German Jim

I use a LEE turret press that I've had since the mid 1990's. I don't load thousands of rounds a month but probably thousands of rounds every quarter () and only have used 2 maybe 3 of those indexing squares. I never seem to have a problem with them wearing out. Guess I'm lucky.

Different brands of Black Powder with the same granulation (something like FFg) and the same volume will weigh differently. I had that problem when I switched from Schuetzen to GOEX. I tried weighing samples of the two powders so that they were equal in weight, When I put them in the casing (.38-40), the GOEX didn't quite fill up the casing as much as the Schuetzen did. Had to add a tad more GOEX. Not much, but just a bit. At least that was my experience.

Looks good but that Hornady stuff seems kind of expensive.

EXACTLY!! Maybe I'm missing something, but I've always wondered why no one (at least I don't think so) has ever made a brass adjustable powder measure (like the ones used to measure "grains by volume") for Black Powder that just measured volume (C.C.s) period. End of sentence.

I use a french fry basket (from Amazon) that I attached to a cut-off metal broom handle. Stuffed the basket handle into the end of the broom handle.

I use a 250gr bullet and whatever 2F BP I have on hand. (currently Schuetzen). Fill case with powder to allow for a LITTLE compression and then top off with the bullet. Crimp and your ready to go.

I use a separator (picture below) that looks very much like this. I use the same formula that you do. My tumbler is a Rebel 17. After washing, I dump out most of the water and pour everything form the tumbler into the separator. I kind of rinse off the brass and put them on a cookie sheet and lay out in the sun to dry (if it's sunny). Place an old glass microwave tray on top to act as sort of a magnifying glass. Dries the brass even in low sun light. No sun or not enough sunlight? place in oven at about 220 for about 20 minutes. The pins, I dump into an 8" strainer mounted on top of a plastic bucket and set it in the sun . I may pour some clean water over the pins to kind of wash and clean them up. Sound tedious? Maybe, but it works for me. Tried brass juice. works OK. Tried one of those dehydrators. Took too long. Stick with the sun or your oven.