Is there any point in buying a reloader now?

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MikeSD said:
I just picked up a brand new, in the box, Dillon 550C, with 9mm conversion kit, for exactly Dillon prices. Nice. And I have found 3500 primers (1000 Small Pistol, 2500 Large Pistol), so I think I'm good to go. Got some 3 die sets for 9mm and 10mm for about $50 each. I have 124gr and 180gr Hornady XTP bullets. And I have found 6 pounds of CFE and Power Pistol at good price.

Looks like I'm good to go, for now. I will be looking for other dies and conversion kits in .223, .357, .44, .45 Colt, and 45 ACP, but will take my time looking for deals on those.
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Sounds like you're set! Have fun and be safe.
 
I was driving out in the rural county today and came across an outdoors store. They had primers from various manufactures.

They had a 300 limit (3 trays) for $6/100. I picked up 300 Federal Small Pistol for $18. Tomorrow I'm going to get 300 Small Rifle. Not bad compared to the $300/1000 some are charging. Got a pound of CFE223 and about 1000 9mm and 45 ACP brass.

They said I could get 300/day. Total spent $169. Nice! Oh! And that included a pair of sandals for my wife.
 
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MikeSD said:
I was driving out in the rural county today and came across an outdoors store. They had primers from various manufactures.

They had a 300 limit (3 trays) for $6/100. I picked up 300 Federal Small Pistol for $18. Tomorrow I'm going to get 300 Small Rifle. Not bad compared to the $300/1000 some are charging. Got a pound of CFE223 and about 600 9mm and 45 ACP brass.

They said I could get 300/day. Total spent $169. Nice! Oh! And that included a pair of sandals for my wife.
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Nice score. Especially the sandals. Never miss an opportunity to make the wife happy.
 
Taking everything into account I decided not to wait. In the time since posting thus thread I have acquired

1) 7500 primers (small pistol, small rifle, large pistol). And I averaged about $8/hundred. Have at least 2000 in each size. I did buy my first box of small pistol for $240, but got it local and didn't have shipping or hazmat tacked on

2) Brand new Dillon 550C in unopened box for $475. I so bought 9mm, 10mm, 45 ACP conversion kits at normal retail price. Also got a couple of extra tool heads. I also bought an Inline Fabrication mount.

3) bought 9mm, 10mm, 45ACP, 45Colt carbide dies for about $60 each.

4) 7 pounds of various pistol powders and some CFE223 at good prices

5) about 700 bullets in 9mm and 10mm (my initial need)

6) 500 9mm cases and 500 45 ACP cases ($49 each). Still need 10mm brass. I have about 700 rounds now of commercial 10mm so can reload that.

7) and just this Monday I found another New Dillon press (XL 750) for $670. Its in box and never opened.. Bought 9mm and 45ACP conversion kits. Also got a strong arm mount and bullet tray. But l probably switch mounts with the 550. Also looking for case feeder.

8) my source for primers has run out of most now at 6.99 but still have CCI #41 for 7.99. 3 tray limit but I take my wife and get 6 everyday. 7.99 is still high but far better than the 25-40 some are charging.

I'm going to setup my 550c for 10mm and my 750 for 9mm. If I can find another Dillon, I might get a third press running, cranking out .223.

I doubt I've spent $3000 for everything. My wife keeps asking "are you about done buying stuff?"

Still looking...
 
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BBarn said:
Now is not really a good time to buy anything gun related. Excepting discontinued items on sale, very little is available at a discount. Buy only what is actually needed now.

When the hoarding stops, prices will drop. There is sufficient manufacturing capacity to satisfy normal demand.
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I don't believe you can "hoard" things that aren't available.
 
Well, time will tell if you won or lost. Sometimes the sure thing beats waiting for a deal to manifest itself though. Now to get to actually do some reloading. If you are like most of us (ME) this will just be the start of another interconnecting hobby to do with shooting. Just don't tell the wife that though. :D You can "just one more thing" yourself for years--------I have.:p
 
FROGO207 said:
Well, time will tell if you won or lost.If you are like most of us (ME) this will just be the start of another interconnecting hobby to do with shooting.
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I started reloading in 1985. Just stopped a few years ago. Bad timing.
 
If you're on the fence, in the early 90s, during the Clinton ammo/primer/component shortage I got a couple of guys into reloading. By the time they got their equipment set up and found components, the shortage was over. But they stuck with it and they stockpiled components, and never suffered during the 2008 to 2012 shortages, nor during the 2019 to present shortages. Same thing with the guys I got into reloading in 2008. The shortages ended before they really got going.....but they are fine during this shortage. So I say to you folks that are still on the fence.......you may not get it all going right away, and ammo may come back before you turn out your first home roll.........but we will have more shortages. Be the guy ready for it, and not the guy regretting never getting into it.
 
You could wait & hope the prices come down or look around to find the lowest price you can to buy now. From what I have seen in the past the prices drop real slow. With Dimbulb as president who knows what he could do to the reloading industry. If he outlaws anything reloading the prices will go way up. It's your gamble.
 
Some things are still pricey and hard to find - primers, certain powders, some dies and presses - but other things are selling at bargain prices from online sellers - some kinds of range brass, discontinued bullets, the more popular powders made domestically or in Canada, and a few other smaller items. In part this is because primers are still costly and rare; without primers, specifically small pistol and small rifle, fewer people in the mag-dump club are able to reload, depressing prices on other components and keeping 9mm/5.56mm at the top of the factory production charts. I've had no problem finding new .40S&W brass, clean, LP .45ACP brass, .38Spl brass, etc. I even found bargains on .380 brass, including here on THR.

