Has anyone figured out exactly how much cheaper it is to re-load?

-Figure you can load premium rifle ammo for about a third the price of premium factory ammo. The same applies to premium big bore handgun stuff (like 44 mag), and rare calibers.
-You can usually load 'white box' or plinking grade ammo for about 80% the cost of factory white box (winchester 223 white box, ot UMC 9mm, for example)
-You'll never be able to beat the price of some surplus ammo - like 7.62x39. If you can find free reloadable brass, you might come close though (and get more accurate ammo, to boot)
 
I just got set up for reloading for my 270wsm.
Factory ammo can cost any wheres from $1 a round to over $2 a round depending on what I would buy and where I would buy it, now that I have started rolling my own I figure it costs me about $.45 a round, I didn't figure the cost of brass in to this as I already have about a hundred rounds of once fired, and not to mention that reloading made a noticable improvment on accuracy:dancingbanana: :dancingbanana:

Russ
 
blindman said:
Cost per bulllet in factory 9mm = .23 cents per round. Cost of reloaded round, provided you have brass for free = .16 cents per round..Hope this answers your question! Keep in mind that if you are loading for rifle, you will gain much better accuracy than you will with factory rounds, so this is also benificial to the reloader. You will save around %30- %40 depending on costs of bullets, powder, primers. I buy powder for $30.00, primers for $30.00, and bullets for $100.00 per 1000. Total is $160.00 It would cost me $235.00 for 1000 rounds of factory ammo. I save $75.00 per 1000 rounds, which is enough when you think of how many thousands of rounds you can shoot in IPSC! You will save even more if you shoot lead bullets instead of FMJ's.
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16C per round of 9mm?
2.1 cents for powder
4 cents per bullet (excel lead) or 6.6 copper plated
3 cents per primer
total cost = 9.1 cent per round.
or 4.55 per 50 rounds

Lemoron's cheapest is around 10.
 
The whole "it's cheaper to shoot , if I reload", is just a little white lie we tell our wives.It's not really cheaper to shoot, we just shoot a lot more for the same money, and tell them that it would cost us at least twice as much if we didn't reload.That way they think we are being good and saving money, when we are really shooting twice as much as we could afford to if we didn't reload.Understand???
Scott
 
magicchip said:
16C per round of 9mm?
2.1 cents for powder
4 cents per bullet (excel lead) or 6.6 copper plated
3 cents per primer
total cost = 9.1 cent per round.
or 4.55 per 50 rounds

Lemoron's cheapest is around 10.
Click to expand...
If you read my post again, you will notice I said " I shoot FMJ's, but if you shoot lead, you will save even more"!!.. I would shoot lead, but right now I am shooting a Glock, so shooting lead is out of the question! I wish I could shoot lead, I would save that much more!
 
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How much is a surgeon saving by using a scalpel as opposed to a butter knife?...If the reloading of ammunition for hunting rifles is something your looking at from a money saving point of view you may want to change your point of view to one of accuracy,and precision. Ultimately that was why the surgeon chose the scalpel...Blasting with an ACP or sks whatever is one thing, but try to look at your hunting rifle reloading souly from a premium round for a clean kill point of view. That'll bring you far more pleasure than $'s saved
 
444shooter said:
Didn't Lee have a program that would calculate savings for reloading? I thought I used one years ago.
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Well if anyone would have it ,the people that bring you such quality as aluminum presses,K-tel zippy trim,and suicide reloading kits would:rolleyes:
 
Blindside,
I can agree that the cost of assembling hunting ammo isn't particularly important. I think that you might be forgetting about practice ammo though. Practice ammo doesn't need premium bullets and the last bit of accuracy isn't needed for a few hundred (Or few thousand) rounds to be shot offhand and from field positions. There are plenty of cases where you can save a lot of money per round, and still use the best of everything. My .416 Rigby comes to mind.;) $43.00 versus $180.00 per box with the most expensive bullets I can find. Dropping that further to $25.00 with cheap Speer bullets helps more. $9.00 a round for hunting means nothing, but $9000 for 1000 practice rounds would start to sting.;) $2250 with premium bullet handloads is a step in the right direction, $1250 with practice bullets is more like it, and $250 with cast bullets will be a whole lot better. Which reminds me, I should fire up that melting pot one of these days.
I for one am glad that there is an economy side to handloading, and am able to shoot a lot more because of it. I doubt that I save any total dollars though, I keep shooting up the profit.:D
Did you ever find your Zebra rug?
Mike
 
Call me foolish. I practice with actual hunting loads even though there more $,more recoil etc. They have the same point of impact...Ya the folk that taxidermied my stuff have a hide on its way with another fellas order...Thanks for asking
 
I used to believe in the whole 'practise with what you hunt with theory,' and I practise exactly that, with varmint guns. The premie hunting stuff is just too expensive though. I expend several hundred (if not thousand) rounds of practise ammo every year through EACH gun I shoot. At a buck a piece, Partitions, TSX's and other premies (or the two buck a piece TBBC's) - it's just not gonna happen.
When I'm lucky I can find a cheaper alternatve bullet that shoots to the same POI as my hunting bullet of choice, otherwise I'll get one with the same BC so that at least if the POI's aren't the same, the drops should still be.
And of course I'll expend a dozen or so of the hunting rounds with the premiums to ensure that I'm good to go.

There's just so much valuable skill to be attained that doesn't require shooting your expensive hunting ammo. Dealing with recoil, trigger control, calling your shots, posture, field positions, etc, etc. It's said that proprioception and kinesthaesia - aka 'muscle memory, the ability to control muscle movement unconsciously. If you can call your shots, if you have an exact clear picture in your mind of what was in the reticle at the *exact* moment the gun fired (even if the gun was moving at the time) then you have it. Anyway, proprioception and kinesthaesia can be developed by repeating an action ~4000 times. As each gun and trigger have different 'feels,' I make it a policy to put a lot of trigger time in with each, to refine the 'muscle memory.' This is where cheap ammo really shines.
 
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