My wife recently got me a Harrell’s BR premium powder measure for my birthday and I must say I’m deeply disappointed in its performance. I’m wondering if anyone here is having good luck with this model from them and if so what powders are you using.
Up until now I’ve been using a Hornady and it has worked great. My powder of choice is RL15 and with a close eye on my form it will throw charges that are very close. Now I’m fully expecting to get a ton of people saying that my form is bad, I’m bumping to much or too little ect… Without going into too much detail I will just say the “form” was about as perfect as could be, the speed of the dump and fill stroke were identical every time.
Nothing seemed to help to increase consistency of the charges. After the dismal outing with my beloved RL15 I wanted to throw it a soft ball so I tried some TAC and BLC2, powders that throw incredibly well in my cheap Hornady. I once again found the Harrell’s had near triple the amount of variation, and this is with the Harrell’s being automated against the Hornady which are still being done by hand.
My gut tells me the design of the Harrell’s chamber does not promote even filling. I feel the undercuts in the chamber profile leave a lot of room for packing/filling anomalies. I’m also finding a substantial problem with powder getting stuck between the chamber dump and the tube. If anyone as looked close you can see where the steel tube is pressed into the aluminum body. At this point there is some very odd geometry, not as seamless as I would like to see. At the end of the day I’m left puzzled on how these measures can be so well liked. I hope I can get my money back. I’m now leaning towards one of the Redding units or possibly the Hornady BR version or just make my own.
I quickly drew up the chamber profile of the Harrell’s vs the Hornady, and yes they are to scale. The red arrows are pointing to the area that troubles me.
This is by no means a knock on Harrell’s. The build quality of there stuff seems very top notch. I love the combo press I have from them. I’m simply trying to grasp how their powder measurers have gained such a following when it would appear the design as got some issues. If there is something I’m missing I’d love to hear it. Is there a model out there that they make that is better than the one I picked up? My pet load being 39.1 grains of RL15 I thought this would be the right choice for me.
My next step will be making a mock chamber that duplicates the geometry of the Harrell’s, only this will have a clear window on one side. I’m curious to see how the powder fills in. If the experiment works I’ll be sure to post pics.
Thanks in advance for any advice/comments you have.
Up until now I’ve been using a Hornady and it has worked great. My powder of choice is RL15 and with a close eye on my form it will throw charges that are very close. Now I’m fully expecting to get a ton of people saying that my form is bad, I’m bumping to much or too little ect… Without going into too much detail I will just say the “form” was about as perfect as could be, the speed of the dump and fill stroke were identical every time.
Nothing seemed to help to increase consistency of the charges. After the dismal outing with my beloved RL15 I wanted to throw it a soft ball so I tried some TAC and BLC2, powders that throw incredibly well in my cheap Hornady. I once again found the Harrell’s had near triple the amount of variation, and this is with the Harrell’s being automated against the Hornady which are still being done by hand.
My gut tells me the design of the Harrell’s chamber does not promote even filling. I feel the undercuts in the chamber profile leave a lot of room for packing/filling anomalies. I’m also finding a substantial problem with powder getting stuck between the chamber dump and the tube. If anyone as looked close you can see where the steel tube is pressed into the aluminum body. At this point there is some very odd geometry, not as seamless as I would like to see. At the end of the day I’m left puzzled on how these measures can be so well liked. I hope I can get my money back. I’m now leaning towards one of the Redding units or possibly the Hornady BR version or just make my own.
I quickly drew up the chamber profile of the Harrell’s vs the Hornady, and yes they are to scale. The red arrows are pointing to the area that troubles me.
This is by no means a knock on Harrell’s. The build quality of there stuff seems very top notch. I love the combo press I have from them. I’m simply trying to grasp how their powder measurers have gained such a following when it would appear the design as got some issues. If there is something I’m missing I’d love to hear it. Is there a model out there that they make that is better than the one I picked up? My pet load being 39.1 grains of RL15 I thought this would be the right choice for me.
My next step will be making a mock chamber that duplicates the geometry of the Harrell’s, only this will have a clear window on one side. I’m curious to see how the powder fills in. If the experiment works I’ll be sure to post pics.
Thanks in advance for any advice/comments you have.
