Powder prices going up.

Hodgdon might control a lot of powder brand names but they are re-packagers (If they even do their own packaging) and don't manufacture much of anything. If they could get more; they'd sell more. There's no money in not ordering it, and no money in sitting on a pile that would sell in a heart-beat.

Handloaders are so far down the food chain for powder and primer supplying that we're lucky they sell it to us at all. The ammunition makers and their huge military contracts will always come first, even sporting factory ammo is just a drop in the bucket.
 
We have perfect storm. The mandates left people at home with pretty good savings from not going out. They were able to take up a new hobby and had money to do it. The Yanks had another hissy fit with a change of president. A few BLM demonstrations and the Yanks believed in oncoming race war. So everybody stocked up. You would think they were in South Africa on an isolated farm in the Veld. Then Russians decided it was good them to invade their neighbour. They have done this regularly in their history. Much to the Europeans surprise , Russians are acting like Russians again. They were hoping they would act like good peaceful consumers. Not only are they helping out the Ukraine, they are rearming.

Lets be happy we are getting any powder.
 
Now that I have depressed you about the demand side of supply and demand equation, I'll further wreck your day talking about the supply side. . First off, I'm no industrial chemist, and Chem 12 was long time ago. But one of materials smokeless powder is made of is nitrocellulose . It might be the main one. It seems 30% of the world's supply comes from China and Russia. The powder manufactures are reporting a shortage now.

This is general problem across industry. The baby boomer generation has retired, all those old pharts that knew the tricks to the machines have been replaced by workers just off the streets. Since there is a labour shortage, by anyone the company could find. Production and QC has dropped.

As someone who lived through the inflation of the '70s, I'm not expecting prices to drop much.

Have a nice day.
 
Last edited:
downwindtracker2 said:
Now that I have depressed you about the demand side of supply and demand equation, I'll further wreck your day talking about the supply side. . First off, I'm no industrial chemist, and Chem 12 was long time ago. But one of materials smokeless powder is made of is nitrocellulose . It might be the main one. It seems 30% of the world's supply comes from China and Russia. The powder manufactures are reporting a shortage now.

This is general problem across industry. The baby boomer generation has retired, all those old pharts that knew the tricks to the machines have been replaced by workers just off the streets. Since there is a labour shortage, by anyone the company could find. Production and QC has dropped.

As someone who lived through the inflation of the '70s, I'm not expecting prices to drop much.

Have nice day.
Click to expand...

I also read that baby boomers, along with post baby boomers who worked in the mining of raw materals had died from covid. Furthermore, there would be less component by-products for powder and primers from Russia and China, hence, sanctions on both these countries, nothing go's in or out.
 
downwindtracker2 said:
But one of materials smokeless powder is made of is nitrocellulose . It might be the main one. It seems 30% of the world's supply comes from China and Russia. The powder manufactures are reporting a shortage now.
Click to expand...

I was of the impression that virtually all smokeless powder plants had their own nitration operation, in other words, they produce all of their own nitrocellulose in-house. Is that not so? It's tough to imagine it being economically viable to run a powder operation otherwise, since most of the work in making powder is the nitration.
 
hawk-i said:
I only buy powder when it is on sale now, same with ammo.
Click to expand...

Finding any reloading component on sale is an oxymoron, meaning: a sale price is much higher than it was two years ago. If the wars continue in the middle-east and eastern Europe, components may become steeper in price and less available.
 
Local gun store owners were recently at a show in Texas and a Hornady rep told them that primers and especially shotshell powder are going to be harder to acquire. Were also told that China has most of the worlds supply of the components for both of them and that shotshell powders are used as the propellant of the missiles being used in the Russian/Ukrainian war. Each missile uses an average of 150lbs of powder.
 
BattleRife said:
I was of the impression that virtually all smokeless powder plants had their own nitration operation, in other words, they produce all of their own nitrocellulose in-house. Is that not so? It's tough to imagine it being economically viable to run a powder operation otherwise, since most of the work in making powder is the nitration.
Click to expand...

I don't think neither of us are much of an authority on powder manufacture . I'm certainly not. My comment is merely a second hand one from powder company spokesman that was being quoted. I do know that we had two pulp mills in BC that made cellulose that long ago converted to regular pulp. Maybe that is what he is talking about ?
 
Canuck65 said:
- ...somehow Americans aren't affected
- international conflict has been pretty much constant for the past 100 years
Click to expand...

So, you're saying Americans aren't affected by the current shortage of powders and primers? And that the period from 1925-1975 had about the same amount of international conflict as the period 1975-2020?
 
Our club looks like a ghost town now. massive increases in ammo and reloading components, Trudeau's corrupt and mentally ill preoccupation vendetta against legal gun owners, and firearm prices far beyond being affordable for most anymore. Not looking very optimistic for the future.
 
Every company out sourced everything off shore and it's now biting them on the ass. Biggest thing is nobody over here wants to work at many jobs anymore.
 
I have purchased 10 lbs of H4350 on sale this holiday season
the box is marked 2015!
since then I don't buy the shortage wording any more
it is all a scam
all

Wmontt9.png
 
I started to reload in the late 70's and have seen powder go from $6 / pound to close to $100, primers from $1 / 100 to $30 and higher, one thing I have learned is that the prices escalate very fast during times of shortages and are very slow to come down once supply increases and the prices never go all the way back to where they were, we have seen this happen 3 or 4 times in the past 50 years.
Once a shortage begins people start to panic buy which escalates the shortage an drives the price up further, when you add to that the number of new shooters that have bought guns and ammunition in the past 5 years fueled by governments that want to ban guns and tax the crap out of anything gun related or governments that pull out of places like Afghanistan and leave behind billions of rounds of ammunition that have to be replaced.
Now on top of that we have record inflation on all consumer goods, everything that we buy has at one time been on a ship, truck or train that burn fuel so add in the transportation costs, high fuel price, carbon tax on top of that and yes come April 1 another increase in carbon tax will drive the fuel price up again by .17 cents per liter, which will be passed on to us the consumer.
If you are going to wait for powder to go back down to $40 / pound you may as well sell your rifle now, it's never happened before and it ain't happening now.
IMHO from an old guy's perspective.
 
legi0n said:
I have purchased 10 lbs of H4350 on sale this holiday season
the box is marked 2015!
since then I don't buy the shortage wording any more
it is all a scam
all

Wmontt9.png
Click to expand...

If you take the 1 lb container and look at the side of the bottle where the label ends meet, there will be 2 rows of numbers in the middle of bottle, the top 1st number is the size of container in your case 1 lb, the next six numbers is the date when the powder went into the bottle in a month/day/year format. The next line consisting of 4 or 5 numbers is the lot number.
 
If you lived through the '70s you'll realize we don't have record inflation. Still much more than the Bank Of Canada is comfortable with, so we get higher interest rates to quell demand. Though as one on a fixed income, what we have is bad news.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom