Plinking Ammo: Pulled bullets vs. Inexpensive NEW bullets?

[tjd308]

I've been buying "premium" or at least premium priced bullets from Hornady, Sierra, and Nosler exclusively but it has dawned on me recently that I might be throwing cash away and if the goal is to shoot so I can improve my skills, I might be able to shoot more if I lower the cost of the rounds. More rounds = more shooting = more skills = more fun...is the logic anyways.

I'm mostly referring to bullets for autoloaders like my AR-15 or M1 Garand. I'm willing to pay a little premium for better components in my bolt guns due to the low volume. Buying 1,000 bullets for $80-120 for plinking ammo is a pretty cool thought as long as it isn't total junk. I'd be going from $0.15/rd to $0.08/rd for 55 grain BTFMJ Hornady versus pulled for example.

Just for context, most of my shooting will be at 100 yards, but out to as much as 400 or so.

Questions:

• How much accuracy will I potentially suffer by going to a) pulled bullets b) inexpensive bullets, compared to the higher end stuff?
• Where the heck do all of these pulled bullets come from? What was wrong with them or the complete rounds they were a part of to get pulled out and sold separate?
• Any recommendations on particular online sites for purchase, manufacturers, etc? (the first one I came across from a Google search for a point of reference of what I'm looking at can be found here)

 

[ColtPythonElite]

I bought a couple of thousand pulled 125 gr. .38 caliber bullets from RMR. I cannot detect any measurable accuracy difference in them compared to the 125 gr Montana Gold JHP bullets that I normally use....I have shot both from a lever .357 rifle out to 200 yards.

 

[kingmt]

That really depends on both what you can do & what you want to do. If you can't sit better then 8" groups at 100 yards then you won't do any better with good bullets. If you want to shoot 1" or under then you need something better then FMJ.

 

[tjd308]

That really depends on both what you can do & what you want to do. If you can't sit better then 8" groups at 100 yards then you won't do any better with good bullets. If you want to shoot 1" or under then you need something better then FMJ.

I know that FMJ isn't used for any sort of match ammo. Just so I can learn, why is that? I assume the process doesn't yield a very concentric round with heavy spots on it if you will? FMJ is a more cost effective way to make a decent round I guess? I'm all ears. Posting all these questions hoping to learn from you guys.

Thanks!

 

[Hardtarget]

The first time I shot Hornady V-max they were pulled bullets. I was very pleased with the accuracy. Most were shot at 100 yds but even the 25% that I sent 200 yds were respectable (for me). I understand wanting to spend wisely. More range trips is a good thing! I get Hornady 55gr fmj from Midsouth Shooters Supply...250/$23.75. I'm lucky...co-worker lives real close so she brings them to me! (no shipping !!) I've gotten five shot groups under 1.5 inch. I know my shooting...might have been accidental.Good luck on your quest. Keeping cost down is a good thing!

Mark

 

[hdwhit]

FMJ is a more cost effective way to make a decent round I guess?

For military use, FMJ ammunition is required under the Hague Convention of 1899, Article 4, Section 3.

Anyone with a contract to make FMJ bullets for military use (ours or a foreign military) has already covered their fixed costs through the contract, they can keep the production machinery running a little longer and make bullets for the civilian market. Since these "contract overrun" bullets don't have to bear a share of the fixed costs, they can be sold for less than other commercial bullets.

 

[kingmt]

I know that FMJ isn't used for any sort of match ammo. Just so I can learn, why is that? I assume the process doesn't yield a very concentric round with heavy spots on it if you will? FMJ is a more cost effective way to make a decent round I guess? I'm all ears. Posting all these questions hoping to learn from you guys.

Thanks!

"Just so I can learn, why is that?"
FMJ isn't match ammo because it can't fly well enough to stand a chance against other shooters using better bullets. Of course this depends on what kind of a match it is.

"I assume the process doesn't yield a very concentric round with heavy spots on it if you will?"
That isn't the case. The problem is the base of the bullet. The better the base is the better the bullet flies. Air closing behind the bullet on a irregular surface will cause the bullet to start to wobble.

"FMJ is a more cost effective way to make a decent round I guess? "
I don't know the answer to this but hdwhit has made a reasonable though on it.

 

[DeadEye9]

For military use, FMJ ammunition is required under the Hague Convention of 1899, Article 4, Section 3.

Anyone with a contract to make FMJ bullets for military use (ours or a foreign military) has already covered their fixed costs through the contract, they can keep the production machinery running a little longer and make bullets for the civilian market. Since these "contract overrun" bullets don't have to bear a share of the fixed costs, they can be sold for less than other commercial bullets.

