Covid hit the family, and knocked the snot out of me. I was down for the better part of a week, and I’m just starting to feel like myself. Yesterday was the first day I had to actually use the Hornady Auto Charge to load rifle rounds. The results were mixed, but generally positive.

This is  an update on my review of the Hornady AutoCharge from a short time ago:

Hornady Auto Charge

I did 25 rounds of my sons’ 30-06 deer loads. The first 5 took quite some time to do. Most of that was my unfamiliarity with the unit. A strong contributing factor is that the controls are a bit arcane. Hornady could have done a better job of making them more intuitive. However, once I got them learned and I got the machine properly adjusted, I got the next 20 rounds loaded with one OverCharge.

I’m using a stick powder, H4895. Trickling is tricky, because the sticks are long and heavy. You can be just at the threshold and a few sticks fall out of the trickler and blow it. I face this all the time with my hand trickler. The Hornady Auto Charge had the means to adjust for that. I had to:

1.  Set the dispensing speed to SLOW

2.  Set the threshold that the unit changes over from dispensing to trickling to .6 grains. It defaults to .2 grains.

3.  Set the trickling speed to 1.5. This is nearly the lowest setting.

The manual does a good job of explaining everything, but it takes a while to get it dialed in.  Some settings can be locked in.  Others have to be  reset after powering off.

So how did it do overall?

1.  It is more accurate than my RCBS Uni-Flow Powder Measure.
2.  I checked a few weights on my RCBS balance and they were dead-nuts on.
3.  The settings I used to minimize OverCharge made the unit considerably slower, but the overall time spent was about equal to my old method of throwing a charge and then trickling it up.
4. For the overall project 150 rounds of 30-06, it will be more accurate and easier, but about a wash on speed.

Was the purchase worth the money?  I think so.   I’m still positive on the unit.

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