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New Precision Turret Press from Area 419.

It looks awesome!! It’s great to see companies press forward to create more precise equipment. At $1200 it’s way out of my price range so I’ll stick with my $160 m press. While this press seems to be aimed at very top end reloaders and shooters, competition is always good and maybe other companies are challenged to up there game with new technologies
 
damoncali said:
The thing is - if the shell holder allows the case to float, the tolerances on everything else don't matter. If the shell holder locks the case in place, you had better have everything else *perfect*, or you're going to have a bad time. Threaded dies are a big limit to overcome, unless you design in some way to adjust their position (or modify them to remove the threads). You could have some fun trying to figure out how to make a shell holder with that kind of repeatability - I'm sure it could be done. There are lots of engineering challenges to make something like that work.

Ultimately, I think we'll see this work with floating shell holders like any other press. At that point, you have a press that's functionally equivalent to a standard cheap one, but with some nice features and workmanship. And there's value in that. I buy mitutoyo calipers that cost 10X what I can get at harbor freight, even though they both do the job well enough for my purposes. The mitutoyo's are just that much nicer. It looks like an impressive tool, I just think the "no float" philosophy isn't going to work out.

At the very least, I hope this pushes the other manufacturers to think a bit more about the usability of their presses. Lee does a good job on that (I really wish they'd make a high end line - Lee does solid engineering/design work, they just make everything so cheap.). Not so much for the others.
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;)I use the forester co-axel press and it was desighned to let the die float to match up with the shell holder . If that wasent possible and your brass went ito the die even a fraction off center you have just turned good brass into saleable junk.:p
 
damoncali said:
The thing is - if the shell holder allows the case to float, the tolerances on everything else don't matter. If the shell holder locks the case in place, you had better have everything else *perfect*, or you're going to have a bad time. Threaded dies are a big limit to overcome, unless you design in some way to adjust their position (or modify them to remove the threads). You could have some fun trying to figure out how to make a shell holder with that kind of repeatability - I'm sure it could be done. There are lots of engineering challenges to make something like that work.

Ultimately, I think we'll see this work with floating shell holders like any other press. At that point, you have a press that's functionally equivalent to a standard cheap one, but with some nice features and workmanship. And there's value in that. I buy mitutoyo calipers that cost 10X what I can get at harbor freight, even though they both do the job well enough for my purposes. The mitutoyo's are just that much nicer. It looks like an impressive tool, I just think the "no float" philosophy isn't going to work out.

At the very least, I hope this pushes the other manufacturers to think a bit more about the usability of their presses. Lee does a good job on that (I really wish they'd make a high end line - Lee does solid engineering/design work, they just make everything so cheap.). Not so much for the others.
Click to expand...

We hear this loud and clear, and we agree. That's why the Zero is the start of a project, not the completion of one ;)
 
I so hope that’s the case. Ditch the 7/8 thread and some amazing capabilities become feasible.

How about centerless ground dies in a conical seat. Tighten them down and the have to be concentric because a cone on cone is self centering. Like a Morse taper, right? Can I get a machinist amen?
 
I'll give you an AMEN for the centering , question how do you adjust for shoulder bump or head space. theres going to have to be a thread some where for adjustment.....
 
Hohn said:
There are times when float is appropriate. Other times it really bad idea.

I will illustrate with an example from my professional experience leading a team of engineers in the development of high pressure common rail diesel fuel injection systems. These systems are required to precisely meter fuel to the milligram at pressures up to 2600 bar, while lasting 20,000+ hours. The materials and tolerances are state of the art. We’re talking mass produced parts with internal clearances of a tenth and a half. So managing dimensional variation is within my professional competency.

Float is a double edged sword. It saves you or it kills you. Consider the case of mounting a hydraulic accumulator to a modern Diesel engine. The plumbing to and from it is entirely rigid steel lines of ultra premium specification, as the lines must have an infinite fatigue life while enduring a constant water hammer effect at frequency and pressures that triple the pressures at the deepest point in the ocean. (The marianas trench).

Because the plumbing is so highly stressed, you cannot induce additional stress in the lines by having the accumulator position vary by much. The first instinct is to have a tiny clearance of the mounting bolts in their holes to hold a tight true position error.

But this turns out to be a recipe for failure because you can’t control tightly enough the “stack up” of all the other parts; lines vary in length, and are fastened to parts that vary in true position while secured by brackets and clamps that induce their own true position error and associated assembly stress. You need to allow the position of the accumulator to “float” a bit to normalize the stress from the high variation in the other degrees of freedom in the system.

So you end up mounting your accumulator with large clearances between the mounting bolts and their flange holes so that it can “float.”

