Home Forums Reloading Big Game Rifles Priming Cases

I have a RCBS Rock Chucker Supreme kit. I got most everything situated and put together. I have punched out and resized a few .280 Rem cases and I'm almost ready to prime them.

The kit came with a hand held priming tool and it has an attachment "priming arm" that is connected to the press.

Which is the better one to use?

I'm not in any sort of rush, so speed isn't an issue at this point. The one on the press seems like it would be a bit slower?

I hate the RCBS hand priming tool. If my options were the same as yours I'd be press priming until I got something better.

What is "something better?"

A Lee hand primer, Ingwe says the current Lyman is pretty good, a Sinclair, a K&M, an old RCBS (and unfortunately no longer made) bench mounted tool I use, ...

The Hornady hand priming tool is very good as well. I did not care for the RCBS hand primer.

Ditto. I don't know what I would do without my 30 year old Lee hand primer.

The only RCBS hand primer I've liked is the one using the plastic strips. It works very well, but the standard one isn't anywhere near the same quality.

The older model of the Lee is great (the reason I have what I hope is a lifetime supply stashed away), but haven't tried the new one.

I forgot the Lee changed, so make my recommendation provisional.

What do you guys not like about the rcbs hand primer?

The nonlinearity and lack of feel is glaring. You can squeeze pretty hard and just get the primer started, try to add a little more force (which is tough when you're already squeezing pretty hard) and wham, it lets go and you've damn near crushed the primer in the pocket.

This is my favorite so far.

John

RCBS Automatic Bench Priming Tool

Not on topic, but I prefer the Ram-Prime.

Interesting opinions and experiences on the RCBS hand tool. It's all I've ever used for the past 9 years (excluding testing out the priming arm on the press), never experienced the issues that others describe.

The only issue I've had with it is with small pistol primers getting flipped inside the tool (not the tray) and getting seated backwards. Now I just run the primer up enough to see its going to seat correctly, slide the case in, and seat it. Doesn't really take any additional time.

It works for me, but I wouldn't be surprised to find another tool works better.

I like the Lee hand primer so much I own 4

All set up with different shell holders

use the press primer and prime on the down stroke of your resizing step. this basically yields a sized/primed case in one step. this is assuming you have the kit with the primer tubes.

Pretty sure I do. Shouldn't the primer pockes be cleans first?

Lee AutoPrime 2. If you can find one. Very consistent.

I have only used the RCBS hand primer a little while at a friends, but the only problem that I saw was changing shell holders. That was a pain but the rest of it worked good. I use and like the older Lee, and have more thatn one and gave a couple away this year so far. if I find a good buy on ebay, I get it for the future. Me or my friends will need it. miles

It doesn't help you much since they too have been changed, but I also like the old round Lee Autoprime hand tool. I've got a couple with some extra parts stashed away. I used to break levers until I learned to keep the pivots greased up good. Hoping they last several more years.

It's an extra step, and doesn't make a whole lot of difference in my experience with loading hunting ammo.

That said, I do scrape it out on rifle cases while I'm checking for tumbler media in the flash hole. Revolver cases don't get tumbled so the primer pockets don't get cleaned.

Dale