Electric powder scale and dispenser.

[Reagan40]

I am looking to get an electric powder scale and dispenser. I'm currently looking at the RCBS charge master 1500, the Lyman gen 6 and the Hornady lock n load power charger. Anyone have any experience with any of these? What would you reccomend? Most of the time it would be used for H-4198 and H-110.

 

[gopurdue02]

avoid the Hornday LNL power charge at all cost. I have one and it is the biggest POS I have ever ownded. It is always off on weights ( I have to double check it with another scale that cost 20 bucks) and always is off by 1 grain on rifle powder drops on stick powders. I keep hoping the POS breaks so I can justify the $$ to buy a new one from a different manufacture.

 

[lovemywoods]

I've used the RCBS Chargemaster 1500 for about two years. Fairly pleased with it. The scale zeros easily. During use, it stabilizes quickly. With stick powders, like Varget, it will sometimes overshoot .1-.2 grains when too many pieces fall in right at the setpoint weight. With finer powders, it's normally spot on. It's not perfect, but I'm pleased with it's performance for the price paid.

 

[mac45]

Have the RCBS unit.
Like it for hard to meter powders, but it's slow.

 

[oldpink]

Don't ignore the excellent PACT dispenser/scale combo.

PACT High Speed Digital Precision Powder Dispenser Scale 110 Volt

I've been using mine for fifteen years now, and it's excellent.
It's also made in USA, right in Texas, which (I could be wrong here), unlike any of the others.
It's particularly good for extruded (stick) powders and flake powders, namely the likes of IMR4831, IMR4350, IMR4895, and H800-X.
I've loaded thousands of rounds, both rifle and handgun with it, and it works perfectly.
Well worth the investment.

 

[17 squirrel]

I own two Harrell Brothers ' Culver ' powder measures. .money very well spent.
Built by bench rest shooters for bench rest shooters. All of there equipment is top shelf stuff. I have one of the ones below and one of their pistol measures. The drum rotates on sealed ball bearings, they are smoooooooth... And with most powders when you change amounts one click on the dial is 1/10th of a grain.
New BR PREMIUM Powder Measure

 

[dekeshooter]

Don't ignore the excellent PACT dispenser/scale combo.

PACT High Speed Digital Precision Powder Dispenser Scale 110 Volt

I've been using mine for fifteen years now, and it's excellent.
It's also made in USA, right in Texas, which (I could be wrong here), unlike any of the others.
It's particularly good for extruded (stick) powders and flake powders, namely the likes of IMR4831, IMR4350, IMR4895, and H800-X.
I've loaded thousands of rounds, both rifle and handgun with it, and it works perfectly.
Well worth the investment.

I agree with the above. I've had mine for nearly 20 years and it has served me well. Mine is the original model and it is not the high speed model. I only use mine for longer grained extruded powders that do not flow well through my powder measures. My PACT unit has always thrown very consistent and accurate charges.

 

[Contender]

I like the PACT. Mine has been getting the job done for 10 or more years.

 

[baba]

I got the RCBS one last fall. I don't know how I lived without it. So far, money well spent.

With any of these, you need to understand the limits of the technology. Bascially there is a little flighted tube, or screw auger (depending on who's model you are talking about) that turns, pushing powder out by exploiting its angle of repose. It tumbles down the tube until it just falls off the edge. The simple program in the machine slows the speed down as it gets closer to the desired weight to walk it in. On some powders that are sticks, and/or heavy, if a group of three sticks stuck together fall off right at the end, you will be over weight.

I have loaded about 100 38spl using unique. Probably threw 105 charges to get 100 exactly on what I wanted. I have done 40 308s with varget, and I averaged about 13 throws to get 10 spot on. Varget is stick, and dense which are the hardest for these machines to handle. I have also done about 60 300blk, with 4227, 4198, and 1680. I can't recall throwing more than 2 or 3 extras in 40 rounds for the first two. I do recall the little spheres of 1680 were perfect charges every time.

