The Hornady Stork Visited My House Today.

[Roadking Larry]

Got my Hornady L-N-L AP today!
Ordered it from Midsouth Shooters Supply. Placed my Order Thursday morning Fedex delivered about 3:30pm today (Saturday).

I am impressed with this machine.
It is very well made and seems to be solid as a rock. Fit and finish is very good but about the first thing I did unpacking it was to find a metal sliver where the hand lever screws into the linkage. I managed to drive it about 16 and half inches into my thumb, dang that hurt.
The pile of parts I had when I unpacked it was a little daunting but it is really pretty "common sense" once you RTFM. I think any experienced re-loader would have no problem setting one of these machines up and even a beginner or novice would do OK if they pay attention to the directions and watch the videos
I've got it pretty well set up and ready for fine tuning and some serious production on .45 ACP. I'd have it p and running but Mrs. Roadking guilt tripped me into going to Wal Mart right after it was delivered.

 

[JesseR]

AWESOME!!!! Congratulations, it is a whole new joy! I think I'm gonna go out and load some 223 right now....

 

[dennishoddy]

I love mine! Like you said when you first open that box, its kind of intimidating, but it all comes together pretty quick. The only thing I need is a couple more of the primer pick up tubes. You'll see what I mean soon enough.
My primary load is also the .45 acp that is ran thru it.
When the ten boxes of .45acp bullets you get for free show up,(or whatever caliber you selected) its another great bonus.

 

[Shadowrider]

Awesome! I loaded up a few .45's myself today with a new loading. Tomorrow I go shoot them.

Here's mine:
[Broken External Image]

Now I've got to get the case feeder. With one of those you can knock out a hundred in about 10 minutes. I think it will take about as long to fill the primer tube as to load them. I'm hoping anyway.

Larry, the only lingering "glitch" with mine is the last one or sometimes two primers will hang up on me. I keep a brass dowel rod to drop down the tube to monkey it into position so it will feed. And you might want to put some blue locktight on the big nut on the handle.

Congrats. You're gonna like it.

 

[dennishoddy]

Awesome! I loaded up a few .45's myself today with a new loading. Tomorrow I go shoot them.

Here's mine:
[Broken External Image]


Larry, the only lingering "glitch" with mine is the last one or sometimes two primers will hang up on me. I keep a brass dowel rod to drop down the tube to monkey it into position so it will feed.
Congrats. You're gonna like it.

Great suggestion! I've seen where you can buy a primer alert that shows when your primer tube gets low, but your Idea along with a "witness mark" may do just as well.

 

[Shadowrider]

Great suggestion! I've seen where you can buy a primer alert that shows when your primer tube gets low, but your Idea along with a "witness mark" may do just as well.

Well that was my idea originally to make a poor mans low primer alarm, but the brass rod is too heavy. Maybe a wooden or aluminum dowel but a full stack of primers and the brass rod is just too much weight sitting on top of the primer slide.

I've heard that Dillon's will work and they are only about $30. Might have to try that out.

 

[SDarkRage]

Hmmm... I've never had a primer feed issue with mine. My press also came with a white Teflon rod that sits in the primer feeder tube. I've marked it where empty is. It's designed to drop down after the last primer and catch and hold the primer slide back. That way you know you are out of primers.

 

[Shadowrider]

Hmmm... I've never had a primer feed issue with mine. My press also came with a white Teflon rod that sits in the primer feeder tube. I've marked it where empty is. It's designed to drop down after the last primer and catch and hold the primer slide back. That way you know you are out of primers.

Teflon rod huh? That sounds like it would work. The last primer seems to need just a touch of help to stay anvil side up in mine. All the ones prior to this run thru the feed great. The slide will hang up retracted (in place to pickup primer) almost everytime. I can't see a damn thing wrong with it either. I'll order one of those next week, I've got to get another shell plate spring anyway.

 

[Roadking Larry]

Mine came with the teflon rod also but it hung up on the next to the last one a couple of times.

I ordered 4 extra large pickup tubes and when I set up for soemthing that takes small primers I'll get some more of those.

I've loaded 300 rounds so far, and went down the hill and shot up 50 just to make sure they would work. Gonna have to work on my ergonomics a little, I need a more solid chair, my ancient swivel chair takes too much effort to stay in one place.
On my turret press starting with primed cases I could knock out 100 in just about an hour. So far taking my time I was running 100 in just at 30 minutes starting with cleaned cases. I expect my rate will improve once I get used to the system.

A couple of lessons learned -
I was used to decapping and then using a Lee hand primer tool. That way I was handling each case twice before I charged with powder, gave me a couple of chances to inspect each case. I had a couple of times where the powder cop showed a high charge when I checked it I found some cleaning media had still been in the case. also had a couple of what should have been culls hang me up, I would have caught them before. Gonna have to look a little harder as I set each case in place.
Also need to work on getting a rhythm established, lots going on all at once. Easy to get hung up watching one thing and forget to set a bullet or a case before pulling the lever.

Happy with it!

 

[Hawgman]

I just cut a length of coat hanger to where it sticks above the top of the primer tube a couple inches when empty. Then put a small piece of masking tape like a small flag at the top. When I see the flag lowered close to the top of the primer tube I know it's about empty.