California reloading

The main problem I had as a reloader in L.A. area was the lack of supplies. Very few places to purchase components, so most of my powder and primers were purchased online, and I started casting my own bullets. I lived in the southern part of L.A. county, and while there were several places to purchase ammo (some vendors made you sign a form and show ID for ammo, some didn't), I had no sources for reloading components, but Angeles Gun Club, located north of me about 1 1/2 hrs freeway time, had a "real" reloading store.. As far as reloading laws go I believe the only "restrictions" are Fire Department regulations for powder storage (a non-regulation for most). I escaped L.A. about 3 years ago so things may have changed...

I don't think you can hunt with cast lead slugs in some areas.. perhaps in some areas not even jacketed lead? Anyway, good luck and make the best of it.

Depends on what you mean by "Los Angeles area".

There are restrictions on what can be purchased online and shipped to you in the city of Los Angeles that do not apply to other L. A. County cities.

Turner's Outdoorsman is always an option for supplies, I'm not a big fan of theirs but I'll let you judge 'em.

There's no big restrictions on reloading other than variable F.D. storage requirements.

The current restriction on bullet types applies to hunting in the Condor zone so far, but that's a constant battle.

Good Luck!

^
Snake Plissken would know what he was talking about.

Biggest worries for CA ( prior resident) relates to shipping...even if its allowed, most outfits won't ship to CA period, the laws are so complex.

As far as reloading components, aside from price- you will have no issues.

Lead in Condor areas is a big no-no...check your maps...they change them semi-annually with the rising and setting of the crystal blue tide and mithril shadows....yes, thats a joke...but they do redraw them very frequently. LA county is horrible.... If you have any choice, move to Kern County...Donny Youngblood is the only sheriff within the state it seems thats pro carry....they issue with some regularity. In addition, there are some great ranges and stores within 30 minutes of just about anywhere in kern....good luck in LA.

When you drive across the country, stop in Tennessee or Missouri or Kansas at one of the several great reloading supply places and buy enough 8 pounders of powder and cases of primers to last you 5 or 10 years.

You also might can have goodies shipped to the UPS Customer Service Center in another county (or even Nevada) and held at the counter for you.

You're talking about the Hwy. 101 corridor, which gives you the options of LA, Ventura, Santa Barbara or San Luis Obispo Counties. Of those, if forced to move back there (kicking and screaming and clawing), I'd pick SLO County. It's pretty yuppie with the wine crowd, but still pretty pro-gun. In northern SLO County, Paso Robles area, you'll find Hogue Grips and lots of other small firearm related companies.

Of course you're going to have to pay the 8%+ sales tax on everything you buy there. The farther you are from LA and SF, the better off you are. SLO County would put you about half way between those two bastions of anti-gun rhetoric, plus there is a great range at Morro Bay.

Hope this helps.

Fred

It might not be a bad idea to run this past some of the folks in the reloading forum on calguns (hope I don't get skinned here for posting that).

Even though I'm in CA, I'm not in LA--so I'm not sure what restrictions (if any) there are for getting components.

Powder limit 20# without a permit, primers 5k...like they will really know.
Powder Valley ships here no problem as well as Wideners, Midway, and several other outfits. At the LGS just find Miwall....they didn't gouge too bad during the great shortages and even had reasonable rationing to help keep as many people as possible into the sports.

Gunshops are slowly dropping out as the restrictions placed on their businesses is slowly grinding them down. Big 5 usually nails you on loaded ammo, Turners isn't as bad and ususally stocks a limited amount of reloading supplies.

Most "exotic"ammo and tracers in general are no-no's.

Go to Calguns and read through their threads; you'll figure it out. Of course if you have a specific question, some of us locals may be able to help.

Any questions?

Moderator, thanks for deleting my last post. I was asked about what's wrong with L.A. and I gave my opinion from working for the city for 25 years and living in the area for 60 years. Sorry, I didn't know about the site's censorship policys.

Welcome to California!

Although there are some annoying restrictions, all-in-all, it's not that bad.

