Buying pulled bullets?

When a manufacturer discovers a problem in a certain lot of ammunition, they will pull that whole lot from inventory and sell it to someone who de-mils it for components. A term of the sales agreement is that the ammunition will be pulled down for components and sold separately, not as loaded ammunition. This can also be true for surplus military ammunition.

The resultant components are then usually sold to a retailer as "pulled bullets", "pull down brass" and "pull down powder".

I've bought several thousand pull down bullets in pistol calibers and they've worked just fine for plinking, and I've gotten some pretty good groups out of some of them, too. I avoid pull down plated bullets, due to the soft nature of the bullets, but pulled down jacketed bullets have proven to be a good value for me.

Hope this helps.

Fred

Fred has a pretty good idea of what it is. You will start to see us move away from pulled bullets a little. There are a lot of new players getting pulling contracts and much of the quality and consistency varies nowadays. We've found that every puller that we've done business with straight up lies about the quality of the stuff they want to sell us and we end up paying a premium for what is supposed to be good stuff. It shows up all mixed and damaged and none of the pullers seem to care. We are also considering starting a pulling operation of our own but I think it may be a year or two before we have paid off enough of our bullet manufacturing machines to justify getting a building somewhere out of town to pull stuff.

Reloader Fred wrote:
...jacketed bullets have proven to be a good value for me.

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Me, too.

I've bought jacketed "pulled" bullets from several sellers whose on-line sites are mentioned here frequently. I buy "pulled" bullets knowing they are "used" and came from "old" ammunition or ammunition that for some reason didn't meet specification, but knowing this going in, I've always felt I got my money's worth out of them.

Sometimes, the "pulled" bullets I get come in batches including more than one weight. So, a batch may have both 55 grain and 62 grain projectiles. Or the batch may contain both round nose and flat nose. In those cases, you can have a relaxing Sunday afternoon sorting them out.

I just bought pulled bullets for the first time yesterday and will report back regarding the quality of them. These should be all TMJ bullets and will only be used in my 9mm loads. I have loaded a number of bullets that I have pulled from my own loads or live rounds I picked up with good results. They have been great for plinking, so hopefully these pulled bullets will be similar in quality.

longdayjake wrote:
We've found that every puller that we've done business with straight up lies about the quality of the stuff they want to sell us...

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Is there no way you can use modern video technology to have them provide a large sample of what they want to sell that you could inspect both visually and for objective criteria like color and reflectivity that would let you get a better handle on the transaction?

Or is it just that the demand for inexpensive bullets - no matter what - is so great that if you don't buy from them there are three others who will?

This is what I got from the seller of a batch of .30 carbine bullets that I bought;

"Demilitarization is the process in which ammunition is disassembled due to terms of military contracts. For example if a term of the military contract between Federal or Lake City is broken they are prohibited from selling the "live ammo" to the public. instead the ammunition has to be disassembled. These are Demilitarized pulled bullets, new but once loaded then pulled apart. These have very minimal pull marks and are ready to load. No sizing is needed."

Just like ReloaderFred said

I've also bought Federal HST "pulled" bullets in both 9mm and 45 Auto, and have had no problems with them.

I recently bought 1000 pulled federal 270 bullets and 250 .257 federal bullets from American Reloading and was satisfied with the quality. The 270 bullets have light pull marks on about 20% of them which was accurately communicated by the pictures on there website. I cannot see any pull marks at all in the .257 bullets. They were also an awesome deal. The 270 bullets were $100 for 1000 and the .257 were like $37 for 250 which were federal fusion bullets, which are a really premium quality speer gold dot hunting bullet.

I have shot a lot of pulled bullets from RMR and a few other places. 224 caliber up to 50 cal. I like to run them all through a sizer and sort them just to make sure nothing goofy slips through though.

Sorted well, they give very good consistency!

Over the years I've bought a lot of pulled military bullets, .223/5.56, .308, and 50 cal pulled bullets. The military pulled bullets I run through a Lee bullet sizing die just to make sure they aren't out of round or over or undersized. Also these pulled military bullets can have pull marks that the sizing die irons down. I've bought a lot of pulled pistol and rifle bullets from commercial pull-down ammo too from RMR and others. One nice thing about buying some commercial pulled bullets is you can buy bullets that are not sold to the public. All the pulled pistol bullets I buy especially bullets without a cannelure such as 9MM, 40 S&W, or 45ACP the only thing you will see is crimp marks and sometimes the crimp marks are not in the correct place. As with all pulled bullets you need to inspect them closely to make sure a 180 grain bullet is not in your 165 grain order for instance. You may find a few pistol bullets with very deep crimp marks. I load these for plinking only. I agree, I would not buy plated pulled bullets BUT I've bought some very nice Speer Gold Dot bullets which are heavy plated. I will not buy mixed lots of pulled bullets or "grab bag" bullets because I load only certain weight bullets for each caliber. The pulled commercial rifle bullets I've bought I've not been disappointed with any purchase. There again you can find some bullets not available as a component. You just have to decide whether you shoot enough to justify the cost savings. I have seen no accuracy difference for instance with pulled Gold Dot bullets and new. As with all pulled bullets you may have many lots in your order and maybe more weight variation than boxed components. No reason to not give pulled bullets a try if you need the cost savings.

