My wife and I were on a trip and we stopped at a local sporting goods shop and they had a TON of reloading supplies including a press by Area 419 called the Zero reloading press shown below. The press is an absolute beast! I messed with it a little bit and it was solid as a rock and nothing moved, giggled or wiggled that all. I didn't see a price tag on it in the store, but on their web site it is around $1,200 for the press alone. Anyone here own one? Curious as to what the forum thinks.

Seems to be a great press, well made, solid. It would be a way to have a better one than most you talk to. I doubt many here own one.

I’d have to compare it to the turret presses offered by Redding & Lyman, less than 1/3 the cost, lower yet for Lyman.

They advertise more precise reloading, less ‘runout’. Is the prospective buyer a casual hunter, shooter, & plinker? If so, I don’t see a clear benefit. I think any accessories you want cost upper end too, compared to other turret type presses.

I’d have nothing against it if someone wants to dive in deeply. I think most Redding stuff is made in the USA, that would cover me.

This would be great for reloaders with limited space!

It’s so pretty you can tell your wife it’s an art object and just leave it set up in the living room…

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Originally posted by sourdough44:
Is the prospective buyer a casual hunter, shooter, & plinker?

Right now my son (13) and I enjoy seeing how far we can ring steel with .22LR, but I do have a 5.56 NM and do enjoy precision rifle shooting. However, I do have a need for something to produce some handgun calibers in bulk too such as 9mm. Dillon is kind of a no brainer when it comes to a Progressive press when wanting to crank out volumes of ammo. I do own a few older RCBS single stage presses and while I can't measure it, I can feel there is some slop in there. To quote 419's web site "When indexing the turret, repeatability variance of the system will be less than 0.0005″." Not saying this press is for everyone, but it does appear very well made. Would I buy it over say a Dillon XL750, that's a tough call. If my sole purpose was precision shooting with a few calibers, then yes I would. However, doing a mixed bag of stuff and none of it really serious or competative. The progressive reloader would be hard to turn down or just stick with a really solid single stage like a Forester Co-axial press.

It's a cool looking chunk of metal, and if I were doing accuracy ladders for some long range stuff, or doing a lot of experimental work where the details really mattered, it looks like a good choice (especially if doing multiple types of cartridges.

I've found that on typical single stage presses, I still get variations in length with a seated bullet, as well as the way a case is flared, etc.

So long as it feeds and functions and stays within an acceptable range of velocity and accuracy, I'm happy, as I'm more interested in loading a lot of ammo, than making every cartridge perfectly identical. The Dillon works for that.

The 419 wouold be great for precise, small-batch work, and ladders. If I were reaching out to 1,000 yards and that's where I lived, then definitely.

quote:

Originally posted by sourdough44:
Seems to be a great press, well made, solid. It would be a way to have a better one than most you talk to. I doubt many here own one.

I’d have to compare it to the turret presses offered by Redding & Lyman, less than 1/3 the cost, lower yet for Lyman.

They advertise more precise reloading, less ‘runout’. Is the prospective buyer a casual hunter, shooter, & plinker? If so, I don’t see a clear benefit. I think any accessories you want cost upper end too, compared to other turret type presses.

I’d have nothing against it if someone wants to dive in deeply. I think most Redding stuff is made in the USA, that would cover me.

I managed to find a Lyman Crusher II in the back of a reloading shop when I was out for training in GA back in March. Significant improvement compared to my Lee single stage. I load for target shooting at longer ranges, and this will more than suffice for my needs, at least at my current skill level.

The Zero is marketed toward the precision rifle (LR and ELR) crowd. They're nice, but honestly for the casual shooter/hunter I'd say it's money that'd be better spent on other tools and supplies.

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Originally posted by vulrath:

quote:

Originally posted by sourdough44:
Seems to be a great press, well made, solid. It would be a way to have a better one than most you talk to. I doubt many here own one.

I’d have to compare it to the turret presses offered by Redding & Lyman, less than 1/3 the cost, lower yet for Lyman.

They advertise more precise reloading, less ‘runout’. Is the prospective buyer a casual hunter, shooter, & plinker? If so, I don’t see a clear benefit. I think any accessories you want cost upper end too, compared to other turret type presses.

