I go through a motor about every 20-25,000 rounds. The brushes go out before the motor. They are an easy fix.

Keep a sharp trimmer blade in there to ease the load on the trimmer.

Avoid trimming nickel and steel cases... The nickel dulls the blade in a hurry and steel, well you can guess.

Hoser

I wondered if you can help me with a problem I am having forming 300 whisper brass with the CH4D trim die. The problem is that my brass "chips" are not curls or chips, rather they are long strings of brass which quickly bind around the shaft of the trimmer.

The method I use to get actual chips to form is to give a very high feed rate so that curling is induced and the brass breaks into chips. I'm nervous about this. I would rather go slower than faster.

Can you tell me more about your feed rate or method to produce the proper chips?

Finally, can you elaborate on the issues that result in a burnt out motor and give me some pointers on how to avoid burning mine out?

Thank you very much for your attention to my questions.

jonblack

I use a vacuum dedicated to the trimmer to start, everything wound up without it. I also find that I feed it in there pretty fast. I don't really like it either. I find that I need to pretty much rely on Dillon's warranty to cover the trimmer. I have done a couple thousand 300 Whisper cases and have no real issues yet.

Obviously not hoser. But I am producing 40-50k pieces a week, every week. No idea how much he is producing. I should be in the top three if not the top for production though.

Doesn't matter what you do, the trimmer will go. Have yet to have one make it past 40k pieces. At any given point I have 11 in rotation with 3 super 1050's. Do the math on that. Expensive.

Dillon has been good about taking care of them if they are under warranty. And after having gone through 20 trimmers or more I can tell you a few things.

1. Not all trimmers are the same. Some just suck.
2. The older out of warranty trimmers seem to last longer than the new ones still under the 1 year warranty. Only difference I can tell is the bearing assemblies.
3. Have yet to have brushes go before the trimmer itself. Failure is always in the front bushing or induced by it. Usually bushing goes and causes motor to slow down noticeably. Or bushing goes locking up motor and burning up armature. Upon diss-assembly the bearings and lube are just burnt up. Most of the time I find zero brass has made it inside the assembly. Seems they can't take the heat generated for excessive periods of time. Yes, the front bearing pack would be exposed to more heat than the rearmost due to its proximity to the friction source.
4. My motors have all lasted longer than the number stated by hoser above. By a decent bit. Except for the ones who failed at some point under 5k. Had one motor make it less than 100x. Only way to get this experience is to buy a pile of new motors and see for yourself.

I see guys selling brass dirt cheap (~$100/k). Those guys haven't made enough to burn up a trimmer yet. Makes me laugh a little. Can't wait to see how long they continue selling at those prices after they eat the cost of a trimmer or two, and have to overhaul their press a few times. As was mentioned, the dillon cutters are expensive and have to be amortized in.

There are obviously some tricks to keep the trimmer from getting wound up with shavings. There seem to be ideal throughput numbers and corresponding CFM ratings needed for the vacuum. And my three machines seem to agree with the numbers I've got. Not much value unless you have the appropriate hardware to verify such things with though.

BatchelorJack

Thank you for taking the time to respond. It seems like you have a great deal of experience. Honestly, I hope to never trim that many pieces of brass. I simply enjoy tinkering with my trimmer on occasion.

One thought I have when I read about you guys burning up motors is: why don't you design your own trimmer or redesign the Dillon trimmer to take a readily available replacement motor? I am thinking back, and I seem to remember finding the source of the motor that Dillon uses, but I don't remember the price. However, if you are being covered under Dillon's warranty, I guess it gives less motivation to reinvent the wheel.

I haven't really used mine enough to determine the major "do's and don'ts." I am just trying to get an idea of a good starting point.

The last time I used my trimmer I used a small shop vac. I have a much larger one that I will use to see if I get better results.

One final thought:

You saidAre you buying cutters from Dillon rather than a supply house? Or did you mean "trimmers" when you said "cutters?"

Thanks again for taking the time to share your experience
jonblack

Nice work, and a good idea/solution on the 550. Do I understand your post above to mean that you sell modified toolheads?

You might find a few customers in this thread with those pics!

Feeding the case in faster is exactly what I do. It is maybe about a one count to form/trim.

After a while the bearings in the trimmers go due to the high load put on them when trimming all that brass. Just the way it is.

If you use too much lube or cases that have been resized, the case can spin in the die. Eventually the cutter grabs the case and starts tearing off brass. Big chunks can jam up the cutter causing the motor to self destruct and have a melt-down.

Lastly, get a strong shop vac. Keep an eye on how much noise you hear the shop vac making, it will tell you if it is having an issue.

Hoser

Thanks for your reply. I appreciate that.

I guess you have to have the high feed rate to induce curls so that chips are made. I read a little about machining (turning) copper and brass and learning that the feed rate must be sufficient to create chips. I guess that holds true with any alloy.

One thing I have been doing (which may be my problem) is that I have been sizing the cases prior to forming. I think I use a Lee .223 die. I use Dillon spray lube. I am probably being generous with the spray lube.

As stated before, I used a small shop vac, but I do have a much larger one that I will use the next time I form 300 brass.

Makes sense about the bearings.

I remember a while back a guy had a RT-1200 on eBay for sale. It had a sticker on the motor that indicated the manufacturer. I got him to send me a photo of it. I will have to dig it up and share. I thought I did a little research on the source of the motor, but I have slept since then. Maybe for the benefit of the group I will look into a source again.

Any other tips you think of that would be helpful?

jonblack