Well that isn't actually the case, he Hague states that signing parties do not use rounds calculated to cause extra or undue suffering and such. There isn't actually a requirement that they be FMJ and a majority of our newer specialty Rounds used by the military are not FMJ. (M855a1, mk262, mk318 etc) Also it's not always the contract over run that contributes to cheaper bullets, sometimes they just don't meet the requirements set forth by a sanctioning body and are therefore "de-militarized" and sold to the public at a discount.
Anyway, pulled bullets are a great way to get "premium" bullets at economy pricing, so long as you trust the source you are getting these second hand projectiles from. I've gotten quite a bit of pulled bullets from American Reloading and they are excellent. Every so often you mind find a few bullets out of 500/1000 that have visible pull marks but by and large they are just as accurate and easy to load as a factory new projectile. Price wise you save a good bit; for my 55gr FMJ-BT I pay about $55/500 count of new Hornady bullets whereas pulled Federal of the same projectile I can get 500 for under $40. (These prices are shipping included) The same is true for specialty loads like HP, PSP, Vmax etc. typically no more than 10 cents per round of these premium bullets shipped when buying pulled, but new can be nearly double from brick and mortar stores. The above info I've given is for .223/5.56. I do the same with pistol bullets when I want a specialty load, but plated new bullets for pistol calibers are pretty cheap in bulk anyway so I more pursue this for my rifles. For .308 and .338 the savings is even greater. For instance 500rds of 150 FMJ in .308 new from my local stores is about $120 but 500rds of pulled 147 FMJ is $65 shipped to my door. These aren't the exact same bullet but close so you get the idea. Accuracy has proven to be nearly identical from pulled bullets as factory counterparts, so long as you don't get bullets from some guy in his garage using a pair of vice grips to do the work. My 16" ARs see a ton of pulled 55-62gr FMJ as that is their typical range diet and I can easily get 1.25 MOA from a 16" 1:9 carbine and pulled 62gr FMJs without magnification. Hell the rifle I'm speaking of here isn't even free floated, standard GI handguards and A2 FSB. Factory American Eagle, Remington, Hornady etc all shoots the same so the pulled bullets are not hurting the accuracy one bit. Every once in a while you MAY get a flier due to a pull mark or something, but I see that literally 2-3 times out of 500 and for shooting steel or plinking even that isn't a factor.

 

[jmorris]

I have a friend that works for an ammunition manufacturer and he brings be pulls from time to time because they can't reuse them and maintain the quality they will let out the door. He knows that I cast so he gives them to me. Some could be reused but I certainly wouldn't go out of my way to buy them.

A "blem" bullet may just have an aesthetic flaw, if they were pulled down and not reused, I always question why. That said pulled bullets don't always have to be from problem loaded rounds, military pulls being an example.

 

[DeadEye9]

I have a friend that works for an ammunition manufacturer and he brings be pulls from time to time because they can't reuse them and maintain the quality they will let out the door. He knows that I cast so he gives them to me. Some could be reused but I certainly wouldn't go out of my way to buy them.

A "blem" bullet may just have an aesthetic flaw, if they were pulled down and not reused, I always question why. That said pulled bullets don't always have to be from problem loaded rounds, military pulls being an example.

Most major manufacturers will not seat a bullet twice. ATK/Speer for example has policies against this. So even if the round was totally perfect, it gets sold off for other uses after its pulled. Majority of the time the powder charge is the reason for pull downs. Either the batch was made with a lot of powder determined to not meet their burn rate, velocity etc. Just because a bullet is pulled does not make it defective.

 

[jmorris]

Just because a bullet is pulled does not make it defective

Agreed, but if they were always as good as new they would have never come up with the policies against reusing them in the first place.

Thus the "why" question.

 

[hdwhit]

jmorris wrote:
That said pulled bullets don't always have to be from problem loaded rounds, military pulls being an example.

A manufacturer is only going to disassemble ammunition if it fails to meet specifications called for in the contact and it can't sell it as loaded ammunition elsehwere. But failing to meet specification is not the same thing as saying that any of the components are defective.

For example; all military contracts call for ammunition to meet certain performance standards. Such standards will include Minimum, Mean and Median velocities as well as a particular standard deviation of velocities from a random sample of rounds. If these standards are not met because, say, the manufacturer's powder measuring equipment is unable to deliver consistent charges the entire lot can be - and probably will be - rejected by the buyer.

And since other posters have already established that by policy (and likely by terms of the contract), pulled bullets or other recycled material from loaded ammunition cannot be reused to comply with the original contract, the components must be salvaged and sold into a secondary market.

The resellers of these components don't necessarily know why the rounds were rejected so they routinely advise customers to check the dimensions and weight of pulled bullets. In the last year, I have bought 1,250 rounds of pulled bullets. And in keeping with the seller's warning, I weighed each bullet and measured its diameter with a micrometer.

Obviously, I don't have much of a social life.

Still, the results were that of those 1,250 rounds, NONE of them were more than 2/10,000 larger than stated diameter and NONE of them were more than 0.2 grains in weight different from one another. I have observed similar variance in boxed bullets sold by the major manufacturers.

At the present time, companies like http://www.evergladesammo.com/ are offering new, made in the USA, FMJ bullets (or in the case of 9mm Parabellum, JHP) for about the same cost as pulled bullets and I have been using their projectiiles.

 

[hdwhit]

Deadeye9 wrote:
Well that isn't actually the case, he [sic] Hague states that signing parties do not use rounds calculated to cause extra or undue suffering and such.

