Bullet selection for reloading

Originally Posted by PeteG

Diamondhitch - it is pretty expensive to buy factory ammo here, .22hornet is +-$100 for 50, .300 +-$130 for 20, .375 +-$200 for 20, .416 +-$400for 20.
a couple of afternoons a month can cost quite a bit for us!
Thats the reason we want to reload!!
Once we get going, i wont bother reloading cheaper bullets, its not a great deal of money saved by loading cheaper bullets as opposed to premium bullets.

Thunderhead - I am happier in my workshop than the office!! i'm certainly looking forward to spending some time trying out different loads.

thanks for the info

Bullets are by far the most expensive relaoding component. If buying from Cabelas (obviously not your supplier but the difference in price should be similar) loading the Ballistic tips in .300 win costs $0.94 per round and TSX is $1.34 per round which works out to a savings of $8 per box which is 30% cheaper. Your .416 will be a much bigger savings yet. 30% more plinking is alot of plinking.

Originally Posted by Fritz Rabe

I do not understand why people would want to load a 350gr head in a 375H&H or a 450gr in a 416. What would you gain??
A 300gr in 375 and a 400gr in 416 already shoots through everything. Why load a bullet that the gun was not designed for. The only thing that it does improve is the mathematics of the person doing it. That stays theory. In the practical world of hunting it does not do one single thing better than the original.
In theory, having an extra 50gr will improve the KE. In practice, there is not a bone in any animal that the original bullet will not penetrate through already so why bother?
Having more numbers before the comma in theory sounds great. In practice I have shot hundreds of Baboons sitting on thin branches high in a tree. I have shot them with 375H&H and many more different calibers. Why did not a single one of them fly backwards through the air - like in the movies - when hit with all that KE as the theory stated?
No sir. I do not believe in all of that. Those new weights were developed because people are bored with a design that is over 100 years old and want something new. They are not satisfied with something that works well.

Good to hear some sound opinion, I am still open to it all, not having tried them. But, and its a big BUT, as you mention that the 300gr and 400 gr in the 375 and 416 respectively have worked and still work perfectly, so I personally dont see a need for a heavier round.

Originally Posted by Diamondhitch

Bullets are by far the most expensive relaoding component. If buying from Cabelas (obviously not your supplier but the difference in price should be similar) loading the Ballistic tips in .300 win costs $0.94 per round and TSX is $1.34 per round which works out to a savings of $8 per box which is 30% cheaper. Your .416 will be a much bigger savings yet. 30% more plinking is alot of plinking.

30% is definately a substantial savings. I suppose in a way I got carried away with going from our high prices to the much more affordable reloading prices so I didnt really consider the actual savings per round on different components.
I'll be looking around a bit more from a different perspective now.

The other thing I thought of is how I often read how people say that certain bullets "don't work in my gun". How bad does it get that a bullet "doesn't" work?
Bear in mind most of our rifles have seen better days, but they still shoot well regardless of which factory ammo i use, except for the last batch of prvi grom 170gr bullets which shot about 6in groups at 100m. the first batch was fine, 1.5in groups @100m.
Is this what I could expect if a certain bullet doesn't agree with my setup?
Can that be minimized by adjusting powder loads etc?

Originally Posted by PeteG

30% is definately a substantial savings. I suppose in a way I got carried away with going from our high prices to the much more affordable reloading prices so I didnt really consider the actual savings per round on different components.
I'll be looking around a bit more from a different perspective now.

The other thing I thought of is how I often read how people say that certain bullets "don't work in my gun". How bad does it get that a bullet "doesn't" work?
Bear in mind most of our rifles have seen better days, but they still shoot well regardless of which factory ammo i use, except for the last batch of prvi grom 170gr bullets which shot about 6in groups at 100m. the first batch was fine, 1.5in groups @100m.
Is this what I could expect if a certain bullet doesn't agree with my setup?
Can that be minimized by adjusting powder loads etc?

Every gun is different, some like everything you put in them, some will blow up 2-3x as big with certain bullets but most will show slight preferences toward 1 bullet or another. Your 1.5 inch gun may shoot 2" with some brands but you may find one or 2 bullet/powder/velocity combinations that shoot 1" while yet another bullet just wont shoot less than 3-4" (rare occasion). There is no secret formula, just plenty of time on the bench fine tuning as much as you like or simply getting something that shoots acceptably and being happy with that.

I should mention that usually if you find a bullet that will not shoot well the cause is usually that it is being pushed too fast or your rifle does not have sufficient twist to stabilize it or any of a number of factors that can destabilize a bullet, it is not always an indicator that the brand of bullet is less accurate than others in general but just because it may perform that way in your particular gun.

Thanks Diamondhitch, that certainly makes sense to me about the speed and twist rate.

I'm looking forward to getting set up and playing with loads!

Some of the manufacturers will not like what I say but Hornady makes a darn nice bullet, that is quite frankly good for 95% of your typical shooting and or hunting and usually costs about half of what the so called premium bullets will set you back. The Hornady's are not as sexy as some of the others, but I've been handloading for 47 years and you can save a considerable amount of money in that length of time by choosing a bullet that is not more expensive than what you really need.
It may sound petty but if you choose a powder/load that takes say 5 gr less per load, you can get 9 more loads per can of powder.... as expensive as powder is becoming even here in the US, that adds up also.