But then you face a head-scratcher: the measured stresses in the lines went up instead of down. But some went way up, some went down, some showed no change. Why?

It turns out that simply having float doesn’t solve your stress problem. You have to tighten those bolts last so that all the other degrees of freedom are constrained FIRST. Then the float will average the stresses. But tighten those bolts first and it exacerbates the stress problem it was supposed to help.

So float can help OR it can make things worse depending on the amount of variation elsewhere in the stack up and where the float occurs within it.

But is absolutely true that float is only even possibly beneficial when your other tolerances are insufficient (“sloppy” isn’t quite right, but it sort of is).

So if you can control the other tolerances but don’t and elect to use float instead, it is a cop out. But if you have an otherwise unsolvable problem, float is clever engineering.

As shooters we see this double-edged sword all the time. Arguments about bushing dies causing runout vs curing it by their “float.” Making dies “float” vs locking down via improved ways to mount them.

The biggest weakness in a press is the threads. Holding concentricity in threads is almost impossible. Threads inherently float, but in a way you can’t predict or control. Now, if these were ACME threads like on a lathe, the tolerances could be excellent. But they aren’t.

Fundamentally we are trying to keep a die and a Ram concentric. But the die is threaded, so we can’t. But if we lock the die down tight so it doesn’t move, the error is fixed and repeatable. And having a little float in the shell holder is all you need to allow for this.

This feature of my MEC press was important to me.

The Area 419 press is what happens when machinists turn engineer. Superb tolerances where they don’t matter.

The only tolerances that matter are in the ammo it produces— it remains to be seen if this press will be demonstrably better at all.

I suspect it may underperform.
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You really need to change your name to engineer...we get it.;)
 
Hohn said:
I so hope that’s the case. Ditch the 7/8 thread and some amazing capabilities become feasible.

How about centerless ground dies in a conical seat. Tighten them down and the have to be concentric because a cone on cone is self centering. Like a Morse taper, right? Can I get a machinist amen?
Click to expand...

Check out the way our brakes work - I think you'll get a sense for how much we dislike threads for alignment. You guys are going to be very pleased with out this progresses.
 
This is a badass looking press but I'm not seeing the problem they're trying to fix with a $1200 press. I watched the video and said to myself "I'll buy one of those" until I heard the price. I shoot 1000yd benchrest and am very competitive. I can take a Wilson hand die and an old RCBS JR2 and make flawless ammo.

Edit: I am not bashing this press anymore than he bashed what we are doing now. You can't sit there and tell me what I am doing now is a cop out and expect no criticism.
 
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geo.ulrich said:
I'll give you an AMEN for the centering , question how do you adjust for shoulder bump or head space. theres going to have to be a thread some where for adjustment.....
Click to expand...

You could put threads on the ram, but you'd still need to figure a way of keeping them centered. Same problem, but maybe there's a way to go about it if you flip it and concentrate on the shell holder. I've always had the idea that waht you want is a ball that fits into the primer pocket (say, about 1/4" diameter) to bear on the case head as you push the case upward into the die. You could rig a tight slip fit hole in the ram for a ball bearing, and use threads and a plunger (under the ball) to move the ball up and down for adjustment. That way, there's no threads aligning anything. Not sure if this is making sense, and it sounds complicated as all getout, but that's one way you could think about it.

Probably all unnecessary, but since we're going nuts...
 
I just can wait to see them produce a zero tolerance part on a Haas and repeat it in a production environment. Not going to happen! Especially if they are getting a UMC750. Crazy stupid advertising tactics of calling zero tolerance is BS!

I deal with machining tolerances on a daily bases working in microns. Everything has a tolerance. No such thing as zero tolerance when it comes to manufacturing.

sorry rant over,
From machinist turned Sr. Applications Engineer for a prestigious CNC machine tool distributor.
 
blisle78 said:
I just can wait to see them produce a zero tolerance part on a Haas and repeat it in a production environment. Not going to happen! Especially if they are getting a UMC750. Crazy stupid advertising tactics of calling zero tolerance is BS!

I deal with machining tolerances on a daily bases working in microns. Everything has a tolerance. No such thing as zero tolerance when it comes to manufacturing.

sorry rant over,
From machinist turned Sr. Applications Engineer for a prestigious CNC machine tool distributor.
Click to expand...

Go ahead and check out what we have published on the press - we never say it's zero tolerance or zero friction - we say we are pursuing those things. Zero, in all practical terms, is an impossible goal - meaning it's a perfect goal to chase.

Do you print 0MOA groups? No. You wanna work on getting there? I'd think so.
 
I don't see the point in aiming for tight fits when mixing aluminum, bronze, and steel. The CTEs are too far apart.

Does it move if it's cold?
 
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