There's a great range near Morro Bay (several minutes drive from San Luis Obispo) that hosts pistol/rifle matches and you can have a nice lunch/dinner overlooking the ocean at Morro Bay just a few minutes away.

I do most of my reloading shopping online and get some components (powder, primers, etc.) at Central Coast gun shows if the price is right (I check with the vendor before the show and they bring the components I want to buy at the show).

BTW, if you like to ride quad/dune buggies, Pismo/Oceano Dunes is just south of San Luis Obispo and you can even drive/camp on the beach!

Hope you enjoy your stay.

As already refered to.

Last year I had a good time shooting a few times at an outdoor gun range just west of San Luis Obispo on hwy 1.

http://www.slosa.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=1&Itemid=7

don't openly carry an unloaded handgun in CA since jan1st... Nor concealed carry. You can own one, but you just can't carry it I guess. Injunction against the governor is in the courts -- californiarighttocarry.org.. Openly carrying an ar15 is a-okay tho -- I bought one jan 1st.

edfardos

edfardos said:

don't openly carry an unloaded handgun in CA since jan1st... Nor concealed carry. You can own one, but you just can't carry it I guess. Injunction against the governor is in the courts -- californiarighttocarry.org.. Openly carrying an ar15 is a-okay tho -- I bought one jan 1st.

edfardos

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C'mon, really? You can open-carry an AR-15 in Ca. but not a handgun? Really???

Just when you think gun laws can't get any more ridiculous, they do!

yah everyone carries 16" firearms now instead. An new bill was introduced as a result, to ban long guns as well. I donated money to the injunction -- hoping the courts rule against the state.

re reloading in CA, it's cheap and easy here in northern half of the state. The northeast part of CA is a very conservative region -- the constitution is still he law of the land here.. My local store sells supplies cheaper than online places.

--edfardos

I reload down in Oceanside (not too far from LA). You're pretty much at the mercy of online retailers for components save for a handful of locations that usually don't have what you're looking for. I know plenty of people within my local gun club that reload with no issue. In all honesty its really the only way in CA with all the restrictions on purchasing ammo and everything else that goes with it. There is a fine art of legally subverting california gun/ammunition laws that I've noticed some Californians have become quite adept at. The calguns forums are an excellent resource for such things, although their reloading section is lacking. Thus my presence here.

The good thing about CA is there is no shortage of federal land to drive out to and blast off rounds to your heart's content. Unless of course you enjoy paying to wait in line to damage your hearing and breathe lead particles at your local (or not so local) indoor shooting range. There aren't many here.

CaneCorso85 says Oceanside isn't too far from L.A.......mileage wise he's right; it's only about 85 miles from my city to his. Time wise is a much different story depending on time of day. It can take me two hours just to get past Irvine (last big city in Orange County on way down to Oceanside) which is about the half way point. Wherever you end up, remember that mileage and time do not necessarily correspond well. A shop 10 miles away may be 1 hour away depending on direction and time of day.

Edit: If out in SLO or Ventura county, travel time isn't so bad. Once you hit L.A. and O.C...all bets are off. Figure L.A. county has almost twice the population in 40% of the area compared to your state.

I'll agree with the comments on SLO. Morro Bay is just one of a number of neat little cities along that stretch. Like ReloaderFred, if I were forced to return to California I would want to move into that same area. Nice college town, great bicycling, wineries, pretty coastal towns, kayaking, horse country, etc., etc.

I think that the Hunter Ligget area just up the road is one of the major hog hunting areas, but would have to check on that. Then of course there are Cambria, Monterey and Carmel all within a couple of hours to the north.

The San Luis Obispo Sportsmen's Association is the home of the Hogue (yeah, THAT Hogue) action pistol range which hosts the International Revolver Championship each year. It was our regular "go to" event when I was in competition as an excuse to vacation in town.

Reloading is not an issue other than the aforementioned possible local laws on storage of powders and primers. Usually amounts to some limit on quantity. It was never a problem for me. I only reloaded for .38 spl for competition so generally kept maybe 8 pounds of powder and 5000 primers on hand.

