Home Forums Reloading Big Game Rifles Best hand priming tool

They are sending me the pieces under warranty. I told them I'd used it for 30 years or so and asked what did I need to do to get replacements. Great company.

I have a Lee. I also have the two that RCBS makes. I recently bought a Forster bench mounted one. It works better than any of the others. Loading primers is a little slow. But then it’s easy and fast. Hasbeen

I've used an RCBS and a Lee and like JGray, I now use a Frankford Arsenal hand priming tool. Works great and provides good feel and feedback when seating primers. Best of all, it allows you to adjust seating depth.

I went from Lyman, to RCBs, to LEE.... then Sinclair,...

Of late I tried the newer square try RCBS hand primer tool... I like it a lot and seem to use it more than others.

+1, excellent tool, but Sinclair is never a bad choice either.

I also like the original Lee for low volume work, but can't find some shell holders that I need; the Frankford does all that the Lee ever did & more with move leverage too.

MM

I had a good RCBS tool but after some decade the handle broke and the replacement didn't work real well, left primers "proud". I switched to Sinclair. Last summer I picked up a new RCBS to do some cartridges I hadn't loaded for in a long time. This one is good, seats primers deep. I haven't picked up the Sinclair (I have 2) since.

Tom

If you're loading hunting/plinking ammo, then the LEE is really better than the press, and cheaper than anything else that works really well. If cost is no object and you are striving for best accuracy, then the K&M is top of the line. Recently bought one, and it is the only one on the market that does EXACTLY what I want it to do.

My favorite is one I not really sure of the maker. Hand held one primer at a time hand loaded. Mequeon? 30-06 size holder, so works for most of my rifle cartridges and 45 ACP pistol. Have a RCBS as well, but a bit of a pain to setup, and a Lee setup that works with the press. Neither are as easy as the hand held unless doing volume reloading.

I used the Lee hand primer tool for years, but now almost exclusively use their table top prime tool. Way easier to get tight primers in. I mounted on a small piece of plywood and clamp it to my workbench when it's time to prime. Love that darn thing.

Once upon a time, I remember reading that a lot of the benchrest competitors were using and praising the old round tray Lee hand primers. I'm sure the K&M is great but the Lee surely can't be THAT far behind it, in terms of producing accurate ammo ... How much difference do any of them really make, in terms of accuracy? So long as they get the primer seated...

I bet when used properly, most priming tools have little impact on accuracy.

I think the differences between priming tools lies in convenience, ease of use, and time savings.

Yup. Tolerances, leverage, ergonomics, seating depth adjustment, etc.

It's not about just seating the primer, it's about getting exactly the same crush/preload on each one for consistent ignition and best accuracy. The same thing can be said about seating dies, but most everyone can agree that the ones with a sliding sleeve produce the most concentric ammo.

I had read once that getting the same preload made a difference, and the only way I could get that was to sort cases by rim thickness, primers by height, and adjust the shims on my Sinclair tool to get the same amount of .003 with a set of depth mics. A real set of depth mics. Not that junk on the end of a calipers lol. I fired 2 10 shot groups alternating each shot on 2 targets and the uniformed group was almost half the size of the other seated with a LEE. It worked, but was tedious beyond anything I wanted to keep doing. Readjusting the shims in the tool for each different size primer wasn't a good solution.

The K&M tool compensates for all of the variables and allows you to make them all have the amount of pre load you wish, which is important to me.

At $147.00, it's not for everyone unless you really need it, or just want it. If someone isn't shooting over windflags, they would be wasting their time and money.

That's very true, but between Sinclair, Frankford Arsenal, RCBS, LEE, etc, I've never noticed a repeatable accuracy difference between ammo seated with any of them, as long as the seating depth of primers in a given lot of ammo was consistent. Of course I'm not a BR shooter, so groups between 0.3-0.5 MOA are plenty good enough for what I do.

But I have noticed a very substantial difference between those tools in tolerance, ergo's, leverage, etc, which all make a difference in actual usage of the tools.

Sinclair is what I’ve used for years.

I'm using a 21st Century for rifle cartridges, its very well made and very comfortable in use, hard to imagine there is a better hand priming tool!

Well, I found a decent deal on a Frankford Arsenal hand primer, so I ordered it last night. It should be here Thursday, and hopefully I am back to hand loading soon. I've got some .30-06 and .300 WM brass prepped and just need to prime them to get moving. I don't think anything could have been worst than the Hornady hand primer, which is sad as I have so far had good luck with all my other relaoding equipment made by Hornady, Of course I am just getting started.