I’d have nothing against it if someone wants to dive in deeply. I think most Redding stuff is made in the USA, that would cover me.

I managed to find a Lyman Crusher II in the back of a reloading shop when I was out for training in GA back in March. Significant improvement compared to my Lee single stage. I load for target shooting at longer ranges, and this will more than suffice for my needs, at least at my current skill level.

The Zero is marketed toward the precision rifle (LR and ELR) crowd. They're nice, but honestly for the casual shooter/hunter I'd say it's money that'd be better spent on other tools and supplies.

You're absolutely right. It's a press made for a very small segment of the shooting fraternity.

I really like that design. I may have to add that to my wish list. I'll be keeping an eye on them. I'd like to see what they come up with for mounting dies in the turret.

It's a great press. It is far more effective to use each die for an entire loading tray as compared to run one round through all the stages before moving on. Unlike other turret presses, you can lock it down solid at each position.

I would wonder how much more accurate it is than what I have come to believe was the "gold standard" of precision presses, the Forester Co-axial press.

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Originally posted by armored:
I would wonder how much more accurate it is than what I have come to believe was the "gold standard" of precision presses, the Forester Co-axial press.

Maybe if you're shooting 1000 yards + you could see the difference but I doubt you could shooting closer.

I dare say you can see the difference at 100 or 200 yards. Now it's not for everyone. By the time you're all in, its going to be $2000 with the spare turret, stand, funnels, etc. Then a V4 auto trickler, and a good primer and you're easily over $3000 without buying a single die. If you want to talk about 1000 yds, you have an annealer, autodad neck turner, etc. I don't shoot 1000 yds. The forster is great - but - you setup the dies at each change and there is always variation in your setup. The Dillion for high volumes. For hunting, defense, the Zero press every day, for me.

quote:

Originally posted by Challer:
I dare say you can see the difference at 100 or 200 yards. Now it's not for everyone. By the time you're all in, its going to be $2000 with the spare turret, stand, funnels, etc. Then a V4 auto trickler, and a good primer and you're easily over $3000 without buying a single die. If you want to talk about 1000 yds, you have an annealer, autodad neck turner, etc. I don't shoot 1000 yds. The forster is great - but - you setup the dies at each change and there is always variation in your setup. The Dillion for high volumes. For hunting, defense, the Zero press every day, for me.

Really? And how much smaller 5 shot groups do you think you can see at 100 yards strictly as the result of a change in presses?

The concentricity of the case won't be affected by the press, only by the dies, and the same applies to the concentricity of the case mouth, so about the only thing that could be would be the seating of the round to where there is little to no runout. That's doable now to around 0.001~0.002 with existing presses and dies.

Curiosity overwhelms me as the world record for 1,000 yards was held by a man who reloaded his rounds with a Lee Loader ($10.00 each) for many years.

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Originally posted by armored:
I would wonder how much more accurate it is than what I have come to believe was the "gold standard" of precision presses, the Forester Co-axial press.

Several years ago I was curious about the Co-ax press. Processed 6.5x47 Lapua brass on a friends Co-ax, full length sized, seated bullets. Could not shoot the difference between those rounds and rounds loaded on my Redding Big Boss II press at 1040yds. I now FL size my long range rilfe brass on a Dillon 650/case feeder. Can't shoot the difference between the Dillon sized brass and the Redding sized brass.

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Originally posted by offgrid:

quote:

Originally posted by armored:
I would wonder how much more accurate it is than what I have come to believe was the "gold standard" of precision presses, the Forester Co-axial press.

Several years ago I was curious about the Co-ax press. Processed 6.5x47 Lapua brass on a friends Co-ax, full length sized, seated bullets. Could not shoot the difference between those rounds and rounds loaded on my Redding Big Boss II press at 1040yds. I now FL size my long range rilfe brass on a Dillon 650/case feeder. Can't shoot the difference between the Dillon sized brass and the Redding sized brass.

Absolutely. Press makes very little difference. Dies do make a huge difference.

I have a Redding T7 and a Rock Chukker, if there is a problem it's usually on the other end of the handle