How Did You Get Started Become Interested In Reloading

[Shootist43]

1. At first it was the cost savings, then it was for the increased accuracy, now it is for the enjoyment I get out of reloading itself. I shoot Bullseye competitively. As such I go through thousands of rounds of 22 (which I don't reload) and several thousands of rounds of 45 ACP. I an currently reloading for a total of 5 shooters although my sons and grandsons do not shoot as much as I do. I am somewhat physically challenged in that I cannot walk very far nor stand for long periods of time. Reloading has become a hobby that is almost as rewarding as hunting and shooting. I currently have 3 Dillon Progressive presses and a Lee single stage press set up. Like others have mentioned I buy powder and primers in bulk when they are either on sale and or available. I buy brass for new (to me) rifles when Midway, Natchez, or Mid-South has them on sale. My current reloading projects include the loads we will be taking to Africa. For me that is a 35 Whelen and a 6.5 x 55 Swedish Mauser. I reload 32, 380, 9mm, 38, 357, 40, 41 Mag, 44 Mag, 45 ACP, 45 Long Colt, 7mm TCU and 7mm International R for pistols. I reload for 223,243, 6.5 x 55, 270, 7 x 57, 7 x 65R, 30 Cal carbine, 30-30, 308, 30-06, 300 Win Mag, 32 Win. Spec, 338 Win Mag, 348 Win, 35 Rem, 35 Whelen, and 375 H&H for rifles. I have no plans for reloading any of the heavy hitters or shotguns. I recently purchased a Hornady Concentricity Gage to be used on the rounds I hunt with.

 

[Clayton]

Like most I wanted to shoot more. Started in 1967. I had killed my first two deer with factory ammo. Since then it's been with ammo I loaded. It has been a real reward to be able to do that.

 

[D.M.V]

My folks bought me a RCBS kit for my 12th birthday so I could load for my 7 mag. Lived about 70 miles from town and I was always running out of ammo and bugging them for a ride to sportsman surplus in Missoula, guess they thought I would quit bothering them if I could roll my own. Didn't quite work out that way, I just started running out of bullets, Primers and powder! Loaded for 7 Rem Mag and my 1911 as those were the only two center fires I had as a kid(I have made up for my abused upbringing now!lol)View attachment 57140
I prolly wouldn't excess like I do now had they just took me to town more often! Lol. That birthday gift has given me more enjoyment than any other in my lifetime.
Keep you're powder dry,
Cody

Man I thought I shot 2 many calibers! ;-)

 

[D.M.V]

I've always been kinda crafty. Hears a weird combination. So I'm a embalmer/mortician and then was a pro surfer and surfboard manufacturer for over 10 years. I retired 2 years ago and moved to the desert. I grew up in my dad's gun shop working on guns but never got into reloading till I moved to the desert. A few old timers from my local masonic Lodge that I met when I moved to the new area were avid reloaders and got me interested in it. It was the perfect hobby for me as it can be a meticulous hobby and my mind was perfectly gear'd for it. Then I found myself buying big bore rifles and odd calibers just to load and shoot. I really enjoy it. We have a great gun shop hear with a big reloading theme. It's basically a reloading shop that sells guns 2. The owner was stoked cause along comes a guy who bought all the 375h&h, 458, 416rigby stuff thats been sitting on his shelf for year's

 

[Bullthrower338]

@D.M.V where is the edge of western civilization? Lol. I've been looking for it. I would say Bozeman, Mt. But there is no desert here. Ha ha. I used to live in NM and I was the only guy in the area that used to shoot anything over .30, which I found proper for jack rabbit, coues deer and such. Haha
Cheers,
Cody

 

[D.M.V]

@D.M.V where is the edge of western civilization? Lol. I've been looking for it. I would say Bozeman, Mt. But there is no desert here. Ha ha. I used to live in NM and I was the only guy in the area that used to shoot anything over .30, which I found proper for jack rabbit, coues deer and such. Haha
Cheers,
Cody

Hi Cody
Lol, The edge of western civilization is a term I coin'd years ago for California. Cause well, it is. I bought some land in the Mojave desert.

