Loading 9mm and .223 and breaking even on equipment cost

[davestarbuck]

I figured that I'd share this...

My brain needed a little workout so I decided to see where I would break even with my equipment costs.

95% of my reloading is for my AR-15 and my Glock 19.

I shoot at least once per week and at least 100 rounds of rifle and 200 rounds of pistol, so that's what I used in my calculations.

I use Dillon equipment, including a 550b, RT1200 trimmer, CV2000 tumbler, Super Swage, etc, etc.

The cost for my equipment to load .223 and 9mm costs $1910 shipped from brianenos.com

I used Luckygunner.com to arrive at the prices of factory .223 55fmj and 9mm 115 gr fmg,which are $0.33/rd and $0.20/rd respectively.

My reloads for .223 consist of LC and PMC brass, 25 gr WC844 powder, pulled 55fmj bullets and Wolf .223 primers, with a cost of
$0.11 per round. The 9mm also costs me $0.11 per round, using Montana Gold 115 fmj bullets, 5.6 gr of Ramshot silhouette, Wolf small pistol primers, and mixed cases.

My reloads are just as accurate and reliable as any factory ammo I have put through my guns.

So using 100 .223 and 200 9mm per week costs per year are:

Factory Reloads
.223 $1716.00 $576.00
9mm $2080.00 $1144.00

Total $3796.00 $1720

Difference $2076

Even with the cost of the equipment I saved $166 in the first year alone for my weekly practice ammo. This gets even better when factoring in any tactical classes and matches.

I'm glad I started to reload!!!

-Dave

 

[armoredman]

Now cast your own bullets, and save even more money. I figure I am spending about $.10 each or less for 7.62x39mm reloads. Haven't taken the plunge to a progressive, using a donated 30 year old RCBS single stage, still cruising along!
Ain't reloading a blast? Pun intended.

 

[davestarbuck]

For the type of shooting I do and the guns I shoot, cast boolets wouldn't work

I'm spending only 0.11 a round for .223 anyway!!!

I agree on the fun part though!!!

-dave

 

[RVenick]

Where are you getting the pulled 55fmj bullets from? I am using Wideners Mil-spec 55g which cost me $39/500.

 

[rellascout]

I have run these numbers myself in the past. Just about every 6 months I consider getting into reloading. At first glance it seems like you are going to be way ahead but...

I think the part that is missing from the calculation is your time. Lets put a modest number on that. Say $15 an hour. How many hours does it take you to load that ammo? Time is not free. To do a "real" cost anylsis you have to factor that in.

Also I think that your numbers are high. I can get 9mm most of the time under $.18 a round delivered. So you are saving yourself $.07 x 200 = $14.00each time you head out to the range. 223 costs me about $300 for 1000 rounds of brass cased Federal so your savings on .223/556 is higher.

I know most people will say that reloading is a labor of love but for a real cost savings calcualtion you have to account for time. I won't even bring up space. LOL

 

[TX expat]

Hmmm. I will respectfully disagree with your last statement, I don't believe you have to account for your time as a monetary expense. If that were true, then you should be docking yourself $15/hr for all your range time and driving time too... If my wife got wind of that, she'd have a fit at how much money I was wasting!

If you are reloading for a hobby as well as to save money, your time isn't worth any more than what you might be doing otherwise, which for most folks would either be $0 or priceless depending on how you choose to look at it.

 

[rellascout]

Hmmm. I will respectfully disagree with your last statement, I don't believe you have to account for your time as a monetary expense. If that were true, then you should be docking yourself $15/hr for all your range time and driving time too... If my wife got wind of that, she'd have a fit at how much money I was wasting!

If you are reloading for a hobby as well as to save money, your time isn't worth any more than what you might be doing otherwise, which for most folks would either be $0 or priceless depending on how you choose to look at it.

Again this is what most reloaders claim. They claim it as part of the hobby. IF that is the case then maybe you do not have to account for it but that is not what the OP has suggested. If that were his arguement he should have stated I love reloading and the money I save is gravy.

Instead he has proclaimed the value of reloading exclusively based on a monetary arguement which is missing a huge part of the "real" cost benefit analysis. If you are doing a cost benefit comparision "time" has to factor in because it certainly factored into the cost of a commerical round. If you are not going to account for the "labor cost" in reloaded ammo it should be deducted from the cost of commerical ammo as well.

Please do not get me wrong. I am not arguing against reloading. I will without a doubt one day make the transition. I am almost 100% sure of it but I really think that these types of cost arguements do not hold up if you do a real analysis. They always skew the numbers in order to make their arguement. It is circular reasoning. The conclusion must follow from the premises not the other way around.

