The price of admission?

[tightgroup tiger]

My admission fee was free. My dad handed all his reloading equipment down to me when I got married and left home. I was the only one still using it anyways.
Lyman JR turret press with .243 dies, Redding Junior cheap C-frame aluminum press, Redding #1 Scale, .243, 30-30, and 32SPL dies and other things.

I had to load all his ammo for him and he would buy the supplies. I jumped all over it. The aluminum Redding junior bit the dust as the leverage pins got sloppy in the holes and kept falling out, from resizing 30-06 on it.
So upgraded to RCBS RCll for rifle and pistol, and years later when I could afford it, Hornady LNL-AP, and Lee ABLP for pistol and revolver rounds.

Admission Fee ? For me, Free.
Upgraded presses? Paid for themselves a long time ago.
Pay to Play, Consumables.... Now that one costs me a lot.

 

[tightgroup tiger]

I feel for folks buying new today.

I do to.

Then I "upgraded" to a Lee 1000 progressive press.
That didn't work out very well at all.

Didn't work out so well for me either. I tried loading on it but the constant jams and coming out of time got the best of me. I used it for punching out primers for years in my .357 mags but recently it simply gave up for good so it's under my bench now. I stole the handle parts off of it and put them on my ABLP press to help mitigate the side torquing from the roller handle. Always liked the ball handle better anyways, so part of that early model pro 1000 still lives on.
Bought it in early 80s also, I remember the box the pro 1000 came in said "The All New Pro 1000". They have been greatly improved since then. But I'll stick with my 4 and 5 station progressive presses now.

 

[Howland937]

I started out using my dad's stuff and buying powder/bullets/primers and dies for calibers I loaded. So not terribly expensive 20 years ago.

Stopped at an estate sale, bought the whole operation for $75 which included 12 sets of RCBS dies and an old Pacific 12 gauge progressive loader along with all the centerfire equipment. Turned it all over to my dad, and he used pieces to upgrade his operation.
Still cranking them out one at a time.

Yesterday a guy I barely know called me. Got my number from a friend that owns a LGS. Selling his Hornady LNL AP... Getting out of loading since he rarely shoots these days. Has receipts and all where he bought it 2 years ago, along with "everything else I have. Little bit of powder, couple hundred primers, 2 five gallon buckets of brass, and maybe some bullets"

So I'm upgrading.

 

[Dudedog]

First press was a Pacific shotgun press I went in 1/2 with my cousin. Want to say about $75 40 years ago.
First metallic was a Lee 3 hole turret and stuff for 9mm, around $200.
Of course now I have a few more $$$ worth of stuff......

 

[GT1]

Lee hand press kit(ram prime, funnel, lube etc) $50
Lee deluxe die set $40
Lee scale $20
FA calipers $15
Lee's Modern $20, was the most important tool I bought.

All that fit in a small tote I slid under the bed when not using, I loaded at the kitchen table.
Not a huge investment at the time, and I knew I could sell it and get a good chunk of the money back if it wasn't something for me.
So many things people think are needed for doing this are simply not.
Tumblers, bench, area, lighting, all that and a bolted down overpriced kit like a rock chuckit boat anchor really adds up quickly, for the same end result, but is much harder to recoup the investment if you find you made a mistake.

 

[Demi-human]

Yesterday a guy I barely know called me. Got my number from a friend that owns a LGS. Selling his Hornady LNL AP... Getting out of loading since he rarely shoots these days. Has receipts and all where he bought it 2 years ago, along with "everything else I have. Little bit of powder, couple hundred primers, 2 five gallon buckets of brass, and maybe some bullets"

Wow! You lucky such n’ such!
Great finds come looking for you!

 

[mdi]

True
I’ve also found that tools branded by the reloading companies are marked up quite a bit. Shopping wisely the same stuff can be had for much less. For instance the same calipers can be had at Harbor Freight. Aka all are the same Chinese stuff.

so one has to learn what really is out there.

