Purpose for Reloading

W

Wendyj

New member
I know we started to save money and found out we shoot a lot more. Accuracy levels increased greatly. Keep adding to the loading room but it's relaxing after a hard days work. Hitting long range targets with your home made recipes are a joy in itself. Just wondered what reason everyone here started loading. Some loads you just can't find in factory either. My 7-08 loves a 160 grain Speer bullet. Have never seen one on a shelf above 140 grain.
 
After I purchased a 357 magnum. I went and purchased a box of ammo for $37 for it.

First words I spoke was.
" Crap the bed... That aint gona work."
Then the hunt began.
Cant say I have saved one cent more than I would have spent had I not taken up loading.
But I can say I can afford to shoot all I want.
 
I originally started reloading to cut the cost of my hunting rifle, a 7mm Rem Mag. Which I don't shoot often so it has saved me some money.

Another reason I started was to do reduced recoil loads (for a .223. She was extremely small) I had read about for my daughter who was 6 at the time. By doing the reduced recoil loads using H4895, I was able to get her shooting Centerfire and two years after she started she was able to harvest her first deer using her .223 using a full load.


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For years I had only one rifle. My father collected guns and did lots of reloading, keeping me supplied with ammo.
On his passing I Inherited several of his guns but passed on the chance to get his reloading equipment.
After I ran out of ammo the reality set in and I started from scratch and learned to do it myself.


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Well I don't really recall that it was for making shooting more affordable, but rather that it was just the thing to do. After all how could you go wrong after examining the Herter's reloading catalog with their greater than great advertisements about Model Perfect everything, order out one of each today and if you aren't completely satisfied, etc. All about getting on board and being in good standing with the world. So I did just that and always considered my two massive Model 3 presses at something like $13 and the improved model for $17 to be my best purchases of all times. But the powder measure left some design features to be desired. No complaints however with the balance beam scale. How we long for the good old days with Herter's. You just couldn't wait for your next order to arrive from Waseca, Minnesota. Ditto with their fly tying merchandise prior to becoming absorbed with walnut and blued steel. But it was puzzling whether to order flat or rounded large rifle primers, so got both just to be on the safe side. They did supply primer cups for each with the primer arms.

It's sort of like the mountain, you do it because it's there.
 
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I started in the middle sixties because I was one of the working poor and could not afford shoot much (even with WWII surplus 9MM ammo). I did not like the price of jacketed 9MM bullets either, so I bought an original Lee Loader (in the Black Red and White cardboard box), and a Lyman single cavity mould and began to cast and handload. I have been doing it ever since.
 
I started aabout 50 - 55 yrs ago...my grandpa taught me ..( and it was cheaper than buying ammo -- and it still is )...but it was also to customize ammo to what you wanted.

Today, I reload because I like it - its part of the gun hobby to me - and I shoot 2 or 3 times as much with the same ammo budget../ but I'd reload even if the cost was a push. Its also part of the gun hobby I have passed down to my kids and now the grandkids ( it makes me the cool grandpa ... :D )...
 
I was in high school and literally dropping by the drug store twice a week looking for the new issue of Guns & Ammo and the more I read, the more I knew I wanted to be a handloader. With money from my first "real" summer job before 11th Grade and leftover paper route money, I bought my first center fire, a S&W 686-3. I think there is a chance I needed that revolver almost as much to handload as to shoot.

My first reloading was actually 20ga for skeet shooting twice a week, but while fun, it was more of a process with very little "art", adjustments or decisions. Loading shotshells on a Mec-650 was a simple matter of dumping the stuff in and pulling a handle.

Loading .38 Special took more human input, seemingly. And I was completely hooked just as soon as I placed shots where I wanted them, from ammo that I made.
 
