LEE IS CRAP

**snuffy19608** · November 8th, 2017, 12:46 AM

I keep telling myself get RCBS, or go Blue, but my penny-pinching upbringing keeps coming back to haunt me. Bought a Auto-Prime, tried to recap some brass just now. What a piece of crap, even compared to the old style priming tools. Took a whole 10-12 cases before stuff started going wrong. Primers going sideways, lever fell off, whole thing jammed several times. I swear, never again! I'll eat Ramen before I get anything Lee again!! Now, off to buy something that WORKS!!

**SIGFAN86** · November 8th, 2017, 01:12 AM

SOME of lee reloading items are crap.
I have used the older version of the hand primer and I can agree, they are sub par. Try a frankford Arsenal.
Their pistol dies are perfectly fine.

**NathanB** · November 8th, 2017, 09:43 AM

I’ve got a buddy who swears by his lee presses and it seems to make reliable ammo in many calibers

**Nate7667** · November 8th, 2017, 10:25 AM

I have an old Lee Pro 1000 in 9mm that has probably close to 10k round through it with out any major issue.
It was a "thats good deal, lets buy it and take over the world" kind of purchase at 20 years old and still in school, and it was great for my needs then. Other than being a 3 station press and needing a separate operation to crimp.
Now, go blue in the 1050 flavor and call it a day.

The only thing will buy and swear to from Lee, factory crimp die.

**Sgt.K** · November 8th, 2017, 10:42 AM

Originally Posted by Nate7667

I have an old Lee Pro 1000 in 9mm that has probably close to 10k round through it with out any major issue.
It was a "thats good deal, lets buy it and take over the world" kind of purchase at 20 years old and still in school, and it was great for my needs then. Other than being a 3 station press and needing a separate operation to crimp.
Now, go blue in the 1050 flavor and call it a day.

The only thing will buy and swear to from Lee, factory crimp die.

I have a Lee Pro 1000 I bought new about 3½ years ago. I also have nearly 10k rounds (of .45) thru mine. No other presses or dies, just 3 stations that got set up and adjusted once. I've torn it down 3 times for a good clean and lube, but otherwise it just does what it's supposed to.

YMMV

**Daycrawler** · November 8th, 2017, 11:55 AM

Originally Posted by snuffy19608

I keep telling myself get RCBS, or go Blue, but my penny-pinching upbringing keeps coming back to haunt me.

Buy once cry once! you get what you pay for.................or do you?

**Bang** · November 8th, 2017, 01:23 PM

Sounds like a warranty claim to me.

**wanneroo** · November 8th, 2017, 01:27 PM

I have found some of their stuff is really good and some not so good. Obviously they price and sell things more in the value range for consumers and that can have mixed results.

**snuffy19608** · November 8th, 2017, 03:46 PM

Well after a night of badly needed sleep I reevaluated everything and I went into "rant" mode way to quick again. If you're gonna trash a company make sure your dies aren't from that company. I HAVE always been happy with Lee pistol dies, had some issues with their 223 dies but other rifle calibers worked fine.

Not that it's an excuse, but I guess I was more sleep deprived than I realized. I won't do anything with powders, but I figured the priming tool wouldn't be a major hurdle. WRONG!! I managed to finish the cases I had to do just now, it's still cheap but I managed to finish. Gonna be a different brand here soon though.

Sorry for the first post, I'll try to keep quiet and just throw things out the window from now on. LOL.

**Yellowfin** · November 12th, 2017, 07:14 PM

I concur with the others: their pistol dies are very nice, FCD's and decapping dies essential, and a couple other things are useful. Keep to what a company's good at and you won't be disappointed.