Hornady's High Speed 3‑in‑1 Power Case Trimmer Rules!

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Historically, case trimming is tedious and slow to accomplish because it requires a lot of fiddling. Hornady’s new 3-in-1 powered case trimmer alleviates that. Rated to trim, chamfer and deburr up to 25 cases per minute—accomplishing these tasks all in one step—it enables you to process a few hundred cases in a half hour or less. That is a big deal.

The High Speed 3-in-1 powered trimmer accepts cases from 1.450 inches up to 3.5 inches long, and up through .30 caliber. The unit is easy to install. Position the trimmer appropriately on the edge of your bench. Mark and drill two half-inch holes in your bench and secure the trimmer with machine bolts (not included). Plug it in, and you’re ready to go.

The High Speed 3-in-1 trimmer has a superbly ergonomic case interchanging setup. No more fiddling, clamping, levering or otherwise wrestling with case after case.

With a twist of the wrist Hornady’s new trimmer unlocks and drops the trimmed, chamfered and deburred case into the included bin. Insert the base of another case into the collet, twist the big knurled handle a quarter-turn or so to secure the case, and you’re back to trimming again.

Carbide Cutters

Each High Speed 3-in-1 trimmer comes with dual carbide cutters. During initial setup, choose the correct pilot; .22, 6mm, 6.5mm and .30 caliber are included. Insert the pilot into the cutter body and tighten the set screw to secure it. I found it’s easiest to remove the cutter body to do this; just loosen the set screw that holds it on the drive shaft and pull it off.

Next, one at a time loosen the set screws that hold the carbide cutters on each side of the pilot, snug the cutter against the base of the pilot, and retighten the set screw.

One cutter has a tiny needle-like blade that slices a low-drag chamfer into the inside edge of the case mouth. The other has a deburring angle that burnishes the outside edge of the case mouth. Both have razor-sharp 90-degree bevels that trim the case to length.

Hornady’s tolerances are such that there’s no need to make adjustments. Simply snug the cutters up firmly against the shaft of the pilot, tighten the set screws, and go to work. Your cases’ mouths will be trimmed perfectly square, and they will come out with a modest low-drag chamfer and a barely-there deburr on the outside.

Set Up

Once the correct pilot is installed and the cutters secured, install the clear safety screen made of high-impact plastic. Don’t skip this step, as the screen is important for chip management—deflecting the chips down into the catch tray. Slide said catch tray for shavings into place, and you’re ready to set and fine-tune trim length.

First, make sure the correct case collet is installed. There are two, each with a series of steps that allow it to fit several different case-head sizes. Between them they’ll handle most of the popular cartridges on the market and a bunch of obscure ones. Collet A works with all .30-06/.308 family cartridges and with all .223 case-head sizes. Collet B handles belted and non-belted magnums and PPC/ARC case head sizes.

If you need to swap collets, spin the knurled silver collet housing cap off. It’s got reverse threads, so spin it the “wrong” way. Pull out the existing collet and swap it for the other. Spin the collet cap back on—again turning it opposite of what feels intuitive—and snug it firmly.

To set trim length, insert the base of a case in need of trimming into the collet. Grip the big knurled silver collet handle and turn it clockwise to clamp the cartridge in place. With the unit turned off, gently move the collet shuttle forward on its slide rods until the mouth of the case slides over the pilot and touches the carbide cutters. Loosen the macro-adjust hard stop if necessary by unscrewing the knurled brass locking bolts.

Precision Adjustments

With the case mouth touching the cutters, slide the hard stop against the collet shuttle and tighten the brass knurled-head bolts down. With the hard stop roughly set, you’ll use the click-adjustable silver micro-adjust dial to fine-tune trim length. Each click equals .001 inch, which is a lot of precision for a piece of high-speed machinery.

Hornady includes a case catch bin with the trimmer. Once the device is mounted, hook the bin on the already-installed ledge. With the bin in place, you don’t have to remove trimmed cases; you just allow them to drop into the bin when you loosen the collet handle.

If you prefer to pluck your trimmed cases out of the collet rather than let them drop into the catch bin, or if you don’t want your trimmer hanging out over the edge of your reloading bench, you can remove the bin hanger and mount the trimmer anywhere atop the flat surface of your bench.

With all systems go, it’s time to trim mass quantities of fired brass with the greatest of ease. In short order you’ll develop a rhythm: Loosen the collet handle, insert an untrimmed case, snug the handle down, smoothly slide the shuttle forward until the case mouth kisses the high-speed trimmer. It’s rotating at about 2,000 rpm and will perform its function incredibly fast. Draw the shuttle back. Repeat.

Final Thoughts

A few notes on proper, safe operation. Make sure the unit is off while making gross adjustments to trim length. Those sharp cutters will eat a tenth-inch of your case mouth in a hurry. Don’t crank the collet handle tight on an empty collet. Doing so can bend and compress the collet, making it difficult or impossible to insert cartridge cases.

The only downside to the High Speed 3-in-1 is cost. This is not a tool for the casual reloader. Full suggested retail is $775. Various online sites such as Brownells, Grafs and Midway USA have it listed for anywhere from $510 to $650. That’s a substantial investment, but if you’re a serious handloader who spends hours each month trimming cases, it’ll pay for itself in the time you save.

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