My post is precisely the case.

Article 4, Section 3 reads (in relevant part) "...the parties will abstain from using "bullets which expand or flatten easily in the human body." This was further defined as a "prohibition of the use of bullets which can easily expand or change their form inside the human body such as bullets with a hard covering which does not completely cover the core, or containing indentations."

If the lead core of the bullet could not be exposed and the jacket could not be indented, the result is that the only type of bullet permitted on the battlefield of signatory countries were full metal jacket (FMJ) bullets. That my reading of Section 3 is correct is attested to by the fact that following ratification of the convention, all so-called soft-point bullets (i.e. any projectivle that had a partial metal jacket and exposed lead at the tip) as well as "cross-tipped" bullets (bullets that had a cross-shaped incision in their tip to aid in expansion (i.e. the so-called "Dum Dum" bullets made at the Dum Dum Arsenal in India) ceased to be used by signatory countries..

 

[JohnhenrySTL]

It depends on how you are shooting? If it's bench rest then I would stick with premium bullets. If you are shooting the way I usually shoot my AR, which often is just plinking or shooting old milk jugs from a standing position at 100 yards or so then I would load up the most cost effective stuff. I shoot the cheap and the good. For my .308 I also use blc2 for the fmjs, it meters faster than the 4064, for hunting or accuracy I spend the extra time with 4064. Ultimately I load both cheap and good, I shoot a lot more of the cheaper and it works great for me.

 

[rfwobbly]

I bought a couple of thousand pulled 125 gr. .38 caliber bullets from RMR.

Rocky Mtn Reloading is a great place to start your bullet hunt. They have a great and ever changing selection of pulls and blems, and with free shipping, the price you see is the price you pay. You definitely don't want to pay higher than their price.

Another source is the Shooter's Pro Shop, which carries a large selection of Nosler blems.

http://www.shootersproshop.com/nosler-products/nosler-blemished-2nds.html

 

[jmorris]

A manufacturer is only going to disassemble ammunition if it fails to meet specifications called for in the contact and it can't sell it as loaded ammunition elsehwere.

That would be assuming all ammunition that has been de-milled was done so because of an imperfection, and that is not the case, unless age is also an imperfection.

 

[Decoy80]

Sometimes a bargain is just that. Going first class costs much more than economy class. I load high and low end ammo. For hunting and long term storage I even seal the primers and bullets when seating them. For shooting fairy soon just for fun I will use the cheapest bullets available. Pulled bulk bullets are usually cheaper and properly inspected will often yield some bullets for your first class ammo along with reduced cost. Low end new bullets would be best if you are trying to save time. Powder and primer cost remains a constant and bullet costs are from less than a dime up to over a buck. Save your brass

 

[Dog Soldier]

I like the pulled bullets for my M-1 Garands. I shoot iron plates with my Garands just for fun. The fact my bullets are not expensive really adds to my enjoyment.

 

[wally]

I don't think you can expect any FMJ to do much better than about 2moa for a 10 shot group. If you are shooting targets ~4moa or larger, why not save money or be able to shoot more for the same cost buy using components that are "good enough" rather than "the best".

 

[jmorris]

Here are two different pulls as examples. The ones on the left are fine except for "blemishes" the 3 in the center have been physically altered, you can even see where the case mouth was if you compare it to the similar new bullet on the right.

 

[Sunray]

"...pulled bullets come from..." Usually milsurp. 'Seconds' are a different thing. Those have some cosmetic issue that doesn't matter. As long as the base is good, so are they.
"...compared to the higher end stuff..." Depends on the bullet. Military ammo is not loaded for great accuracy. Usual accuracy spec is around 3" at 100 yards, as I recall. So the bullets are long way from match or even hunting bullets. If accuracy is your goal, they can be out of round, the points not concentric, varying weights, etc. etc. For fun shooting, they'll do nicely though.

 

[Kaldor]

I guess it depends on how much Im saving vs the same bullet new. I shoot a ton of Hornady FMJs. They hover right around an inch from my rifles. The pull has to be significantly less expensive to make it worth my while to take a chance on a known good thing.

 

[BrocLuno]

Mixed lot of 1,000+ in 5.56 for $63 ... Sort by magnet, weight, length, BT or not, etc. Usually end up with piles of a few 100 each. Load in batches and soot milk jugs with friends AR's and Ranch Rifles

Push them down range with WC844. That'll be a new one for me, so will have to work up something ...

Keep the best of the lot for Pops single shot 22-250 over 4064

 

[HankC]

Blemish, second or pulled may be from mix batch and not consistent which has an effect on accuracy. FMJ as tail exposed and not as consistent as tail covered. Under 100 yds, probably won't notice the difference!

 

[Wreck-n-Crew]

Most major manufacturers will not seat a bullet twice. ATK/Speer for example has policies against this. So even if the round was totally perfect, it gets sold off for other uses after its pulled. Majority of the time the powder charge is the reason for pull downs. Either the batch was made with a lot of powder determined to not meet their burn rate, velocity etc. Just because a bullet is pulled does not make it defective.

+1