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

[jcwit]

Reloading only costs less if your time is = to $0.

You can honestly claim to put a dollar amount on every minute you live?

 

[Xfire68]

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

Why did it cost so much? Were the prices when you bought yours higher?

A 550B is only $430? The other items purchased should not have cost another $1480?

 

[BullfrogKen]

^^^

brianenos.com sells entire soup to nuts packages with scales, tumblers, etc.

 

[rellascout]

edit - Why is it that Rand-heads like to argue so much? What on earth is an avowed non-reloader doing in a forum set up to help reloaders learn the reloading hobby, anyway?

Maybe you did not read my 2nd post.

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.

 

[frankenstein406]

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.



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:



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

And when the idiot that took the "oil changing class" and strips your drain bolt. or crunchs your oil filter and puts a screwdriver through it, yet still fills the car up with oil then the place says no we didn't do that. i guess my 20 minutes changing the oil is worth it. you wouldn't take your car in if the oil, gas, air in tires, or winsheld washer fluid was low.

 

[Xfire68]

WOW! That must have been the super elite special one of a kind package!LOL

 

[BullfrogKen]

Yeah, I read it. But a thread full of silly attempts to justify why it's a poor use of time capped off with the comment - "sit like a monkey and hand press out ammo" weakens the claim that you aren't against reloading.


Just admit you have no desire for the activity and be done with it.

 

[rellascout]

Yeah, I read it. But a thread full of silly attempts to justify why it's a poor use of time capped off with the comment - "sit like a monkey and hand press out ammo" weakens the claim that you aren't against reloading.


Just admit you have no desire for the activity and be done with it.

Obviously you have no sense of humor and you are a mind reader. You seem frustrated that I have not agreed with you that I have illustrated your poor logical.

Oh well I guess I will just go back to being a Rand head....

 

[gshipps]

I think I may like reloading more than shooting. Need to find somebody to shoot all my stuff so I can have something to do. Don't care what it cost!

 

[dom1104]

Rellascout is making... ZERO sense.

I paid about 500 bucks for my Hornady LNL reloading system, I can reload at least 300 rounds per hour on the thing, I cant imagine anyone making a "Time Cost" argument against it.

I would never go back to paying thru the nose for ammo, and I know of no one who does who is a serious shooter.

 

[Funshooter45]

Like gshipps, I also enjoy the reloading even more than the shooting. Well, sometimes anyway. It got me to thinking. How much should I pay someone to shoot for me so that I can reload more often? And then I got to thinking some more. I also enjoy eating, sleeping, and sex as well. How much should I pay to have someone do those things for me?

 

[jcwit]

Rellascout is making... ZERO sense.

I paid about 500 bucks for my Hornady LNL reloading system, I can reload at least 300 rounds per hour on the thing, I cant imagine anyone making a "Time Cost" argument against it.

I would never go back to paying thru the nose for ammo, and I know of no one who does who is a serious shooter.
__________________

YUP!

 

[mcdonl]

I can reload at least 300 rounds per hour on the thing

Dang Dom! One of the things *I* like about reloading is I am poor. I get my ammo money $20-$40 at a time. So, I can buy a thing of powder, or primers. I cast my own bullets and have plenty of brass...

At 300 rounds an hour, I would find myself not being able to keep up with my reloading equipment. I would run out of ammo to supplies before I had the cash to buy more!!

 

[NeuseRvrRat]

imo, the most ridiculous part of this argument is equating handloads to factory ammo

handloaded rounds that have been made with a great deal of precision and care are significantly better than the very best factory ammo

apples and oranges

 

[Ky Larry]

Reloading to me is like time spent fishing or playing with the grandkids. I don't assign a dollar value to these activities. I reload because I get better ammo at a cheaper price and enjoy the process as much as I enjoy shooting. I don't know if I'm saving money by reloading but I know I'm saving my sanity.

 

[RustyFN]

A 550B is only $430? The other items purchased should not have cost another $1480?

Yes but that is not everything you need to reload. I know a guy who called Dillon and told them he wanted a 650 and everything he needed to reload and told them to just set him up. After Dillon got done adding the roller handle, spare parts kit, strong mount, tumbler and so on it cost him $1,400 to load one caliber, and that was at least five years ago. The last six threads I saw where somebody was buying a Dillon 550 for their first press by the time they had everything they needed they spent $850.

 

[mcdonl]

Some people just need to have the best of the best to start out with. I spent about $500 including casting equipment to get started.

My ammo shoots as good as if I spent $2000 I am sure.

 

[jcwit]

Some people just need to have the best of the best to start out with. I spent about $500 including casting equipment to get started.

My ammo shoots as good as if I spent $2000 I am sure.

Almost right, some people equate the most expensive as being the "best", completely forgetting the concept of value. Of course its their funds that is spent. I've found over the years those that have the most in funds just about never forget the value concept. Mayhap thats why they have the funds they have, suppose? They also seem to be the ones least concerned with bragging about how much their equipment cost.

 

[RustyFN]

Some people just need to have the best of the best to start out with. I spent about $500 including casting equipment to get started.

My ammo shoots as good as if I spent $2000 I am sure.