An example I experienced; when I was building fishing rods I often use crutch tips as "butt pads/tips". If I bought them from a hardware store they ran about $.79. If I bought them (exact same design and manufacturer) from the store I got my building supplies they cost around $1.00. If I went to a medical supply and bought "crutch tips", again same item, they cost $1.49...

 

[murf]

price of admission - free

started reloading back in the sixties: first helping my dad reload for our ground hog hunting, and deer hunting, soon loading my own. i think i was about eight years old when i got to loading my own hunting ammo on that big heavy lachmiller press. my first setup came much later using a cheap lee o-press and whatever dies needed to shoot my handguns.

the lessons i learned loading varmint rounds are still priceless: consistency, attention to detail, record keeping.

murf

 

[Howland937]

Wow! You lucky such n’ such!
Great finds come looking for you!

I won't post the price because I'm almost ashamed. It was his price, so I don't feel bad. Hopefully he still has the instructional dvd or whatever

 

[3% outdoorsman]

Started out with a lee a kit with the c press and then added a lee challenger press to speed things up.i wore out all the cutters,chamfer tool and eventually broke primer arm on lee hand primer and the challenger press broke also.lee sent me free replacement parts and I sold the lee stuff to a friend real cheap.

Only had $200 or so invested in the lee stuff along with some lyman hand tools and made thousands of rounds but I wanted to upgrade.

So new set up is rcbs, Redding mixture of stuff. no kit bought just ordered what I wanted.probably $600-700 total invested in equipment/tools.

Now I'm thinking of upgrading some dies for precision rifle rounds.

Brass,bullets and powder is a whole different story

 

[AJC1]

It's funny to me to hear that a Chargemaster is part of a 'bare bones' loading setup.

Scoops ? Sure.
A Lee scale ? Okay
A Lee Perfect Powder Measure ? I could be convinced of that.

A $350 Chargemaster ? Ummmm....well....


No harm intended my friend, just seemed strange to me.

That's what he had or I could buy something. I had a very different start from most, but had I been in my home state when my dad passed I might have more stuff than most. I actually use my herters powder throw a lot more now but the only scale I have is on the chargemaster so I have to use that to set it.
I guess my drill press for case prep is just as bad. I had it so that's what I use.

 

[Ironicaintit]

I got into the hobby when my dad passed, and I got all his stuff.
An old Lyman Spar-T, Lyman scale and trimmer, RCBS uniflow, hand primers, a bunch of 70-80s vintage dies, powder, primers, bunch of brass, books, books and books.
I’ve added very little to the mix besides maintenance items, and gave the Spar-T an overhaul.
As an added bonus, I got to sort through a ton of ammo that had both good and bad in it.
My first exercises loading were with tearing down and rebuilding dubious lots.
Thank God for the collet puller!

learned a lot. Catalog/mark freakin everything, alcohol and reloading don’t mix, and if you have cataracts, have somebody else inspect your brass!
Not meant as an insult to my dad... I’d still rather have him than the gear

 

[AJC1]

I got into the hobby when my dad passed, and I got all his stuff.
An old Lyman Spar-T, Lyman scale and trimmer, RCBS uniflow, hand primers, a bunch of 70-80s vintage dies, powder, primers, bunch of brass, books, books and books.
I’ve added very little to the mix besides maintenance items, and gave the Spar-T an overhaul.
As an added bonus, I got to sort through a ton of ammo that had both good and bad in it.
My first exercises loading were with tearing down and rebuilding dubious lots.
Thank God for the collet puller!

learned a lot. Catalog/mark freakin everything, alcohol and reloading don’t mix, and if you have cataracts, have somebody else inspect your brass!
Not meant as an insult to my dad... I’d still rather have him than the gear

I feel exactly the same. My dad reloaded everything but in his last two years taking chemo his quality just fell off a cliff. His bucket of 9mm he sent me was the only squibs I ever had. I threw out 200 rounds probably stupid but better safe than sorry.

 

[Ironicaintit]

I feel exactly the same. My dad reloaded everything but in his last two years taking chemo his quality just fell off a cliff. His bucket of 9mm he sent me was the only squibs I ever had. I threw out 200 rounds probably stupid but better safe than sorry.