 

[TX expat]

I see your point. Labor costs must be associated with factory ammo because labor is paid for; you don't 'pay' yourself labor however. If that were the case, it would be cheaper to have my oil changed, have my lawn mowed and have just about every home/auto/anything else repair fixed by someone else. Thankfully it's not, at least for me!

Your point makes a great deal of sense if you were actively taking billable hours away from something to do these things, but for most folks, free time is just that. So I'll give you that if you would otherwise be working and earning some sort of pay, then you would absolutely have to figure in your time as a hard dollar amount, but if this wasn't something that would interfere with billable hours, then any dollar amount you put on those hours would be an arbitrary one, so any ROI would be totally subjective to the individual. You might assign $15/hr on your free time, but the OP can equally assign $0/hr to his time and you'd both be accurate since the value has no meaning outside the individual interpretation of the value of their free time.

 

[rellascout]

so any ROI would be totally subjective to the individual. You might assign $15/hr on your free time, but the OP can equally assign $0/hr to his time and you'd both be accurate since the value has no meaning outside the individual interpretation of the value of their free time.

I guess that is my point. When people make this argument they are making a ROI arguement. In order to determine ROI both sides of the equation have to balance. You cannot pick and chose the "costs" associated adding them to one side but removing them from the other. By doing so like the OP does it skews the results in favor of the one with less cost factored in. I just think if you are going to make an attempt at a objective ROI arguement you have to do it properly.

Thanks for indulging me... LOL Again I am not against reloading. I think there is a lot of value in it.

 

[mcdonl]

Reloading saves money, and allows you to shoot more. It also provides for better, more reliable ammunition and for some of us it is fun.

If you were to get paid an hourly rate to reload your own ammo would you do it then given all of the other benefits?

You cannot pick and chose the "costs" associated adding them to one side but removing them from the other.

Rella, the two sides of the argument are not ROI for me to make ammo vs the ROI of the vendor to make ammo.

The two sides of the argument are the ROI I get from shooting my own reloads vs the ROI I get from shooting commercial ammo.

 

[ny32182]

Unless you are skipping work to reload, I don't see why you have to assign a dollar amount to hours spent reloading.

People who load commercial ammo do it... well... commercially, so they get paid for it. I load it as a hobby, so I don't get paid for it. If I wasn't reloading I'd be doing some other activity that pays me $0 an hour.

I just want to see the component breakdown that gets you .11 for a plinker .223 round... mine are more like .18 each.

 

[Geckgo]

When I finally take the plunge and buy my rock chucker I'll be reloading .45 ammo, and I shoot a lot these days. I've worked out costs like this before. Did you factor in the price of new brass? Just have to ask, I price mine at about 1/4 of the brass price, even though I should get more than 4 reloads according to "the books." I pick up brass at the range to, so in a pinch I should be able to get some freebies out of that pile.

The real savings for me will be when I get the dies to reload my 30-06 cases, or if I get an AR10 and start reloading .308. Excellence in .30 cal bullets starts at 1.50 per round, and I don't intend to be reloading "cheap practice" ammo for those guns, but the best hunting bullets that money can buy, or at least what I finally decide looks the best. So my reloading for hunting bullets I will figure 2.00 a round probably.

 

[TX expat]

I guess that is my point. When people make this argument they are making a ROI arguement. In order to determine ROI both sides of the equation have to balance. You cannot pick and chose the "costs" associated adding them to one side but removing them from the other. By doing so like the OP does it skews the results in favor of the one with less cost factored in. I just think if you are going to make an attempt at a objective ROI arguement you have to do it properly.

Thanks for indulging me... LOL Again I am not against reloading. I think there is a lot of value in it.

Trust me, I think about this very argument every time I have to go outside and shovel snow

 

[rellascout]

Trust me, I think about this very argument every time I have to go outside and shovel snow

I hear you!!! I live in WV and we have had snow on the ground since late Nov.

The funny part is most of the time I am making the other side of the argument in favor of reloading. The wife is the one who normally points out my weaknesses in my ROI arguement.

 

[cfullgraf]

Your point makes a great deal of sense if you were actively taking billable hours away from something to do these things, but for most folks, free time is just that.

For the home reloader, he needs to exam what he would do with the hours. If the choice is watching television or reloading, would he charge himself $15/hour for watching television? Probably not.

So, for the home reloader who will consume his own reloads, labor cost would always be zero.

For a true business model where profit is the name of the game, the cost of labor is an important factor.

