Reloading questions...

[CosmicGrooves]

How much does it cost to get all the supplies and equipment? Initial investment cost.

How much cheaper is it to reload vs. buying new ammo?

Are there basic recipes for putting together ammo for new people?

And any other questions I don't know to ask.

 

[SaxonPig]

Depends. New or used equipment? Discount or retail? How many calibers? Any specialty calibers? Dies for the 30-'06 run $40. I paid $140 for a set of wildcat dies.

Depends. Which caliber? In most cases, yes, you will save money but it's impossible to predict exactly how much. Lead bullets are cheaper than jacketed. Big calibers cost more in bullets and powder. Some calibers I don't reload because the cost of surplus or factory ammo is too low to justify the time spent loading my own. In general I think I can load typical calibers for about 1/3 to 1/2 of factory ammo cost.

You need to buy several reloading manuals and consult them. Check out the equipment manufacturer's web sites for info.

Lots. It's a learn as you go process. I started reloading in 1976 and can't imagine not doing it.

 

[Samgotit]

There's a sticky in the reloading forum. It should help with some of your questions:

http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=238214

 

[Sam1911]

It can cost as little as $37 for a Lee hand press or over $2000 for a very good semi-commercial machine like a Dillon 1050 with all the goodies.

What are your goals? For a lot of shooters, the Lee Anniversary Kit for about $95 comes with most of the things you'll need to begin loading ammo. For under $200, you could have a pretty decent set-up, including probably your first batch of components, and be rolling.

It can be a LOT cheaper to reload, or a little. It depends on what you're comparing. If you're buying factory 9mm for $9/50, then you could save about 8 cents a round. Give or take. If you're buying factory .44 Special at more like $30/50, you could be saving more like 50 cents a shot. With rifles, the same thing goes. If you're shooting factory .308 at $0.50 a shot, you could save a little. If you're buying premium match or hunting ammo for $1-$2 a shot, that savings is quite a bit more. If you're buying .416 Weatherby Mag for $155 for a box of 20 rds ... yikes. You could be saving $100 a box, probably.

There are LOTS of basic recipes. You should buy some load books like those from Sierra bullets, Hornady, Speer, etc. But for starters, Hodgdon's site has a VERY convenient on line resource covering Hodgdon, IMR, and Winchester powders. http://data.hodgdon.com/main_menu.asp

Yes, there are lots of other questions! You should buy The ABC's of Reloading http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/08..._m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=120CF1F1B3B34JFQSKK8

Read that, then you'll be in a better position to ask the best kinds of questions.

Good luck!

-Sam

 

[CosmicGrooves]

Thanks for the tips. Right now my biggest expense is the .357 magnum (about $22 for 50 is a cheap price). Would it be worth loading 7.62x39?

 

[Sam1911]

Whoops.

-Sam

 

[Jenrick]

Bare bones, $60-$80 using a Lee Loader or handpress. With a press probably about $150 if you do some serious shopping around.

You can reload match ammo for plinking prices or plinking ammo for half or less price even on common ammo. Large caliber expensive hunting rounds are usually a 60-80% savings.

Yes there is a ton of free readily available load data out there.

Good luck, and head over to the reloading forum they'll get you squared away.

-Jenrick

 

[mljdeckard]

A couple of years ago, I found $500 worth of RCBS setup slightly used on ebay for about $200.

The good news is that yes, when you cover your setup costs, it costs significantly less. The bad news is, when you handload, you shoot a lot MORE.

 

[woad_yurt]

For a Lee progressive press with .38 SPL dies, powder, primers, bullets, etc, it cost me about $300-$350 for everything I needed to start making my own. Now, I figure that it costs me maybe $5.00 (no more) to make 50 rounds. It costs roughly 1/3 the price of the cheapest factory ammo.

Reload! If you want to shoot, you won't regret it.

 

[Utah1]

I wouldn't reload 7.62x39. Too cheap by the case. After you buy all of the components, there wouldn't be that much of a savings and then you have to factor in your time as well as the cost of the reloading equipment.

For just about everything else I'd say go ahead and get into reloading. It won't save you any money however, you'll just wind up shooting more. At least thats been my experience.

 

[mljdeckard]

I completely agree. AK ammo isn't worth it. I suppose there are guys with bolt rifles who might want more precision, but I'm not one of them.

 

[Palehorseman]

Many variables involved. I started back in the 1960s with Lee Classic Loaders for about 10 bucks for each caliber, Lee still makes them for around $20.00 if shopped for right. Slow, but they produce very good ammo.

I currently have two older Dillons, cast my own boolits for both rifle and pistol, lots of powders and primers bought back in the days of cheap. I can handload most pistol calibers for less than 5 cents a round, rifle calibers for just a bit more.

With that said, dependent upon your needs or desires, today your mechanical reloading equipment can run from a few bucks, into the thousands.

New brass is expensive if purchased, (me, I pick up any and all reloadable brass) primers will run around $40.00 a thousand, powder about $20.00 +/- a pound. Condom bullets are expensive, shoot as cast boolits, (Lee makes low priced molds) much, much, less so, if one wants more precision cast boolits, bit more expense involved for mechanical equipment.