Go ahead and stock up on what's cheap because once primers come back, bullets and brass will go back up in price. Cannister powders won't really be effected by factory production; factories don't use cannister powders for boxed shelf ammo. That's why they came back first after the lock-downs ended. Factories DO use the same primers as boxed shelf primers (according to Vista and Fiocchi, at least) which is why they're slower coming back.
 
Dude's reference to canister powder raises a question. My modern era experience doesn't go back that far.

I recently had a discussion with a clerk at a local gun store re: reloading components. Their claim was all powders were being used in factory ammo and thus the shortages. All powders? They said yes. Didn't sound plausible to me.Too many options from too many origins to say that is where it is ALL going.

* Edited to say that I would believe that ALL powders were developed with either military or civilian factory ammo in mind.......and in the big picture....... any powders sold in canister sized quantities to the reloading market is no more than a flea on the dog's back. It thus follows that unless there is a bulk demand for a particular product, the physical product won't exist in bulk or canister form, even if it is a known and described product.

So question is......in "normal" times, are the shelves lined or "in stock" options normally available for any of the commonly listed powders? Or are some nearly impossible to find then too?
 
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Same with bullets. I've been able to find suitable bullets from Hornady for everything I'm loading for. Have yet to find ANY Sierra bullets I want for anything. Same with brass that is not Lapua....(which is 2X to 3X cost of alternatives like Starline).

Would all these components normally be available or rare sightings there as well?
 
Howa 9700 said:
Same with bullets. I've been able to find suitable bullets from Hornady for everything I'm loading for. Have yet to find ANY Sierra bullets I want for anything. Same with brass that is not Lapua....(which is 2X to 3X cost of alternatives like Starline).

Would all these components normally be available or rare sightings there as well?
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Depends on how popular an item is. Powders and bullets are manufactured commodities. They take time, skilled labor and materials to produce. If a supplier of some essential material, let’s say for example frog toes, just to illustrate the point, they capture the market on the frog toes critical to making the very popular Powder X, then a few things can happen: the price of Powder X goes up while the availability goes down; or, the competition buys all the frog toes from the capturing supplier and comes out with their own Powder X-Squared (better than X, it’s Squared!) driving down the demand for Powder X but not the demand for frog toes; or, the supplier and manufacturer arrive at an agreement to keep supplies and prices unchanged while still benefiting the supplier for capturing the frog toes market and the manufacturer for protecting their formula.
Some powders have broad market appeal while others are only popular to a niche market. We live in a world of scarce resources; where does it make the most sense to use the resources available?
 
Still not sure I'm understanding. For example, there are somewhere around 170 powders listed in the burn charts. I have been able to find A powder that works for each of my calibers........will load something that goes bang. Perhaps not THE powder I wanted, but A powder.

In normal times, can I expect to find THE powder? Or should I expect it to be the case that some powders (and other components) while they exist in theory, will almost never show up on a shelf that I can buy?

Trying to decide what my realistic expectations should be. To date, I've grabbed something that will go bang out of theory that something was better than nothing. If that is the normal state of things, then so be it.
 
Howa 9700 said:
In normal times, can I expect to find THE powder?
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I think the answer to that is MAYBE. I know a guy that likes Varget, and has been using it for years. He told me that when/if he finds it, he will buy a few pounds, but that he doesn't find it often. So he also works up loads for other powders. Some powders are common enough to find eaily/often since they may not be as popular.

If I have a powder that I like, I try to buy enough that I can load and shoot using that powder for a couple years. Two pounds will generally do that for me, for others it may be much more.

chris
 
The propellant manufacturers are the same as ammo manufacturers. They have large contracts that make them a lot of profit. Then when that demand is sated they shift to the next most popular. Rinse and repeat, just like the brass manufacturers. Most canister grade propellants are on a repeatable production run schedule in order of quantity needed. Less changes = more output/profit. The products with less total needed stock have less surplus stored between runs. We end up with unprecedented demand and they are now playing catch up. Lucky are the ones that their favorate canister propellant is also a commercial one used in volume. They just make a years supply for the canister market after satisfying their big order and move on to the next one down the list.
The interval could be less than a year to repeat or even two years. We just have to be patient folks.
 
FROGO207 said:
The propellant manufacturers are the same as ammo manufacturers. They have large contracts that make them a lot of profit. Then when that demand is sated they shift to the next most popular. Rinse and repeat, just like the brass manufacturers. Most canister grade propellants are on a repeatable production run schedule in order of quantity needed. Less changes = more output/profit. The products with less total needed stock have less surplus stored between runs. We end up with unprecedented demand and they are now playing catch up. Lucky are the ones that their favorate canister propellant is also a commercial one used in volume. They just make a years supply for the canister market after satisfying their big order and move on to the next one down the list.
The interval could be less than a year to repeat or even two years. We just have to be patient folks.
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Some powders and bullets are around for the lifetime of the industry, too. Laflin & Rand-DuPont-Hercules-Alliant Unique and Bullseye powders are still in production after over a hundred years. HS-7 was replaced by Longshot, Hi-Skor 800X is going away, who knows what's replacing it? There are lots of the old Laflin & Rand and Hercules powders that are still around with old and new names - 2400, Red Dot, Bullseye, Unique, Herco - they survive because they are still in use. Sharpshooter, Lightning and Infallible went away despite being very popular but "better" powder formulations came around. If HiVel #6 was your preferred powder for .30-06 in 1941, you were a sad puppy by 1945. Time to buy some of that newfangled IMR 4895 stuff...
 
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