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By Jeff Brown

Snobbery exists in the realm of shooting and handloading as much as anywhere. A good example is the amount of flak that Lee Precision takes from those that would have us believe that Lee handloading gear is next to worthless. Criticism of the materials used for manufacturing moulds, simplicity of die sets and the low cost of Lee items in general abounds yet many of us would not be doing nearly as much shooting and/or loading without the extensive range offered by this company. Indeed I often look at the retail price points of Lee products and wonder how on earth the company can still manufacture on US soil, make a buck and sell for what they do. Case in point; a double cavity rifle mould for less than $30.00! Now straight off I can already hear some of you saying "yeah, but when did anyone win the CBA nationals using bullets from a Lee mould" and I grant you that is a fair question. Answer; (from my limited research) NONE but here is the clincher. The vast majority of cast bullet shooters are not into precision target matches. Most of us shoot non precision disciplines or just for fun or hunting purposes. If a Lyman (Ideal) tong tool was perfectly acceptable for preparing hunting fodder for grandpappy's age old thutty thutty then why is the modern equivalent by Lee any less worthy of the task? Bottom line; it isn't. Which brings my rambling to the point of this blog.

I often share load data from rifles I am shooting and experiments carried out and it is not unusual from powder charges of 'odd' measures to be listed. For example my Lee Enfield No4 MkII target load burns 13.8gr of Alliant 2400 powder. Humans love round numbers. Why 13.8gr and not 14.0 neat or 13.5gr? Simply answer. I used a Lee Autodisc for all my smaller charges (under 20gr) and the 1.09 cavity of the larger disc throws 13.8gr of 2400 powder. Either side of this the disc drops 13.1gr and 14.9gr from 1.02 and 1.18 cavities respectively. As much as my OCB tendancies would prefer my loads to be 13.0, 14.0 and 15.0gr my efficiency driven nature is happier to use the Autodisc as the device running any one of the four disc units supplied is FAST to setup and above all else REPEATABLE without effort. Also available for the measure, as shown below, is an adjustable charge bar with a range of 0.28 - 1.6cc for applications that require a powder charge that may not be available from the 24 cavities in the disc set but I can honestly say mine charge bar seldom sees the light of day.

For those not familiar with the Lee Autodisc it is an automatic powder dispenser that screws into a through charging/neck expanding die. Designed for pistol loading primarily the measure is activated as the cartridge case is run into the expanding/charging die, engages the expander plug and the resulting force of the brass case being pushed onto the plug lifts the powder dispenser activating the cross slide that drops the given charge of powder. The hopper holds 1/2lb of powder and has a shut off allowing for changing of discs while powder is still in the hopper removing the need to decant propellent between charge changes. Worthy of note also is an adaptor kit available that allows stacking of measuring discs allowing for a great range of powder charges to be dispensed.

See the following video from Lee for an overview.

Loading of my .310 Cadet or .32-20 can be achieved as shown but for throwing charges for other cartridges I have to utilise an adapted .303 British case previous run into the case forming die for my .303 Pygmy wildcat cartridge. The long, skinny, untrimmed neck is sufficient to act as a faux .32-20 case fully entering the charging/expending die and activating the dispenser. Of course the powder charge must still be poured into the correct cartridge case in the loading block but this still makes for great utilisation of the Autodisc.

As I have at my disposal a mini lathe I have been able to make up a handful of expander plugs for the Autodisc to suit loading of the aforementioned .310 Cadet and .32-20 cartridges. I bought my Autodisc secondhand and the expander plug that came with it measures .309 found to be far too snug for loading either cartridge so I fabricated a .311 for loading jacketed bullets in the .32-20 (long since ceased; filty habit) and another at .313 suitable for charging the unsized .310 brass or for loading of .314 diameter cast bullets in the .32-20.

Strangely enough I have found the chart supplied with the measure I have does not accurately reflect the actual weight of any given powder charged thrown by the device so to that end I have made up my own chart. This is kind of neither here nor there as far as I am concerned as regardless I know what I am loading. At one end of the spectrum the smallest charge of H4227 is 3.7gr used as a kicker in my duplex black powder .310 Cadet loads and at the other extreme the largest dose of the same powder is 20.6gr. See here for Lee's chart.

Retailing new (as shown on the Lee site at the time of writing) the Autodisc is a USD58.00. Would I buy one again? Without a doubt. It is an accurate, adaptable, sturdy bit of kit that does exactly what it should.