I used to purchase my powder and primers at a club I belonged to in the SF Bay area which sold them to members at cost plus 6% and bought bullets and brass on line or by phone.

Also have to second SHR970's remark about travel in L.A. proper. Major bummer; maybe two hours of stop and go traffic to go 20 miles. The 24 hour diamond lane says it all.

Orange County is a rats nest of freeways that feel like canyons. We lived in the SF Bay area for 19 years after leaving Orange County. Every so often I'd get irritated with the bogged down 680 freeway from San Jose up through Pleasanton in the bay area then a trip to OC would put my head straight. After OC the bay area seemed like farmville on the freeways.

edfardos said:

re reloading in CA, it's cheap and easy here in northern half of the state. The northeast part of CA is a very conservative region -- the constitution is still he law of the land here.. My local store sells supplies cheaper than online places.

--edfardos

Click to expand...

It's good to hear at least part of the State is fighting back. Keep up the good work!

ahh yes, Jefferson.... the holdout of sanity in CA.

Want to echo those who have said positive things about the SLO area. I'm down in San Diego - not that bad, in general, and not without ranges or stores or public lands for shooting - but central coast is my favorite part of the state. Beautiful, still quite uncrowded, and great if you love wine, the ocean, rolling hills, quiet, and empty roads.

And yes, I am probably the only person in SD who not infrequently does wine-tasting and shooting on the same Saturday (and yes, again, the shooting BEFORE the tasting). Having wine and guns as your two main non-athletic hobbies makes for amusing contrasts.

Reloading is, as noted by some, only a matter of (mysterious? ever enforced?) local fire department storage restrictions on powders and primers. Otherwise, I have no issues - online, look for deals, buy from locals via Calguns or Craigslist esp. for primers and bullets (no bar on ammo or component sales there). I think I get my components at decent prices and there are no CA-specific issues for most (the poster above was correct about LA City and SF - ? - having restrictions on mail-order ammo shipments).

Actually the only two SoCal component brick-and-mortar sources rumored to be decent for component selection and price are in the LA area - Angeles range store (mentioned above) and Phillips Wholesale, in Covina (http://www.phillipswholesale.net/home.html). Haven't been to either. Ammo Bros. (two locations) might also have reloading potential, not sure.

The CalGuns Foundation, NRA, Second Amendment Foundation et al are having some successes having CA's ridiculous gun laws overturned in the courts. But it's really like some sort of Marx Bros. movie - the "legislature" keeps churning out dozens of absurd, unconstitutional, frivolous laws like a machine. Most serious, intelligent Americans wouldn't believe how extravagantly the state is mismanaged. Your best bet to avoid the self-inflicted wounds of CA's sad public life is to stick to more rural and less ruined jurisdictions like SLO County or Ventura County.

Northern L.A. is still Southern Calif.

You are located in a condor protection zone.

So for hunting near home/work you will need to use solid copper bullets out in the field.

If you travel way north by many hours on the road, 10+, this will get you out of the condor protection zone, and then you can use normal lead core copper jacketed soft/expansion point bullets. But unless you plan to do that a lot, then for hunting you might as well stick with solid copper bullets instead.

Your protection loads at home can be anything you want. But if you plan to pack your piece in the USFS or BLM lands with you for hiking or camping, the loads need to be solid copper then. Or else someone may give you a really hard time about it even though you are not shooting just packing.

The condor, a regal looking but dummazz bird, is being out-competed for habitat by the ordinary turkey vulture here. So until they all die off, this lead bullet prohibition will continue in effect for areas south of Monterey where this dummazz buzzard still flies.

You can order most of what you need in California to reload from Cabella's online or by phone and take delivery by FedEx.

Power may be a different story, and primers, and for these you would want to find a nice local gunshoppe. In Old English, a gunshoppe is a shoppe that deals in guns, whether long guns or short guns, like shotguns, rifles, revolvers or pistols. We have plenty of those. Gun was not always a nasty word.

So if you can order it, you can load it. But if you get caught with it in the field, a DFG LEO will be inspecting your ammo, so depending on where you are hunting, you need to have the right ammo.