powder measures

J

jbarkervt

Guest
I'd love to hear some thoughts about powder measures or scales. I've used a Redding BR30 measure for years -- no, make that decades -- and finally had the bright idea to weigh charges to check accuracy. Found that a 36.5 gr charge could vary by 1.5 grains with Varget. I have a very accurate electronic scale, and find that weighting each charge is tedious, time-consuming, and probably not necessary. RCBS Chargemaster, from a video on YouTube, seems noisy and not at all pleasant. Culver types are expensive and seem unlikely to be much more accurate than the Redding, at least according to this: http://www.realguns.com/Commentary/comar63.htm
So, coming from a guy returning to benchrest after a couple of decades off (amazing how some things have changed a lot, and some not at all!), what are the best of the alternatives? Thoughts would be much appreciated.
Jim
 
what br load are you using that is a varget load ?

measure's vary in how they handle types of powder(ball stick flake...).

if you are too impatient to weigh charges, maybe another sport is in line.

ok ...br powders......some score guys reload at home, most group guys reload at the range. the range guys as a rule use a measure, tho the chargemaster has some followers.

n133 is a short stick powder and goes thru a harells measure at about plus or minus 0.1( tho most br shooter will say no way). it is the most popular powder in group. so it and a good measure work well together. what works better is 8208..a milsurplus with even a smaller stick. it goes thru a harrels at plus or minus 0.05.....one reason it shoots so well. a modern version may hit the street one day.

this is not a cheap sport, spends your money, and take your time, enjoy the sport.


mike in co
 
A friend of mine (anal engineer) bought, under various recommendations the lyman dps1200 set. This was the series 3 model, as of last year it was the newest version. Everyone we talked to said it was the absolutely fastest and most accurate way to weigh charges. His high power load was that of what most Palma shooters use with 155 Seirra's and Varget. But he wanted to weigh them all and do it extremely accurately.

I was at his house one evening before a local BR Match and he was going to load up some charges with his new Lyman dps 1200 series 3. His goal was to come to our VFS match and show us guys how well a great shooting Palma rifle could stomp us into the dirt. We unboxed his new Lyman and went through the set-up/ warm up and so on procedure. After warming the unit and weighing various test weight we were satisfied in the accuracy of the scale. This friend also has an older Dillon digital scale, and older O Haus balance scale and a real nice new Lab grade digital scale (did I say anal?). I told him all the reports give the Lyman rave reviews and that we are wasting our time with all this testing. It was getting late and no rounds were loaded yet.

So I set the machine to throw I believe 47.5 grains varget and started throwing charges through the Lyman. Man they were going fast, much faster than my Pact. I was impressed. (had I mention he is anal about things?) He is also right many more times than I. He was sitting across the table and I told him to start putting bullets on these cases. Instead he was weighing them on not one but three scales, that had all been zeroed and tested with this same pan. They now show that every load varied in weight from what the lyman said it was throwing... can't be we just tested the Lyman. So here we go dumping all the loads I was throwing back into the powder can.... Let's test the scale again on the Lyman.... Right on the dot. Ok lets verify it on the other scales, Right on the dot.... Ok throw a charge 47. 5 vooooom out comes 47.5. Put it on the Dillon, 47.4 hmmmm, put it on the Lab scale, 47.4 Huuuuuh, Put it on the O Haus, 47.4 Wooow. What the heck.....

Okay lets throw another vroooom 47.5 okay put it on the dillon 47.2 Whaat? and so on and so on.... The Lyman is fast in the powder throw mode, the scale is accurate in the scale mode. Buuutttt in the powder throw mode the "Lie Man" 1200 DPS computer is programmed to tell you when It's "CLOSE ENOUGH", I guess this makes for a fasssssster powder measure system. Maybe LieMan thinks 47.2 is close enough to 47.5 Dave doesn't think so, neither do I. Once again Anal Dave was right.

Later that week we went to my house and threw some charges on my Pact. The Pact is much slower than his LieMan. The Pact scale is as accurate as his Dillon. What we see with the Pact is that it sometimes drops an extra kernel if the tubes don't stop quick enough... In that case the scale reads 47.6... If that's not "close enough" you can dig out .1 grain and when the scale reads 47.5 you can load the shell and seat a bullet. Once in a while the slow pact stops short like at 47.4, if you don't think that's "close enough" you can hit the trickle button and trickle the extra .1 in and load the case and seat the bullet. The thing is, in the Auto mode the Pact scale is still a scale, while the LieMan is just a digital readout telling you what the computer thinks you need the see. I can't judge the RCBS... we have no experience with it.

