Let's be honest--shotshell reloading components are high-priced; promo shotshells from federal/winchester/remington at walmart are cheap.
Has anyone torn apart these shotshells to harvest the powder, shot and primers? I figure it's got to be cheaper than buying components individually. You'll probably booger up the wad getting it out, so I'll count that as trash.
My walmart sells 1-1/4 oz. 12 ga promo loads for $22.97 plus tax (works out to $24.81 around here) per 100 rounds.
That gives 100 x (1-1/4 oz) #8 or #7.5 birdshot = 7 lbs, 13 oz shot (would cost $12.50 @$40/25 lbs)
Also gives 100 x (conservative estimate of 22 grains powder per shell) = 0.3143 lb powder (would cost $3.93 @ $100/8 lbs)
Also gives 100 x (209 primers) = 100 primers (would cost $4.00 @$40/1000)
Also gives 100 x hulls = 100 hulls (would cost $5 @ $0.05/each once-fired from my supplier)
Sooooo, even counting the wads as trash, we can harvest some value out of these promo loads; shot, powder, primers and hulls total up to $25.43 worth of components (after tax, we've only spent $24.81 on the case o' shells).
This method allows reloading shotshells at low cost--without the initial investment of buying 8 pounds of powder, 25 lbs shot, 1000 primers and a bunch of hulls--especially if, like me, you're a fan of the 7/8 oz or 26 gram 12 ga loads that only take 10-15 grains of powder each.
Some food for thought....
Has anyone torn apart these shotshells to harvest the powder, shot and primers? I figure it's got to be cheaper than buying components individually. You'll probably booger up the wad getting it out, so I'll count that as trash.
My walmart sells 1-1/4 oz. 12 ga promo loads for $22.97 plus tax (works out to $24.81 around here) per 100 rounds.
That gives 100 x (1-1/4 oz) #8 or #7.5 birdshot = 7 lbs, 13 oz shot (would cost $12.50 @$40/25 lbs)
Also gives 100 x (conservative estimate of 22 grains powder per shell) = 0.3143 lb powder (would cost $3.93 @ $100/8 lbs)
Also gives 100 x (209 primers) = 100 primers (would cost $4.00 @$40/1000)
Also gives 100 x hulls = 100 hulls (would cost $5 @ $0.05/each once-fired from my supplier)
Sooooo, even counting the wads as trash, we can harvest some value out of these promo loads; shot, powder, primers and hulls total up to $25.43 worth of components (after tax, we've only spent $24.81 on the case o' shells).
This method allows reloading shotshells at low cost--without the initial investment of buying 8 pounds of powder, 25 lbs shot, 1000 primers and a bunch of hulls--especially if, like me, you're a fan of the 7/8 oz or 26 gram 12 ga loads that only take 10-15 grains of powder each.
Some food for thought....