P5 Guy
Member
It is always good to be prepared, gather the components you'll need. Load up some to prove your handloads. Now you are ready for that 'rainy day' when the next panic hits.
I'm like DB in that I don't get a lot enjoyment out of hand loading, but since I can generally hand load ammo for roughly half the price of factory ammo, there's an economic incentive.
Also, the good thing about stock piling components is that powders and primers can be interchanged to load different cartridges. So although I may not hand load 9mm often, I can use W231 to load 40 S&W or 45 ACP. Gives me options.
We're at the same place. I'm trying to standardize down to a few powders and buy lots of it.
Took me a little while to respond to this. Their hazmat fee to Alaska is ninety dollars!!!!!!!I And it must ship next day air. Cost prohibitive. I really don't know how we survive up here.This summer is going to be an excellent time to do just that. As families concentrate on vacations, powder and primer prices will drop even more. Powders are already down from $170/ 8 lb to less than $150.
Graf & Sons is currently giving you a free 1 lb can if you buy one of a dozen 8 lb jugs for $128. That works out to be less than $15/ lb !! Their HazMat is also down around $12.
https://www.grafs.com/
D.B. Cooper asked:
To load or not to load...9mm
That sure sounds funny.Their hazmat fee to Alaska is ninety dollars!!!!!!!I And it must ship next day air.
Took me a little while to respond to this. Their hazmat fee to Alaska is ninety dollars!!!!!!!I And it must ship next day air. Cost prohibitive. I really don't know how we survive up here.
There is a market for it for sure. We have only two dedicated ammo/reloading stores, and one of those is an hour drive away. I don't really have the start-up capital to make it work. Plus, I used to work at a gun store...I don't think there really is a lot of mark-up/profit margin in this industry. If I were to invest time and money into a business, I'm not sure it would be guns and ammo-at least not for the long haul. You can, however, make a good short-run profit by simply hoarding and scalping ammo at the next election. We complain about the ethics of that, but is any different than cash-flow investing in the stock market?Might be time for you to step up and open your own reloading supply store in Alaska.
Instead of Powder Valley, you could call it Powder Igloo.
I have no idea exactly why it is that way, but I suspect it has to do with transport of hazmat materials through Canada opening up a whole can of worms.That sure sounds funny.
I didn't think powder/primers could go air, I thought it was ground only for HAZMAT.
I have never had a factory box of ammo shoot like this. Don't mind the holes with the slit in them as those are from previous shooting. The red marked ones are 124gr RMR matchwinners at 21ft.I really enjoy reloading because I can sit back and say yeah, I made that and look what it did (accuracy) compared to something I would spend more $ on. As far as 9mm goes I load on a LCT with an auto drum and case kicker. Its faster then single stage or powder drops but still time consuming. I usually load a bunch of 9mm during the winter, rainy days, etc. and don't much care how much time it took. I wait until I have a bunch of it and then shoot it. Right now I have about 400rds completed and I will be saving those until my stash gets to 1k and then I will pick away at it. Yeah, the cost savings aren't much but my ammo is more accurate, cheaper and it gives me something to do on crappy days other than watch TV. Yes its worth it to me.
So it looks like Federal dropped their aluminum cased 9mm (i.e. cheap) ammo. Does anyone else make a cheap ($7-8/box of 50) 9mm 115grn FMJ? The next best things I can find are Magtech and Winchester NATO at $10/box and Blazer Brass at $11/box. (I'm gun shy about steel cased ammo so avoiding it.)
So at 20¢/ round compared to about 12¢/ round, I'm not sure I should go in to loading 9mm. I use a Lee LCT turret press and can produce about 125 rounds per hour. I figure I can load 9mm for about 12¢/rd; that only saves me about 8¢/rd, or about $10/hr. I'm also loading 44 special at about 14¢/round, but on that caliber, I'm saving 46¢/ round, or about $57/hr. I hate to pay $10-$12/box of ammo for 9mm, but according to basic economic principles, I should be focusing on loading 44 spl; any time I spend reloading 9mm is an economic loss.
Scenario 1: I'm doing this purely as a cost cutting strategy, I don't need hyper-accurate ammo, and that I'm not reloading for the joy and/or sake of reloading in and of itself, what do you guys think? Should I even gear up to reload for 9mm?
Scenario 2: Massive ammo shortages. Should I gear up to reload 9mm not as a cost cutting measure but as a hedge against market fluctuations/hyper-inflation? And if the answer yes, why wouldn't I just buy as much loaded ammo right now as I possibly can afford?
A lot of truth to that.Net net at 12 cents per round a box of 50 would be $6. At this point its more about enjoyment of reloading than cost savings!