Money was the last thing I was thinking about when I started reloading. In the late sixties I got my first centerfire handgun. One time I emptied the cylinder and thought "I wonder if I could use these things for something?" I checked around (I had no friends or acquaintances that shot or reloaded), looke at a few gun magazines and found the term "reloading". I went to a library and looked up cartridge reloading (this was waaay pre-web). I wound up buying a Lee Loader, a pound of Bullseye, 100 CCI primers, and 100 generic lead bullets. I picked up a few cases at the police range I shot at and went from there. I reloaded 38 Specials for 18 months easily and successfully. I branched out to more "sophisticated" equipment and continued, off and on, since then. I have had my lean times and times when I was "flush" but costs were secondary. For almost 40 years I have reloaded because I like reloading. Simple...;)
 
I got into reloading because I could form brass for cartridges that were almost impossible to get. I still do not reload everything. There is now some factory ammo you can barely match or even beat by reloading.
 
I just enjoy it. A little piece and quite always works. Nothing like going out to the garage and fartin' around with stuff.
 
I used to own a 280. Ammo was hard to find and expensive and I was considering reloading. I ran across a good deal on a used custom 338-06 and had no other real option. While I no longer own either of those, and all of the cartridges I now load for are more common, I still find I can get better quality ammo. I don't really do it to save money. I probably do, but that isn't the primary reason.
 
The gun run of '08 started my reloading career. To be fair I wanted to reload before then, but I just kept putting it off because of start up cost. I started in 2010 when components started to be normal again, thanks to my wife buying my press for my birthday (and in turn being mad that I had to spend another 200 bucks on dies, powder, primers, and projectiles).

I never dreamed of owning any kind of firearm in a more unique caliber. Heck, growing up in a small town where 30-06 is king, .243 winchester was considered exotic. Never mind 7mm-08. Now, I can buy about what I want. Oh, and I can shoot about as much .357 as I want. And I can make match grade rounds for about the price of bulk ammo. Shoot I could shoot 338 lapua for around 1 buck a round if i so desired (instead of 3 or 4). There are tons of reasons to reload. I can shoot more. I can buy guns in calibers that were cost prohibitive before. I enjoy my time at the reloading bench. The number 1 reason is putting rounds I loaded into 1/2moa at 500 yards.
 
I had always had just the tiniest curiosity about reloading but never near enough to jump in on my own. Fast forward 15-20 years, a friend from work began to sell off his long passed grandfathers reloading gear. All kinds of stuff, bullets, lead, shotshells, on and on. I purchased a big chunk of the stuff and started sorting through it. One of the items was a cheap little lee press, new now days they are about $30. Well onwards and upwards I went. Several months later he had another big batch of stuff to sell off, "Ill take it all" Grandpa had good taste. So then came my casting obsession. Add to this a love for IDPA and a HUGE savings on ammo and here I am, fully hooked.
 
I bought a Savage 340a 30-30 bolt gun last summer and wanted to load some Spitzers for it. I couldn't find anything but ammo suited for tubular mags for the lever guns. So I decided it was time to load my own. I'm now loading 8 calibers, 4 rifle, 4 handgun. Enjoying every minute of it!
 
Heck, I can't remember :p

Ah, I'm pretty sure cost was the primary motivator for me. But I also knew I have the personality/mind-set for loading. In childhood, I spent a lot of time building models (airplanes, ships, cars). Before that, it was LEGO's. I'm just wired for loading ammo.

I spent an afternoon learning how to load from an old guy my brother knew from work. Good guy. Other than that and my Speer #10 loading manual, I was pretty much on my own and self-taught. I remember my first powder purchase was Red Dot, Blue Dot, and Unique. I'm really surprised I never blew up any of my guns with the Blue Dot. A notoriously unforgiving powder that decided to be forgiving enough for me. Still don't know how that happened.

To circle back to the point: it was savings that motivated me toward handloading; but I wouldn't have bothered had I thought I didn't have the mindset for it. I approached it as a craft from the first round.
 
I had wanted to start reloading for a long time but really had no place close to shoot so I firgured, why reload. Then one day I permission from a local landowner with a sand pit to shoot there. I had just bought a 7-08 and could only find 140gr ammo for it for a premium price. I went to the cabela's website and bought the rcbs starter kit and now I load for 4 calibers and all my rifles shoot moa, and I have even gotten another friend of mine into reloading since he saw and tried my setup..
 
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