I'm with you there. I'm into reloading and casting for four calibers for around $600 and my ammo is as good as factory or better.

 

[GLOOB]

We all cook, to some degree or another. But if we figured $15.00 an hour for our time in cooking and washing dishes, it would be cheaper for a lot of us single guys to go out to eat, every single meal. For the cheapest and quickest (time is money, afterall) we would hit the drive through at MdD's 3 meals a day. (Or for shooting, we'd buy Blazer or F.C. FMJ, only) Still, one may want to cook, occasionally, just to pass the time or for the variety. And let's face it. No one is going to pay you 15.00 an hour to cook for them, anyway.

But aside from the pastime aspect, there's another positive aspect to cooking which translates over to reloading. When you give yourself the tools and ability to cook, you can buy food in a totally different form.

That one day you don't feel like going anywhere, you can open the fridge and hope to find some cold pizza or chinese food leftovers that aren't moldy. Or you can rest assured you have a pantry and freezer stocked with anything you could possibly want, should you get hungry enough to prepare it. Especially reassuring if the restaurants are closed or out of food that day!

With a reloading press, you are able to purchase components at a significant discount. Not only are they cheaper, but they have greater potential than a case of finished rounds. With a few basic components, you can make a wide variety of different loads, as needed. And rest assured that when you need them, it will be worth your time to reload some rounds. A rainy day with nothing better to do is bound to happen, sooner or later.

My time is worth much more than 15.00 an hour, and I eat out frequently. But I still have a pantry with full of crackers and rice and pasta. A freezer with frozen meats and veggies. Yeah, I might go weeks without touching them, but one day I'll be happy to have that stuff.

 

[cfullgraf]

And rest assured that when you need it, it will be worth your time to reload some rounds. A rainy day with nothing better to do is bound to happen, sooner or later.

Definitely!

Because I reload, during the component shortage we just went through, I never was out of ammunition.

Even when my regular components were in short supply, there was enough substitute components out there that kept me in business when I thought I was running short. Besides, I discovered a new to me powder for pistols that I had not tried before. It is now one of my main powders.

Different strokes for different folks. Reloading for some is a religion, is the scourge of the earth for others, and everywhere in between. It is what makes the world go around.

If one has to put a monetary value on his free time to justify not reloading, that's ok by me.

 

[mcdonl]

Mayhap thats why they have the funds they have, suppose?

Yeah, I think about that all of the time. To spill my guts some, I have a great job but due to stupid financial decisions of the past I do not have the cash I should have. Kids and stuff don't help, but yeah, making good decisions is cheaper than bad decisions no matter what the purchase price.

 

[davestarbuck]

Hey all!!

All I have to say is HOLY COW!! I post up an example of how reload can pay for itself, only in terms of the equipment, even shooting the two cheapest (per retail prices) reloadable calibers, and it turns into Econ 101 .

I didn't mention time, because I dont know what your time is worth to you. I reload in my FREE time so it's free to me .

Now in terms of time...

With my equipment it is not difficult at all to sustain a loading rate of 400 rounds/hour. For 9mm that’s straight up, not including the time it takes to tumble clean the brass and to setup/swap toolheads.

For 10400 rounds a year that is a total of 26 hours per year of reloading. So ½ hour a week of loading will keep up.

For .223 we have to take into account brass prep time. Let’s see
For 1000 pieces of brass..
Intial Tumble= ½ hour
500 rd/hr Size/Deprime/Trim= 2 hours
Tumble off Lube= ½ hour
Swage Primer Pockets= 1 hour (easy)

So taking our time, 1000 pieces of brass would take 4 hours. So 5200 cases a year would take 20.8 hours per year or 24 minutes a week. It would be faster after initial prep because you wouldn’t have to swage the primer pockets again.

After prep you load 400 rd/hr no problem so 5200 caes would take 13 hours per year, or around 15 minutes per week.

So .223 will take 29 minutes per week/5200 cases in total.

Around an hour a week will produce 200 rounds/wk of 9mm and 100 rounds/wk of .223 with a Dillon 550. Not too shabby.

Of course if you are shooting double that it’ll be 2 hours a week, and so on...

I'm actually quicker some days than the aformentioned 400 rds/hour, and I'm quicker on the brass prep as well, I just processed 2500 cases of .223 and from start to finish it took me 6 hours total, so I was a little quicker this time..

I'd also like to mention that I started my yearly prep and loading of the years 9mm and 223 just after Christmas....and I'm done!!! As in no more loading needed for those two calibers.

Now on to .38 special for Dad.....

-Dave

 

[RustyFN]

All I have to say is HOLY COW!! I post up an example of how reload can pay for itself, only in terms of the equipment, even shooting the two cheapest (per retail prices) reloadable calibers, and it turns into Econ 101

It's all your fault Dave.

 

[davestarbuck]

Why did it cost so much? Were the prices when you bought yours higher?

A 550B is only $430? The other items purchased should not have cost another $1480?

Yep $1910 all together for the press,trimmer,caliber conversion kits,dies,tumbler,media seperator,calipers,scale,Super Swage, extra toolts heads and powder measure,etc. etc

Thats just for 2 calibers, I also reload a few others but in much lower volumes...

-Dave