 

[D.M.V]

I see you might be a 338 win mag fan. That was actually the 1st round I ever loaded. For a beautiful Winchester model 70. It's one of only 2 push feeds I own. Great gun

 

[Steve Steyr]

Way , way back, when I was 15 and before the GCA 68, the LGS manager called me and said he had a rifle I just had to have. It was a Remington 722 in .257 Roberts. It came with a Lee Loader, a box of Speer 87 grainers, a box of CCI primers, and a can of IMR4064. It was tight on my small allowance but I scraped together the $65 and bought the rifle. I was hooked on reloading from that time forward.
I still use Lee Loaders in many calibers for the sizing dies. No lube and its attendant mess and extra steps. It neck sizes and brass lasts a long time. With the long box of dippers, I can get a variety of loads. I also have used my trusty RCBS Rock Chucker, which I bought used in 1975 for $50, a whole lot. I also often use the Lee Hand Loader for seating. The Lee items allow me to reload anywhere away from my bench.
On pleasant evenings here in the country I can sit out with my little plastic mallet and Lee Loader and enjoy the process. The pounding kind of drives my wife crazy but, what doesn't????

 

[MS Hitman]

I have been teaching my children to reload. My daughter and I prepped and primed about 1,000 pistol cases last night. I believe it is a skill set that will prove valuable for them to possess.

 

[ChrisG]

I got started because well... I always have. My dad had reloaded since before I was born. I started with him as a little kid, running brass through the press. As I got older, the pros of making your own ammuniton became obvious. It's cheaper (once you have the equipment.) But mostly, you're not limited to what you can find on the shelf. What if your gun is all sighted in for Federal Premium and all of a sudden, they stop making that load, or all the stores run out of them? I can load almost any 270 grain .375 bullet (Hornady, Swift, Sierra, etc.) with the same powder and load and I can guarantee that they will likely hit within 1.5" of where the gun is sighted. Also, Components are typically easier to find that loaded shells. I can load what would otherwise be "premium" rounds for about a third to half of the cost of buying them. The savings goes up tremendously if you also take up casting. You can taylor the load to your gun, you can choose the bullet YOU want, not the one the Factory THINKS you should be using. You can download a bit to gain some terminal bullet integrity... I could go on... just know that reloading is the apex of ammunition production. How much of a firearms enthusiast you are is actually a table from least to most like this:

Casual Shooter->Shooter->Reloader->Bullet Caster->Jacketed Bullet Swager. Hunters can fit in there anywhere, some are at the head of the line, most are somewhere in the middle. The last one is for those who live and breathe reloading. I would love to swage my own bullets but the equipment is expensive and I have no more space for it.

 

[Bren7X64]

It's the fault of Western Civilization - you guys hated us guys in South Africa.

It was really that sanctions were biting, and very little ammo was getting through, and that ammo was really, really expensive. If you had a .308, you could probably "score" military ammo, but it was FMJ and not all that well loaded, since pulling 10 rounds and weighing the charges would be anywhere between 43 and 46 grains (which we found out after getting our reloading kit).

Anyway the old man decided to try to reload the 9mm with a Lee Loader and our Berdan cases after being brainwashed by G&A - there was a lot of fun with that as well. Primers exploding - drilling out anvils, crimping primer pockets, and other things which I cannot really recall.

Unfortunately the old man had a .30-06 (and, yes, I believe that no-one from the US can believe the .30-06 is an exotic cartridge, but you're wrong). Getting ammo was prohibitively expensive. When looking for ammo he could get maybe one box of SAKO, another of Remington and another of Hirtenberg. All different bullet weights, of course.

So the old man decided to reload and such - he bought a setup with an RCBS Junior press and some RCBS dies. He started with the only South African powder suitable for rifles - MR2 (think of 3031) - it changed names and so on to MR200 and then MR400, which was really nice for the .30-06. Luckily the old man's rifle - BRNO ZKK600 was a total slut and would accept and fire almost any load into just over MOA at 100m.

This is lucky because it was really difficult to get any .30-06 cases - so the old man found, scrounged, stole cases wherever he could and reloaded them all many times.

Later he gave me the rifle and the ammo. I was really not happy about 20 rounds with 15 different headstamps, and decided to fire them all and discard - I have never seen so many split cases - incipient head separations, longitudinal splits, neck splits - you name it

There's a lot more - I've concentrated on my Dad's .30-06. There's a lot more about my discovery of Lee dies and just in general.

Now - my deep insights - reloading is either a chore or a hobby.

If you consider working up loads and using your brain to try to wring out accuracy - or you spend the time imagining your kids taking pleasure form it - it's another hobby - if it's something you HAVE to do actually go shoot - it might be better if you got a custom reloader to do it for you.

Either way, when you go hunting - you will be using a load YOU have decided upon, because you believe it is better than the commercial loads.

 

[D.M.V]

It's the fault of Western Civilization - you guys hated us guys in South Africa.