Yeah I didn’t throw much out, but I was busier than a cat tryin to bury a turd on a frozen lake, tearing it all down, truing all the brass, and cataloging. Took years to get through it all.

 

[AJC1]

Yeah I didn’t throw much out, but I was busier than a cat tryin to bury a turd on a frozen lake, tearing it all down, truing all the brass, and cataloging. Took years to get through it all.

These were cast bullets when I was buying primers at 3 cents and picking up free brass. Had they been nice bullets I would have done differently. I had my 7th squib for the day and I was just done and pissed.

 

[presspuller]

I lucked up and found a widow lady that wanted to sell her dead husbands stuff. I bought it sight unseen for $200 (she named the price), all I knew was it was green equipment, by her description. At the time the RCBS rock chucker kit was $225. I got everything that was in the rock chucker kit, a brand new unopened Rcbs piggyback II, the case prep station, case trimmer, about 4k primers, about 10 lbs of different powders, about 5k of different bullets, dies for most of everything I shoot, plus a lot more I have traded/sold off. A few reloading books was in there as well, oh, and a case tumbler and separator, a hammer bullet puller and enough corn cob to last the rest of my days.
It pays to keep an eye out for someone in the same boat she was.

 

[Shak3s1977]

For my 40th Birthday my wife was stashing money so I could buy a Colt Competition 1911. She wasn't able to save quite all of it, but had 75% of it. I could have saved another month or so, but I decided as much as I wanted that Colt, I wanted into reloading instead. My dad was using a single stage, and I knew I wouldn't be happy with a single stage. I ended up with a Dillon 550 in 38/357.

To this day, I'm glad I made that choice. My wife and both my kids shoot, so I can afford to feed all of their guns too. I plink with a 45-70, and at $49.00 for 20 rounds that gets pricey. I now cast and can load those same 20 rounds for $3.20. I'm averaging about 500-600 rounds a year in 45-70 so I save a ton there.

Only bad thing? I sure have accumulated a lot of crap in 2 years lol. Dies, conversions, molds, trimmers, etc. It never ends lol.

 

[AJC1]

For my 40th Birthday my wife was stashing money so I could buy a Colt Competition 1911. She wasn't able to save quite all of it, but had 75% of it. I could have saved another month or so, but I decided as much as I wanted that Colt, I wanted into reloading instead. My dad was using a single stage, and I knew I wouldn't be happy with a single stage. I ended up with a Dillon 550 in 38/357.

To this day, I'm glad I made that choice. My wife and both my kids shoot, so I can afford to feed all of their guns too. I plink with a 45-70, and at $49.00 for 20 rounds that gets pricey. I now cast and can load those same 20 rounds for $3.20. I'm averaging about 500-600 rounds a year in 45-70 so I save a ton there.

Only bad thing? I sure have accumulated a lot of crap in 2 years lol. Dies, conversions, molds, trimmers, etc. It never ends lol.

There's nothing quite like a Trail Boss load for 4570. Compared to a load of 30 31 or 4198 you're not even in the same game

 

[Shak3s1977]

There's nothing quite like a Trail Boss load for 4570. Compared to a load of 30 31 or 4198 you're not even in the same game

I'll have to try and find some then. My plinking load is 30gr of IMR 4198 behind a 405gr cast. Seems light and is really accurate out of my 1895.

 

[horsemen61]

I started a little over 11 years ago I had a friend my mentor actually write down what I needed I started with a breech lock challenger kit from Lee other than the safety scale it all worked great I believe to get started the kit was $120 and I spent another 80 bucks so all in all $200 bucks I started with the 30-06 I’ve lost track of how much I’ve since spent on just tools and improving my setup.....


But it’s better than the people I know who wasted that money at a bar or on a brand new ride that depreciated faster than my stuff ever will and it makes me happy

 

[Hooda Thunkit]

But it’s better than the people I know who wasted that money at a bar

What's the old saying ?

Over the years I spent almost all my money on whiskey and women. The rest I just wasted.