Ultramount

Some years ago, I built a long, low work bench to use for firearm maintenance and build projects. It worked great, but project work was eventually shifted to more specialized work areas and the bench became home to handloading equipment. Because the bench is low, the press eye view was much as pictured left, which meant poor visibility and often having to work stooped over for long period of time.

I kept putting off work on a dedicated bench for the presses as too time consuming and could find no commercial stand or bench that  actually fit my circumstances. All I really needed to do was to raise the press up a bit, but a mount would have to be solid so that the press wouldn’t move around in operation. I ran across an ad for the Inline Fabrication’s Ultramount and decided to give it a try.

The Ultramount is made of powder coated 3/16″ steel. It is supplied with a press mount top plate, a lower storage tray that adds to the mounts rigidity and all necessary hardware. The Ultramount for the Redding T7 is priced at $75. Priority shipping is free and, for $18, top mount plates may be purchased to fit other presses.

Quality parts, easy to assemble…

The Ultramount was received with each piece individually foam sheet/bubble wrapped, with detailed assembly instructions and associated hardware sealed in plastic bags; no dings, scratches, no missing parts to chase.

Seen from the back of the Ultramount, the top plate is loosely assembled with 4 countersunk screws, flat washers and lock nuts.

The mount is flipped over, the lower storage shelf is installed with the 4 supplied fasteners and tightened down.

The mount it turned right side up, the top plate is tightened down fully and 4 studs are screwed into the threaded holes in the mount plate, above, insert.

Is it worth it?

The press didn’t change color, florescent lights don’t play well with electronic flash and I was too lazy to change white balance. The stance of the Ultramount is much wider than the mount pad on the press. Subsequently, the press is much more solidly mounted than when it was bolted directly to the bench. Line of sight is excellent, I can actually see what I am doing, and there is a lot less stress and strain during long production runs.

I ran into one small problem with the installation. The spent primer collection tube that is tapped into the end of the ram would no longer clear the bench. I guess I could have drilled a hole for the tube that would have routed it through the bench, but I settled on putting an old artifact ashtray to use by having it catch spent primers. The mount is a useful accessory, well made – sorry I waited to long to get one.