It was really that sanctions were biting, and very little ammo was getting through, and that ammo was really, really expensive. If you had a .308, you could probably "score" military ammo, but it was FMJ and not all that well loaded, since pulling 10 rounds and weighing the charges would be anywhere between 43 and 46 grains (which we found out after getting our reloading kit).

Anyway the old man decided to try to reload the 9mm with a Lee Loader and our Berdan cases after being brainwashed by G&A - there was a lot of fun with that as well. Primers exploding - drilling out anvils, crimping primer pockets, and other things which I cannot really recall.

Unfortunately the old man had a .30-06 (and, yes, I believe that no-one from the US can believe the .30-06 is an exotic cartridge, but you're wrong). Getting ammo was prohibitively expensive. When looking for ammo he could get maybe one box of SAKO, another of Remington and another of Hirtenberg. All different bullet weights, of course.

So the old man decided to reload and such - he bought a setup with an RCBS Junior press and some RCBS dies. He started with the only South African powder suitable for rifles - MR2 (think of 3031) - it changed names and so on to MR200 and then MR400, which was really nice for the .30-06. Luckily the old man's rifle - BRNO ZKK600 was a total slut and would accept and fire almost any load into just over MOA at 100m.

This is lucky because it was really difficult to get any .30-06 cases - so the old man found, scrounged, stole cases wherever he could and reloaded them all many times.

Later he gave me the rifle and the ammo. I was really not happy about 20 rounds with 15 different headstamps, and decided to fire them all and discard - I have never seen so many split cases - incipient head separations, longitudinal splits, neck splits - you name it

There's a lot more - I've concentrated on my Dad's .30-06. There's a lot more about my discovery of Lee dies and just in general.

Now - my deep insights - reloading is either a chore or a hobby.

If you consider working up loads and using your brain to try to wring out accuracy - or you spend the time imagining your kids taking pleasure form it - it's another hobby - if it's something you HAVE to do actually go shoot - it might be better if you got a custom reloader to do it for you.

Either way, when you go hunting - you will be using a load YOU have decided upon, because you believe it is better than the commercial loads.

Not all of us felt that way. Growing up in America you are bombarded with propaganda from all directions of society. If your lucky enough to have parents who teach you different or someone else in life who gives you insight into world politics, it's very easy to grow up insulated from reality.
Growing up I didn't understand who Nelson Mandela was or even what apartheid ment or the history behind any of it. All I remember was being told Nelson Mandela was a saint and that's it. Nothing else.
It wasn't till I got a little older and moved to Hawaii and bunked with some South Africans did I get a insight into South African political science, and boy was a eye opener.
Another time back in California sometime later in life I befriend a older man working as a security guard who was in the Rhodesian Army. I'd often have lunch with him, and again, gain some more insight into the conflicts that went on there.
People hear in America could never really imagine living under that kind of stress. Although I'm sure someone will chime in hear and offer there opinion and tell me I don't know what I'm talking about. I'm just telling you about what I learned from the people I met in my life.
So after all this I feel the world/the west had no right to interfere with the government of SA and how they administered their country, and since over the years I have read and study'd a little more about Afica. The Congo, Rhodesia, Kenya, German east Afica. North Africa.

 

[Bren7X64]

Sorry - didn't want you to feel defensive, just how we felt. Didn't want to start anything political.

 

[D.M.V]

Sorry - didn't want you to feel defensive, just how we felt. Didn't want to start anything political.

No worries mate. Not defensive at all. I think it is a good thing its talked about. Many of us Americans don't have enough access to the facts we need to make informed decisions and usually when informed you will discover how reasonable and good natured we are as a people. Problem is the people who we elect are often the complete opposite of a reflection of of character.

 

[D.M.V]

Like I was speaking about earlier. The attempt to brainwash me as a youth was easily disintegrated instantly with just the simple fact I met my first South African.

 

[Ridgewalker]

Since 1970. Reasons: Cost (premium ammo at reduced cost), accuracy (3 shots in 5/16" for 300WM 200gr Nosler Partition), to get what I want (110 gr FMJ @1900fps in 30-06 for turkeys, grouse, etc that shoots 3" below my 180 big game load @100 yds), and now a 300WM FMJ load for the little African antelope that won't blow them to pieces.

 

[D.M.V]

Cause 416 Rigby commercial is expensive

 

[MS Hitman]

Not feeling defensive at all. Our lame stream media never met a communist they didn't fawn all over. Here, to learn the truth, one must research and speak with those who have first hand knowledge of a subject.

 

[MS Hitman]

Cause 416 Rigby commercial is expensive

That is the truth!!

 

[D.M.V]