Ordered an RCBS chargemaster lite powder dispenser.

Modern Muzzleloading Forum

Help Support Modern Muzzleloading Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

redear

Well-Known Member
*
Joined
Nov 8, 2016
Messages
464
Reaction score
322
Well I had been wondering if I really needed an electronic powder dispenser and finally talked myself into it today. My Imr 4198 charges are a little tough with Dad's old redding manual dispenser and I wasn't satisfied with how much effort it took me to get an acceptable charge. I was dumping many charges back. Yes I have a trickler but my hands are very bad due to a nerve disease and are not steady. I watched some videos on the rcbs lite dispenser and it looked like a well spent 248 bucks or so with tax and shipping.
 
natchez has them for about 220.00 plus shipping of about 17 bucks and tax.
 
I had one for a few years, unfortunately it quit working and I haven’t decided whether to replace it or not. They aren’t terribly fast and depending on how you define “acceptable”, you’ll still be dumping charges.
A good manual dispenser set to throw a slight undercharge and a powder trickler are pretty tough to beat.
 
I still use my RCBS manual thrower and a Redding trickler. I have noticed that my thrower is always within .2gr and that small amount is insignificant in my sml's. I took my thrower apart and deburred the sharp edges that contact the powder, which I thought would help it to not stick on kernels of powder, it did not but my measures near right on every time. I check every 10th one I throw on the scale.
 
I think my powder was a big problem with the manual tower. I'll report on how this works out with the rcbs lite electonic unit.
 
You guys probably will wonder why old Encore hasn't upgraded, even laugh, but the only thing I throw in the manual any more is BH209.
All my SML charges are done entirely by hand. I still fill a 35mm film container and rotate the powder out of it into the pan on the balance scale.
I guess I've learned to be "fast enough" with the process and remain safe. I find the time fun and much better time spent than watching re-runs on TV. ;)
 
If i were shooting a Smokeless ML i would be Weighing my Charges on my RCBS 10/10 Beam Scale ONLY, I personally wouldn’t Trust my Digital Scale With Smokeless Powder, Even Though my Little Digital has worked AWESOME for Several Years. Fact is, it’s Digital, and Electronic Stuff can All of a Sudden Fail. With Smokeless you don’t have much, if any Wiggle Room for Error
 
My charges also go into the blackhorn charge tubes with the marks on them, I always look at that too. I have another little digital scale on my bench thats has been getting used with every charge for double check also.
 
I use a RCBS ChargeMaster 1500 Combo. When the powder gets put in tubes its pretty easy to tell if a load got boogered. Its not like we are using Red Dot where a grain is going to make a big difference. Fastest powder we use at all is around 60 on the charts and over 30gr. 5744 for example has been "scooped" for years. Obviously there is going to be +/- a grain or so scooping powder. Ive never had my ChargeMaster throw off by a grain over.

If you are that unsure just get a piece of brass that will only hold the load you are weighing. Drop it in the "volumetric case" first. Something like a 7mm Mag case cut down to fit your load.
 
the rcbs CM lite came today, it is very light and small and will fit on my desk well. Haven't tried it yet. I watched several videos of guys that had more expensive units also and were making a comparison with the cheaper lite model and they all said it gave up nothing to the more expensive units except maybe the ability to program a bunch of different charges. now the units that measure to .01 grain thats a different class of scale and you will pay through the nose for that type of machine. As a hunter I only need a plus/minus tenth grain capability.
 
I just got done weighing out 10 charge tubes of imr 4198 at 56 gr, on the rcbs lite unit and that thing is awsome. It was dead accurate each time, I verified each charge with another scale and it trickled to the exact setting each time. perfect for what I do.
 
I didn't have to dump back a single charge. the lite model has a different feature inside the tube where the powder comes out, there are lengthwise grooves in side that tube and apparently it controls the trickle better than the old design. It gives a digital readout when the machine is on, thats not evident in most of the pics I have seen, nicely backlit visuals too. I emptied the machine out its side port but I picked the machine up forgetting that there was powder in the drop tube and I made a little mess, I should have run that in the pan, lol.
 
I don't think you could tell anything about the rifling with the barrel dirty like that. Clean it up real good and take another look at it. I tried to contact midway about a product that was in the mail for 18 days and they never answered me back. It's a possibility there is nothing wrong with the bore except being dirty makes it appear the rifling is deeper on one side. being dirty in certain places can make it look like that. If it was me I would clean all the stuff in the barrel out until it's shiny so I could better see the rifling and if it still looks like the rifling is boogered up I would call CVA which is in Georgia now under BPI. I couldnt get a hold of midway either so that seems not possible right now with their limited staff. I wasnt happy about not being able to talk to midway either, it's all about the pandemic right now.
 
I highly recommend this rcbs lite powder dispenser, it is a joy to use, I just ran some more charges and everything was perfect. They changed the inside of the drop tube and put legthwise grooves in there and that was supposed to control the trickle better, and it seems like it does just that.
 
I emptied the machine out its side port but I picked the machine up forgetting that there was powder in the drop tube and I made a little mess, I should have run that in the pan, lol.

It makes an even bigger mess when you forget to shut the side port after emptying and loading another powder into the hopper. Not admitting to doing so, just sayin'........:bump:
 
For me measuring 25 loads or less of SML I'm very old school . I use a lee plastic dipper. Dip out of a small coffee cup of propellant then into the pan of my beam scale, then into a funnel in what ever tube or cartridge. The dipper of choice is always on the high side so I can finish with a trickle. After doing it enough times one can get fairly fast at it.
If reloading shotgun shells I use my old manual RCBS.
If reloading a large quantity of center fire the electronic RCBS scale does a very accurate job for me with very good load wht. accuracy.
I don't know if Lee still makes the dipper sets . The set I have has 15 different measurers.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top