What was the question?


Paul
 
Last edited:
Something's wrong here.

"Found that a 36.5 gr charge could vary by 1.5 grains with Varget."

You need to change your technique.
 
After re-programing

my Chargemaster to throw faster I must admit, I am concerned that the same thing might be happening. I must check. :confused:
 
Ok Pete and Paul

After reading your test I thought I would perform a similar test with my RCBS chargemaster, the two other scales I used were a 505 Beam Scale and a Dillon Precision Digital, confirmed them with scale check weights, found that the Dillon
weight (consistently) .1 grain heavy against the other two scales.

Ran 37.5 Grains with the Chargemaster (after speeding it up) 30 times (small scientific sample) found that only twice was the chargemaster heavy by .1 grs and to me it could only be .05grs cause when I set the charge back on the RCBS digital it would bounce from 37.4 to 37.5 before settling back at 37.5.

This was just a quick test that I could perform with the equipment I had, all in all, I can't find anything wrong with the Chargemaster, its a good unit and seems to be very repeatable.

Hope This helps.
 
Redrock said:
After reading your test I thought I would perform a similar test with my RCBS chargemaster, the two other scales I used were a 505 Beam Scale and a Dillon Precision Digital, confirmed them with scale check weights, found that the Dillon
weight (consistently) .1 grain heavy against the other two scales.

Ran 37.5 Grains with the Chargemaster (after speeding it up) 30 times (small scientific sample) found that only twice was the chargemaster heavy by .1 grs and to me it could only be .05grs cause when I set the charge back on the RCBS digital it would bounce from 37.4 to 37.5 before settling back at 37.5.

This was just a quick test that I could perform with the equipment I had, all in all, I can't find anything wrong with the Chargemaster, its a good unit and seems to be very repeatable.

Hope This helps.
Click to expand...

the problem with testing 0.1 scales against 0.1 scales is tolerance stack up. most likely your results are plus or minus 0.2....not 0.1. you need a more precise tool to compare with. same applies to the original statement.

the denver instruments mx-123 is a good benchrest scale. electronic, with a 0.02 readout/0.03 sensitivity( if i remember correctly). i use it for all my br loads and some other competition loads as well. not cheap but most things in br are not cheap...about $325, but definitly takes the issue of power charge weight out of the variable list.

mike in co
 
I have an original Lyman DPS to which I've added the speed-up kit. I found that it tended to throw a tenth of a grain high half the time or so. So I set it to throw a tenth below what I want and that way I'm either right on or no more than + or - a tenth.

However, having more money than good sense, I've bought a RCBS Chargemaster and am playing with that now. :eek:
 
Back to olden days

Why don't you guys get back to basics and buy a Belding & Mull powder measure wit h 2 or 3 drop tubes and throw loads with out worry and rechecking. Life is too short. Your Liemans etc. I bench shoot and I have three B&M's loaded with different powders. Give one a try. I am getting up in years and don't buy green bananas anymore.
Largemouth1
 
I did check it out

I made the McDonalds or, actually the Sam's Club modification ( the Sam's Club Straw is a better fit to the extrusion tube ) and I found that after an initial few charges that throw over the programed amount, the Chargemaster becomes quite reliable and consistent. I am not sure the straw is a panacia, however.

I also agree on the error stacking thing. Unless one has an actual certified labratory scale setup, one does not know which fibber is fibbing. I still favor throwing close and trickeling by the curnel by hand. It is as fast as the auto setting and gives piece of mind, to me at least. One does not need a Chargemaster for that ;)
 
mike in co said:
the problem with testing 0.1 scales against 0.1 scales is tolerance stack up. most likely your results are plus or minus 0.2....not 0.1. you need a more precise tool to compare with. same applies to the original statement.

Like I said in my post I used the scale check weights to confirm each weight
are they not to be trusted either,

tell you what you send me your Lab fancy scale and I'll do the test again then we'll see how far my caveman like results are off
Click to expand...
 
Pete Wass said:
my Chargemaster to throw faster I must admit, I am concerned that the same thing might be happening. I must check. :confused:
Click to expand...

The Chargemaster beeps when the target weight has been reached, or passed. If you wait a second or two after the beep, it returns to scale mode and reads the actual weight, which can be as much as several tenths high. Haven't tried the straw mod yet, but confirming the actual weight is not a problem with the Chargemaster.