The other thing to consider is that this with this 5% error rate, the other 95% are spot on. EXACT. The best performance I have gotten out of most powder measures is a +/- 0.2gr spread. If you are lucky and using an easy throwing powder (like NOT Varget or 4985). All in all, I am quite happy with the performance. A lot of the reviews you read I think are bad because people have unrealistic expectations for the technology. It is slower than a powder measure, but also way more flexible and repeatable.

-Brian

 

[oldpink]

I got the RCBS one last fall. I don't know how I lived without it. So far, money well spent.

With any of these, you need to understand the limits of the technology. Bascially there is a little flighted tube, or screw auger (depending on who's model you are talking about) that turns, pushing powder out by exploiting its angle of repose. It tumbles down the tube until it just falls off the edge. The simple program in the machine slows the speed down as it gets closer to the desired weight to walk it in. On some powders that are sticks, and/or heavy, if a group of three sticks stuck together fall off right at the end, you will be over weight.

I have loaded about 100 38spl using unique. Probably threw 105 charges to get 100 exactly on what I wanted. I have done 40 308s with varget, and I averaged about 13 throws to get 10 spot on. Varget is stick, and dense which are the hardest for these machines to handle. I have also done about 60 300blk, with 4227, 4198, and 1680. I can't recall throwing more than 2 or 3 extras in 40 rounds for the first two. I do recall the little spheres of 1680 were perfect charges every time.

The other thing to consider is that this with this 5% error rate, the other 95% are spot on. EXACT. The best performance I have gotten out of most powder measures is a +/- 0.2gr spread. If you are lucky and using an easy throwing powder (like NOT Varget or 4985). All in all, I am quite happy with the performance. A lot of the reviews you read I think are bad because people have unrealistic expectations for the technology. It is slower than a powder measure, but also way more flexible and repeatable.

-Brian

Excellent writeup, and you echo my experience by and large.
I use mine for all powders, but especially for the notoriously difficult to drop accurately with a powder measure IMR4831.
I'm being more picky than needed, so I rerun a dispense cycle for anything not dead nuts on my setting, not even allowing 1/10 of a grain off.
If you're at least one grain below max (I am), it's really unnecessary to do that, but I have the ability to go for perfection, so I generally do.
Even then, with the toughest powder to dispense (IMR4831, IMR4350, IMR4895, and any other extruded stick powder), I only have to do that about one in twenty or one in thirty dispense cycles, even though I'm being way more particular than necessary.

The only thing I can think to add to your comments is that -- while these dispensers are a bit slower than conventional powder measures -- you have the benefit of a weighed charge every time, and I greatly make up for almost all of the slower powder dispense cycle by dropping the dispensed charge in a case, replacing the scale pan and hitting the "DISPENSE" button, then taking the newly charged case over to my press (single stage...Rock Chucker Supreme) to seat the bullet.
With .30-06, it generally takes me about ten to fifteen seconds to carefully seat each bullet.
By the time I get each bullet seated, the powder dispense cycle is already done or nearly so, quite a difference from having to keep my hands occupied with my Uniflow powder measure before I can seat a bullet for each cartridge.
It also makes reloading more fun.

 

[Ericpwp]

I just picked up the RCBS. They have a $50 rebate going now. I can't wait to try it out.

 

[CountryBoy19]

I have the Lyman DPS II with the III upgrade kit factory installed. I'm happy: I've had a few instances where I had doubt in the scale but allowing it to warm up properly seems to take care of that.

As mentioned above, it's possible to over-throw: I set my desired charge .1 gr below the charge I actually want and then about 1/2 of them throw right and 1/2 of them I lightly tap on the dispenser tube to knock 1 or 2 granules of powder out. I feel like I get a more accurate powder charge using this method.

I really like the RCBS unit because it allows you to "hack" into and adjust the parameters of how it throws (speeding up and slowing down certain functions and changing thresholds to get a faster, but more accurate powder throw). However, you will pay for that convenience. IIRC, I bought the Lyman for ~$150 several years ago.