Collet Bullet Pullers

[HMFIC]

Anyone have any experience with the different brands of collet pullers?

I've always just used a kinetic puller with .30 caliber stuff and never really had a need for anything else. But evidently with smaller weight bullets like .223 they don't have enough weight to really work right.

So... I've done some research and narrowed it down to either the RCBS or the Hornady. Both have great reviews and work the way I'd like them to it seems. I'm wondering which one is going to leave the least amount (preferably none) of pull marks. The RCBS uses a screw method to tighten the collet and the Hornady uses a cam-over pull method.

Reviewers have said that both work better than the other depending on which one you read. I'm leaning towards the Hornady but one guy who had several different types said that RCBS was better at not leaving marks. He thought the RCBS and Hornady were tops of the list too.

So... what say you? Anyone have either of them (or both) ?

 

[Hoov]

I use the RCBS and am happy with them.

 

[HMFIC]

I use the RCBS and am happy with them.

Thanks!

Ever get any marks on the bullets at all?
Ever pull .223?
Any pointers, or gotchas I need to look out for?

 

[dennishoddy]

I use the RCBS as well. I've never left a mark on any bullets.
I have not pulled any .223, although I have a collet for them. I have some range pickup that I need to pull bullets on, so I'll give it a test, and report back later tonight. I'll be prepping some .223 brass anyway.

 

[HMFIC]

I use the RCBS as well. I've never left a mark on any bullets.
I have not pulled any .223, although I have a collet for them. I have some range pickup that I need to pull bullets on, so I'll give it a test, and report back later tonight. I'll be prepping some .223 brass anyway.

Cool! Thanks Dennis!

Can you desribe how the screw lever works? Do you just give it a little pressure gauged by feel? Is there an opportunity to overtighten or does the collet prohibit that? If you wouldn't mind, really crank down on one and see if the results are any different?

 

[tyromeo55]

MY FIL has the RCBS And I have the Hornady. Both are fine units and shouldn't leave pull marks as long as they are used properly. I ended up with the Hornady for a couple reasons. when tightening the lever on the RCBS it might be indexed a way that you might not want it to be to get it to catch (handle ends up in the back ) also on the Hornady, after it is set the same pressure is applied to the projo every time you flip the handle. Your welcome to borrow mine for the weekend if you want to try it out

 

[alank2]

Hi,

I use the Hornady and it is nice and fast once you get it adjusted. I can always find marks if I look hard enough, if you can pull them without leaving even a small mark I have to wonder if you had enough case tension in the first place. But then again, I suppose you could be pulling bullets that aren't crimped. I had some 44mag bullets one time that were so tightly crimped than I couldn't pull them no matter what I tried.

Good luck,

Alan

 

[dennishoddy]

Cool! Thanks Dennis!

Can you desribe how the screw lever works? Do you just give it a little pressure gauged by feel? Is there an opportunity to overtighten or does the collet prohibit that? If you wouldn't mind, really crank down on one and see if the results are any different?

Your correct, you apply it by feel. I pulled three with no marks as usual. It doesn't take a long learning curve.
I cranked one down as hard as I was comfortable with, and again, it left no marks. As it was steel cased wolf stuff, the crimp left by the original load actually compressed the bullet. It came out easily, but I have second thoughts about reloading those bullets with the crimp that I would apply might not seat well.(I use a light roll crimp)
Using quality Brown and Sharpe digital calipers, the bullet size above the crimp is .2225, below is the same. The crimped area was .2185. Might make a plinking round?

The only time I ever left a mark on a bullet was some old european .45ACP that was tossed at the range because of a FTF. I tried to pull the bullets, but it didn't happen. They were seated too deep, and the die couldn't get a good grip on it. It left a small ring on the bullet as it couldn't get the entire pofile into the collet. It wouldn't have made any difference what brand was used.

I've never used the Hornady, so I offer no judgment. The fact that it uses a lever to set the same pressure each time, might be a time saver. But I'm so far into mine with all of the collets, I won't change.

As far as the RCBS not indexing in a good position, its pretty easy to adjust the body of the puller up or down to make it convient.

 

[HMFIC]

Cool thanks very much for all of the information and thanks Dennis too for indulging me on that test, that's a biggie that you can't really overpressure it and what I would expect with a quality collet.

It sounds like they are both comparable.

tyromeo, I might just take you up on that offer to try out the Hornady and see how I like it. I know they sell it over at Bass Pro so I might just go get one anyway, I'll have to think about it and check on their return policy just in case. I'm not sure that they sell the RCBS one anywhere in town.

 

[Blitzfike]

I have two different collet bullet pullers, one is RCBS and the other is a much older unit by Lyman or Lachmiller, I can't remember which one made it, the only difference in them is that the collet length is quite a bit different, one is almost twice as long as the other. I have collets for 223, 308, 270, 357, and 44 cal. I made a collet puller for the 50BMG based on the design of the rcbs unit scaled up appropriately and it works well also and doesn't leave marks. If I'm pulling more than one or two bullets, I use the collet puller. I have never used the Hornady unit and it sounds like a better system if you can repeat the torque on the settings. You can tighten the screw type collet puller enough to damage bullets if you aren't careful, but it didn't take long for me to learn to feel the correct amount of torque to apply to get it to pull bullets without leaving marks. Hope this helps.. Blitzfike