I am pretty new to reloading/handloading but I have never seen pulled components. Even then I am not sure I would want to buy someone's "oops" rounds. But that is just from me.

herrwalther said:

I am pretty new to reloading/handloading but I have never seen pulled components. Even then I am not sure I would want to buy someone's "oops" rounds. But that is just from me.

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It's usually nothing more than cosmetic issues, particularly with just the bullets. Pull down powder is a another story though.

herrwalther said:

I am pretty new to reloading/handloading but I have never seen pulled components. Even then I am not sure I would want to buy someone's "oops" rounds. But that is just from me.

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Often times they aren't someone's "oops". They're surplus, overruns or ammunition that must be de-milled due to contractual requirements. Don't exclude them unnecessarily just because of some notion that they're a bad product. They're often a good product, and if pulled down properly, almost as good as new, only cheaper.

Hope this helps.

Fred

JackSprat said:

Well ,I think I will order me some 6 mm from American Reloading(thanks Someguy2800,I didn't even know about them until I seen your post).
I am torn between the 80gr PowerShok,and the 95gr Fusion..Im leaning toward the Fusion,because from what I understand they are a Speer DeepCurl,or GoldDot,but when I look up 6mm DeepCurl they are 90gr bullets,so I am not 100% sure they are what I think..I'm pretty sure the 80 gr are Speer HotCor,which I am familiar with,and have had good results with ..So I am torn between the two...

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The fusions are the federal Accubond, and with just the factory loads, they're a frigging laser outta my .243, I've been holding off buying any pulled yet as I have too many other projects, so I can't confirm, but 95 gr bullets still work well with that h1000.......don't forget to share your results!

Get the fusions, some of the best bullets you can buy.

More of a personal choice................

JackSprat said:

These Fusions look a little like a Remington CorLokt they are a soft point and it looks like just a little lead is exposed.Ithink I will order them.I don't have H1000,but I have a good bit of H100 V Hybrid,and it has gave me good accuracy with 100 gr ProHunters,and Speer PSPBT..Thanks,and I will share my results.

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Yup, they're a nice bonded bullet with the "protected" lead tip. They're also, for some unknown reason, the cheapest off the shelf ammo around here. We really liked the Dickens outta them when we're in a pinch.

I'm just finishing up 1000 pulled Gold Dots in my Springfield R.O. and they shoot better than factory loaded for me. Like many others, I have fired many thousands of pull downs with no problems. Buy from Rocky Mountain and you will be satisfied, just the way it is. Jake will get you good bullets or on the super slim chance there is a problem, he will make it right.

I've bought quite a few pulled bullets from RMR, all jacketed. I've been happy with everything recieved.

Remember when you fire a pristine and perfect jacketed bullet, once it leaves the bore it has rifling grooves and scars all the way around it that looks worse than pull marks.

I just received these: "308 168 / 175gr Sierra MatchKing HPBT Pulled- 250ct." from American reloading. Just under $45.00, delivered. 32 of them were 175gr. the remainder 168gr. No pull marks on any of them. I would say they are in excellent condition. I have shot many pulled bullets and they are as accurate as I am.

On Saturday I received the 500count 9mm 115/124gr TMJ pulled bullets from American Reloading for $30 shipped. These bullets were ordered on Wednesday. The packaging was very good and the shipping quick using a USPS small flat rate box. After sorting I ended up with:
39 x 115gr RN plated with some crimp marks
2 x 100gr FP plated
11 x 124gr RN looks like jacketed with a cap at the bottom covering the lead
3 x 115gr plated HP (looks like the Xtreme HP's)
The rest or bulk of them were 124gr RN TMJ/plated with no crimp marks. The bullets measured:
.355" diameter
.584" length

I don't know if they are TMJ's or just plated, but the bullets are in very good shape. I did not count the remaining bullets, but they did fill up a box normally used for 500 9mm bullets. Here is a picture of the bulk of the bullets after I tumbled them just to shine them up a bit.