thinks otherwise I don't want to be around on the range firing line.

The only task to change and enjoy an auto powder dispenser is seating bullets as each case is charged- I don't see the issue with that, if anything it's a better procedure . If the dispenser is still lagging behind, possibly priming the next cartridge in the same step will get it up to speed.

Powder charging to me is like watching paint dry. So, I have a little TRUSTED helper to weigh each charge for me as I do something else, like measure OAL, measure headspace, measure run out, check primer depth, recheck the previous charge, prime the following case, inspect the current case, or simply go get a smoke. JMHO

There is NO drop off of performance when using an auto dispenser. My loads are much more precise with the dispenser/ scale combo than ANY mere measure available. Even if it is off from time to time I know about it, and can decide to use the charge or not.

I respect the old school hand loading procedures, as the difference in accuracy usually isn't measurable. But, having a job (not retired), family, and a hand loading/ shooting hobby I appreciate all of the help I can get. Besides, It'd be really hard to find someone trustworthy to drop and trickle powder charges spot on for $300, for any length of time anyway.

I have most press and powder scales and measures.I use the lee disk powder measure with powder thru expanders,on pistol.I check the charge when I set it.I mark the measure with a label and dont check it again.I do have a pact and an other inexpensive one.my scales work fine.for rifle I use the lee double disk and powder thru die.and I may open up the discs.
with the turret and auto advance all I have to do is place a bullet on the powdered case.most of my loads are lead bullets and target loads.I am working on my Garands now and I have a AR and FN49.I had so much factory I did not have to reload rifle but have experiance from my win 73 and win tools from 1936 on.but hay if it makes you happy why not.just remember not many of the newbes have any mechanical skills.and NO experiance.

Well my wife let me pick up a chargemaster, and a Hornady LNL AP. I didn't have time to use them today, hopefully I will get a chance tomorrow. I'm looking forward to trying out the chargemaster. The LNL will require shell plates, so I will have to find those, they are hard to find these days.

Well, I loaded about 80rnds of 30-06 with 50grs of Varget. I dispensed the powder while seating and crimping the bullet in my turret press. Sometimes the powder was done before I was, more often than not I had to wait two to four seconds or so.

Overall I would say it really sped up my work flow. I didn't actually time it. But I do know I probably had never loaded more than about 50 30-06s because I would get tired of measuring. With the dispenser I wasn't losing interest the same, and was going to load some 22-250 too, but my wife had lunch ready...