Of course, if reloading time takes away from income earning time, then the labor costs would be figured in.

Reloading is not for everyone. Different folks value their free time differently. To some spending time at a reloading press is not as valuable to some as watching television or surfing the 'net.

 

[BullfrogKen]

I guess that is my point. When people make this argument they are making a ROI arguement. In order to determine ROI both sides of the equation have to balance. You cannot pick and chose the "costs" associated adding them to one side but removing them from the other. By doing so like the OP does it skews the results in favor of the one with less cost factored in. I just think if you are going to make an attempt at a objective ROI arguement you have to do it properly.

No, you don't.

My time is only worth what I and someone else can agree my time is worth. Unless I forego some activity or work that pays me so I can go reload, my time is not worth anything in a dollar value. My time watching t.v. is not worth anything. My time sleeping is not worth anything. At least not worth someone to pay me doing it.


Now, there are opportunity costs for reloading. While I'm reloading, I must forego something else - sleep, television, family time or chores my wife gives me. There is a cost in that while I'm reloading something else isn't being done.

But opportunity cost has no dollar value. It's simply an activity I must give up to accomplish something else. You could make the same argument that the time you spend shooting costs you money in the for the time you spent at the range.


Time spent reloading doesn't have to get calculated at a dollar value, unless you know you could paid a certain sum of money performing a task that actually pays you. In that case, the dollar value your time spent reloading is what you would have made doing that other task.

Businesses make these kinds of decisions all the time. The difference is they're getting paid for their investment of time. Reloaders don't.



I like reloading because I can most definitely shoot more than I could if I had to buy factory. For me, it's not a matter of saving money as it is shooting more on my ammo budget. And, I can load for things not commercially available like groundhog loads for my .308; 38 Supers that take full advantage of its potential; downloaded .44s . . . on and on.


Edit to add - it was also nice during the recent severe ammo shortage to be able to pull a pound of powder from my cabinet, a few hundred primers, and go load for something to actually be able to shoot. Because reloaders stock components that have uses across many different calibers, I don't have to keep a supply of every caliber I own when I get the bug to go shoot one of them.

 

[Glock20]

Others may feel differently, but even if I didn't save a dime handloading, I would still do it simply because I enjoy loading my own ammo.

But since I do save money, especially on several calibers, it's a hobby that pays..... And there is not too many of those.

 

[rellascout]

No, you don't.

My time is only worth what I and someone else can agree my time is worth. Unless I forego some activity or work that pays me so I can go reload, my time is not worth anything in a dollar value. My time watching t.v. is not worth anything. My time sleeping is not worth anything. At least not worth someone to pay me doing it.

If you accept that then the arguement or example has not objective value. Your time is worth nothing. My time might be worth $50 a hour. It reduces the objective truth value of the analysis to zero. You are purposefully choosing things which have no value for you. This does not necessarily apply to anyone else. Again when someone presents something as an objective analysis you have to address it objectively not subjectively or you render it meaningless. IMHO

I also disagree about your assesment of opportunity costs. You again assume no value for this. Your assesment is subjective and only applies to you. For many of us time is limited. Time spent on one thing is time we do not have to spend on something else. If I spend my time reloading and as a result pay to have my lawn mowed or the snow shoveled then there is a value to this "opportunity cost." This is a accounting arguement. There is room for interpertation. My point is and still stands that too many of the standard reloading saves me money are examples of poor accounting.

 

[brickeyee]

My point is and still stands that too many of the standard reloading saves me money are examples of poor accounting.

Good thing I do not keep books on what I do with my life outside of paid hours.

 

[Jspotto]

TIME! If you were not reloading for fun at least you can explain to the Mrs. about the money you're saving. Othewise all you're free time will be spent getting paid $0.00 doing the HONEY-Do's.

 

[BullfrogKen]

Good thing I do not keep books on what I do with my life outside of paid hours.

No kidding. Or the IRS; they'd assign a dollar value and tax it.

This is a accounting arguement. There is room for interpertation. My point is and still stands that too many of the standard reloading saves me money are examples of poor accounting.

You're struggling with mixing economics concepts and accounting. They are two distinct and separate ways of assigning value. This actually is an ideal example of an argument in economics. And economics isn't concerned with accounting for decisions in terms of a dollar value. Actually that part of the study is the most difficult concept for new students in the field to comprehend.

Your time is worth nothing. My time might be worth $50 a hour. It reduces the objective truth value of the analysis to zero. You are purposefully choosing things which have no value for you. .

