A little info: I have reloaded for years, and for consistency all of my dies are RCBS. But I wonder are their general opinions on who makes the best entry level dies? Or is that more of a ford chevy type debate.

I think they are all good, just a bit different.. I have RCBS, Hornaday, Lee and Redding on my shelf.. If i was going to standardize it would be Redding, Hornaday, RCBS in that order.. Lee makes some crimp and specialty dies I find very useful FWIW...

I like the Lee dies simply for the crimping die. The dies I have that are not Lee I am in the process of ordering the Lee crimp die for that caliber...d2

I have lee, rcbs, and forester. They all work and make very accurat ammo. I like the forester, lee, then rcbs in that order. Had problens with my 260 rcbs . But i have more rcbs than all the others. But thats due to what my local shop keeps. Also the reason I ordered forester to try.

Lee dies work , work well and do it for less money , if your already stretching your budget to get started , there is nothing wrong with Lee

I have all Lee and they make ammo that works well.

Most of my dies are lee, and they work great

I have used Lee, RCBS, and others. They all work.

I almost exclusively use Redding dies, they have given me the best results time after time!

Lately I've been buying Hornady dies for my rifle cartridges because you can buy one micrometer adjust seating stem and it fits all their rifle dies. Micrometer adjust stems can be had for all of the major die mfgs seating dies but it's one stem for each die as far as I have seen.

I agree with Larry Hall for I have taken the same route.
Roy

I've been buying Lee collet dies to reload for hunting, Redding for target shooting.

Redding is the best mid level IMO. I don’t trust RCBS (dies) due to some severe runout issues with seaters. Had a rifle go from 1.5” to .5 just changing dies. Forester Bonanza Benchrest are worth the money , and my favorite if available for the cartridge I’m working with. The only thing that I crimp are shotgun shells and hard kicking pistol ammunition.

I like the lee dies for their crimping dies. It makes it alot easier for me to crimp the rounds after getting them to the depth I like. Have used hornady and rcbs dies. Takes some dialing in before I get the bullets seated to the depth I need.

Fairly new to reloading myself, having loaded my first rifle in 50 years back in April. Since then have loaded a few hundred rounds using Hornady, RCBS and Lee dies. In category of "Best Entry LeveL".....Lee wins that one hands down.

Lee sizing die also has decapping pin......which is a singe piece mandrel....including pin and a solid neck sizing mandrel. That mandrel is held in place by friction from a collet nut. If primer won't come out, pin doesn't break, it slides up out of the top. Also doubles as an extractor for removing stuck cases.....loosen nut and tap on end of that mandrel to drive case out bottom of the die. As for sizing, Lee dies are made to just barely get cases back to SAMMI specs......no more. A 270 Win I am loading for must have a tight chamber.....when I size fire formed cases, I only get 0.003 shoulder bump when setting up die as per instructions. A near perfect outcome.

Bullet seating die always seats to within 0.005.....and I suspect all that variation is from variation in the bullets more than the dies.

And as per Mr. Lee, purpose of factory crimp die is to hold bullets in place.....keep them from moving, until adequate and consistent start pressure is reached......which means you do not have to be loading to the lands. I'm loading to about 0.010 over COAL listed in load data....basically factory depth.

I recently reported here on some 270 Win loads.........printed 4 rounds on the target........3/4" MOA with 3 of 4 holes touching. Loaded with Lee dies.

Hornady and RCBS dies both 2 die sets, with typical taper crimp option built into seating die. Hornady dies came in clear plastic clam shell package (no case). Brief instructions printed on card packed inside. Also came with a spare extractor pin, which I view as both good that they sent a spare......and bad as they must have felt some compelling need to include a spare. But again, no hard case. I had to find one. Both Hornady and RCBS dies loaded good ammo.

Lee 3 die set sells for around $35, which is $10 less than I paid for either the Horny or RCBS. For that, you get the case, 3 die set, small sample of Lee case lube, appropriate sized Lee powder dipper and a complete set of instructions, with extensive load data for the caliber of the die set.

I have an ingrained bias against cheap crap. My first impression of all things Lee was that it had to be crap.....cause it was the cheapest stuff out there. Turns out this is one of the very few cases I have ever encountered where the least expensive option also happens to be one of the best.

lee also has a good manual that explains how to properly use Lee dies , and the what and why.


Doesn't hurt that Lee Dies are made here in Wisconsin

Hayday said

I also see some variation in seating depth, typically .002 or less. It doesn't seem to matter whether it is a RCBS or a Hornady seating die. Hayday may be correct but my impression is that the variation comes from play in the ram pivot because when a load is a bit long a second run through the die with a bit more force results in a shorter load. That would make both press mfg tolerances and user technique a factor in seating depth accuracy. I'm curious what others think.

Have a mix of RCBS, Hornady and Lee dies. RCBS presses plus a Lee for decapping. Don't care for Lee powder measure but other than that I like their stuff.

On my Lee press, with Lee dies, running them through again does nothing. Say supposed to be 25......I get 30. Have run them twice...three times.....rotate and nothing changes...still 30. Next one back to 25.

Also may make a difference in press style. Lee press does not cam over......it has a stop in the linkage. Assuming you have setup the die as per instructions, when it hits bottom.....ram is pressed against die and that is as far as it goes. A press that cams over may be different.

I run a Redding Big Boss 2. It has a large roll pin at the base that acts as a stop when raising the ram. It's stout but it still flexes based on how much force I apply to the lever... If I pay careful attention to how much force I apply when seating (and sizing) I will cut my variation down to less than +/- .001 But I will get the occasional outlier that's out by .005-.006... and that is usually a variance in the bullet itself.

How hard I mash on that lever each time plays a part in how much variance I get... But I do occasionally get a weird bullet.

Just my own experience and observation.

Mike

Mike, that matches my experience. If a load is a little off (long) I can rerun it with a bit more force and have it come out a bit shorter, but there are occasional odd balls that I can't do anything about.

Hayday, I don't set my ram to stop on the bottom of the seating die because I don't want any crimp. The RCBS, Redding, and Hornady dies (and maybe others) will crimp the case mouth if the case extends that far into the seating die.