Something to bear in mind, there are 7,000 grains in a pound. If you reload say for a .38 Special, using 3.5 grains of Bullseye powder, that is 2,000 rounds from a pound of powder. For .45 acp, 3.8 to 4.2 grains of bullseye works great for me.

 

[MrWesson]

I just spent 270 on everything I need to reload and cast my own ammo(9mm). I got a lee turret press with a lee 4 die set among many other small things needed. It should serve me well for the next 10-20 years. I cant speak as to how much you will save but if you reload + cast you will save a ton. My figures put my cost at $2.40 per 50(casting free wheelweight and range brass) as opposed to 10-15 around here(if you can find it).

 

[Guy de Loimbard]

Reloading really begins to shine when you get into the less widely available calibers. The only .45 Colt available around here is $35/50rd, the last equivalent box I loaded ended up costing about $7. .45-70 and .38 Super are the same in my experience. Plus, the variety of bullet types and power levels is increased tenfold.

 

[IdahoLT1]

I havent priced initial costs in a long time but ~$350 would get you a very nice set up using a single stage press and most of your dies. ~$500 would get you a very nice progessive loader with all the dies. And those are probably a bit high.

It costs me ~$.30/round to load 110gr. Hornady Vmax varmint bullets for my .308. Really around the same cost for a good hunting bullet like Hornadys Amax or Noslers accubond. And last time i saw, all that crappy FMJ mil-surp 7.62x51 was ~$.50/round when bought in bulk.

Usually, if you shoot the same amount of ammo as you would if you didnt have a reloader, it will take a while to re-coup the initial costs. All reloading does is makes people shoot more for the same amount of money.

 

[supham]

I reload .380 of of necessity. It is not available in any quantity around me.

 

[youngda9]

Get a reloading manual and read it to understand what you're doing.

Price out the components to see for your particular caliber. General rule that I've found is that you can reload for 40% of well priced store ammo without much trouble.

 

[RandyP]

Like a local clothing store advertises "An educated consumer makes the best customer."

Read the stickies and posts here and on other reloading forums. I predict that whatever make gun you own there is a make specific forum out there and they too have a reloading section. Google is your friend. So is youtube (hundreds of pretty good reloading videos) as well as the Lee website help videos.

http://www.leeprecision.com/html/HelpVideos/video.html

Happy studying and shopping. Reloading is a GREAT hobby IMHO and there is a way to participate in it at all budget levels. Heck if I can learn it anybody can - lol - it is really not all that complicated or difficult to make perfectly safe, reliable and accurate ammunition. Yes, you have to be able to follow simple instructions and need to use common sense and have an attention span greater than a sand flea. But yes, you too can do it.

 

[mongoose33]

It's a combination of what you'll shoot, how much you'll shoot them, and what you buy components for.

I believe the big hidden issue for reloading, for new reloaders, is that to get down to the really low-cost ammo, you have to buy in bulk. You can't buy bullets 100 at a time, or powder a pound at a time, or primers 100 at a time, and expect to come out ahead.

Initially, you'll buy powder in 1# cans to try things out, but when you get to where you find a load you like you should buy the powder in 8# kegs. That'll cost you anywhere from $120-160, assuming you buy it online and factor in the hazmat charges.

Primers have to be bought in lots of 5000 or more to really get the price down. Same deal--hazmat charges bump up the cost.

And bullets? Assuming you do not cast your own, you need to buy them in lots of 2000 or more to get the really good prices.

The reward is ammo that costs 1/2 or even less than factory junk you buy at Wal-Mart. My .45 ammo is costing me 1/3 that of WWB at Wal-mart. I'm at half price for 9mm and .223.

Some of that bulk cost you can mitigate if you can find a buddy to split an order with you.

 

[Jonah71]

I gotta look into this. Glad I did a search. I shoot hundreds of rnds of 9mm, .380, .38 spec. Mostly 9mm. At the very least 2-400 rnds a week of 9's. Will go up if I get the CZ 75B I want next month. And I'll go through the 600 rnds of .357 mag. I have in no time this spring. Gotta replace the .357 I traded off first though. With that many rounds....I have to get another revolver... right? And I just got a Kimber .45acp (older and cheaper model), but according to a lot of what I've read on THR, I'll be too busy dealing with ftf's to worry about shooting it much. lol Sounds like re loading may be a practical thing for me to do. But I've never done it myself or even watched anyone. Thanks again. glad I found this thread and all the info.

 

[mcdonl]

But I've never done it myself or even watched anyone.

Youtube.com is your friend!

 

[Husker_Fan]

I got a Lee Challenger kit (the one with the hand primer) from Cabelas on sale. The kit was just over $100. I bought a set of .38 carbide dies for around $25. I already had a set of calipers and picked up a bullet puller pretty cheap.

Not including the cost of the equipment, my .38 rounds cost is about 12.5 cents each. My brass is from wwb I shot before I started reloading. If you devide the cost per round paid for wwb by the total times that brass can be fired (a lot for standard pressure .38 loads) the cost per case is about 1 cent. Primers were purchased at $30 per 1000 and I can still get that price locally (including tax). Powder cost is variable depending on load, but for a .38 plinking load it's about 3 cents. Cast bullets from Missouri Bullet Co. run about 6 cents each shipped.

That works out to a savings of over $10 per box of 50 over WWB from Wal-Mart. It doesn't take long to pay for the equipment.