Cheers,
Keith
 
I have a somewhat simple set-up much like what boyd allen describes.
It is a stainless steel ( non- magnetic) scale box, with a hinged glass window.
It houses an O haus 10-10 scale. In the side , next to the pan is a hole
where a trickler can feed the pan. From a measure(set low) to the scale
and touched off with the trickler. Now as a confidence builder, I have a small electronic scale for final check. Well, electronic scales are excellent,
but can we get a good one for $99 bucks or less. Thats the question.
Ya, I think so, mine has not failed to read what the rest of my
Rube Goldberg system says. The stainless steel scale box sits on my tool box and is windproof in a near tornado. Hey, you got to believe something
 
Keith

mks said:
The Chargemaster beeps when the target weight has been reached, or passed. If you wait a second or two after the beep, it returns to scale mode and reads the actual weight, which can be as much as several tenths high. Haven't tried the straw mod yet, but confirming the actual weight is not a problem with the Chargemaster.

Cheers,
Keith
Click to expand...

Could you explain about the straw modification?

Thanks
Dave
 
Cut a piece of a drink straw from McDonald's and stuff it into the trickler tube.

I haven't tried it yet.

With the Chargemaster, make sure it is level, and cord is not kept rolled up, and electricity is conditioned. You can zero it with the supplied weights. It is slow compared to drop measure like BR or Culver, but faster than trickle. It also does not do well with small pistol charges. So I use the trickler and just the scale for W231 45 ACP loads. Chargemaster does well with the AA, IMR, Alliant and Hodgdon powders I put through it.

I like the Chargemaster because it is so easy to do load development, I start at min charge, then make 5, then punch in a new number, and keep going up to max.

Every once in a while, it will consistently go over the designated charge. I unplug it, let it rest, then recalibrate, and start new.

I don't care for the fact that it doesn't handle small charges for pistol. You'd think it would be smart enough to go slow when 5gr is typed in. But no, it hauls ass like it wants to measure out 25gr, then tries to slam on the brakes and trickle in the rest, but is already a few tenths over.
 
I was wondering

about the Promethius (sp?) dispenser which was written up in PS eons ago. I think a few of them were made. Has anyone had any expereince with them? It looked "Neat" in the pictures.
 
If you want to charge cases even faster... set your powder thrower a half a grain light, throw the charge into the pan, put it on the Chargemaster and hit dispense. Then toss it in the case and repeat as needed. If you want fast weighed charges, thats about as quick as it gets.

Me, I generally get by with the Mickey-Dee straw modification and some appropriate tweakings to the speed setpoints in the programming. It dispenses charges about as fast as I can put a bullet in the case, seat it, wipe off the lube, and set it in the cartridge box. By then its time to pick up the next completed charge and repeat as necessary. Figure I have to put the bullets in at some point any way, so getting in a rush about throwing charges as fast as I can reaches a point of limited return.

As for the accuracy of the Chargemaster... my 'other' scale is a Sartorius GD-503 and I can honestly say that 95% of the time (or a little better) the Chargemaster throws within +/- 0.1gr. Most of the time much better, but once in a while a little worse.
 
Try doing it

milanuk said:
If you want to charge cases even faster... set your powder thrower a half a grain light, throw the charge into the pan, put it on the Chargemaster and hit dispense. Then toss it in the case and repeat as needed. If you want fast weighed charges, thats about as quick as it gets.

Me, I generally get by with the Mickey-Dee straw modification and some appropriate tweakings to the speed setpoints in the programming. It dispenses charges about as fast as I can put a bullet in the case, seat it, wipe off the lube, and set it in the cartridge box. By then its time to pick up the next completed charge and repeat as necessary. Figure I have to put the bullets in at some point any way, so getting in a rush about throwing charges as fast as I can reaches a point of limited return.

As for the accuracy of the Chargemaster... my 'other' scale is a Sartorius GD-503 and I can honestly say that 95% of the time (or a little better) the Chargemaster throws within +/- 0.1gr. Most of the time much better, but once in a while a little worse.
Click to expand...



The same except by trickeling using your thumb and finger. Faster and not as likely to over throw.
 
FBecigneul said:
the problem with testing 0.1 scales against 0.1 scales is tolerance stack up. most likely your results are plus or minus 0.2....not 0.1. you need a more precise tool to compare with. same applies to the original statement.

"Most likely your results are plus or minus 0.2"
How scientific is that. How accurate is your assumption.?

Allow me to assume Our results are off +/- 0.05

And that's good enough in an AR any number.
Click to expand...

assume what you want..the problem is you DO NOT KNOW how far off you are.
my assumtion is reasonable...you have two scales that are plus or minus 0.1...that means it CAN be off .2 and still read the same.....
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top