No, your time is also worth nothing - by itself. It takes two people to agree what your time is worth -

• first someone must want what you produce;
• and you have to agree to do the work for the price he's offering to pay you.

You can't just put your own price on your time and think that settles the matter. If you produce something that no one wants, your time is worth nothing in accounting revenue doing that task. Say you had a skill producing widgets for an obsolete technology. You aren't able to put a price it, because you can't sell it.

But the time you spent producing those widgets has an opportunity cost in that you spent time making something no one wants when you could have been doing something else. Go Google that term. I didn't just make it up.

For many of us time is limited. Time spent on one thing is time we do not have to spend on something else.

That's the concept of opportunity cost. Everyone's time is limited. We all have the same 24 hours in a day. Opportunity cost has no dollar value by itself; its what we must forego when we chose one thing over another.


Trying to assign a dollar value to opportunity cost is a meaningless exercise, unless you actually would have spent that free time doing something that earns money. If you had so little free time that you couldn't spend an hour reloading without paying someone to perform your household tasks like mowing your lawn, how can you find the time to go shooting? Or even posting on this forum for that matter? Have you considered how much your time is worth posting here? Does it cost you money to spend your time here?


In case you didn't know it - I'm an accountant. I'm also a student of economics. And of your friend Ayn Rand - http://aynrandnovels.com/essay-contests/winners-atlas-shrugged-2000.html. I'd be Ken O'Donnell.

 

[rellascout]

Thanks for the primer econ/accounting. I bow to your area of expertise. I am just a simply small businesman and an accounting and econ hack at best. LOL

I will still stand by my statement that the OP is skewing the numbers, his prices for loaded ammo are inflated, and he is not accounting or considering the true costs of associated with reloading.

If you had so little free time that you couldn't spend an hour reloading without paying someone to perform your household tasks like mowing your lawn, how can you find the time to go shooting? Or even posting on this forum for that matter? Have you considered how much your time is worth posting here? Does it cost you money to spend your time here?

This is nothing but a strawman arguement. You are attempting to exaggerated a caricatured version of my arguement that one can place a $$ value on free time. You have attempted to change the dicussion to if you have to pay for services then you cannot have time to shoot or post here. I stated clearly that there is not a cost when one enjoys the task which takes up their free time. For some that enjoyable task is reloading. For many others it is teadious and mind numbing chore. To answer your exaggerated question yes posting here costs me some degree of productivity and therefore $$$ one way or another. My wife and I have considered this concept more than once. LOL What you have done by misrepresenting my arguement is the definition of a strawman arguement which is a fallacy.

You have attempted to argue that there is no value to free time by stating:

It takes two people to agree what your time is worth -

first someone must want what you produce;

and you have to agree to do the work for the price he's offering to pay you.

I disagree. Take the example someone gave of changing your own oil. It might take you a hour of free time to complete this task. You can have it done for $50 $20 of which is labor the rest is parts which you would have had to pay for anyway. When I choose to pay to have my oil changed instead of spending the hour to do it myself I have assigned a $$ value to my hour of free time. That hour is worth $20 to me. It might not be worth $20 to you but it still has a value which I can justify and I have produced nothing that someone wants to buy and I have not agreed to work for anyone. This does not mean I have no free time to spend on things I want to do like shooting or typing here. If you would like to challenge that assertion I am all ears.

In case you didn't know it I am a philosophy major and a student of logic... LOL

 

[TX expat]

feeling... the... thread... lock... coming... any... time... now...

 

[rellascout]

Why its been a great dicussion which relates directly to the OP?

 

[Funshooter45]

I hadn't really planned to read this whole thread, but I did (taking away valuable time from my work at the office I might add).

Then I got to thinking. When I go home in the evening, instead of reloading, what else might I be doing instead? TV is pretty bad these days, and there's no daylight or warm temps to do much outside. So, if I wasn't reloading, I'd probably drink beer. Now, beer ain't free ya know? If you were to sit at home and drink it, you might spend $1/can. It would be easy to go through 10 cans in an evening, so it would cost $10. But if you wanted to sit at a bar, this cost could easily triple. And of course, there's the possibility of getting a DUI in that scenario, which costs a whole lot. To say nothing of the possible health costs of consuming beer each night instead of reloading.

But even ignoring those types of possibilities, just focusing on the immediate cash outlay of buying beer, it's easy to calculate that by sitting at my reloading bench for 3 hours instead of consuming beer, it has indeed saved me a minimum of $10 in just one evening. Therefore when calculating the ROI of reloading, I need to deduct $10 from the costs for every evening that I spend reloading.

This is indeed a money making hobby!