12 gauge reloading?

[bigsaxdog]

wanna get into action shotgun! i've reloaded alot of rifle and pistol ammo, but never shotgun. is it worth($$$) it? i've got a dillon and do .45 for my 1911 cause' i like to and it saves alot of $$$, but after checking out prices for shotgun components, i can't seem to come close to wal-mart prices (@$.12-.15 per round). am i looking in the wrong places for components? or is this just the deal? thanx for the help for a newbieee!!!!!!!!

[tightloop]

Here is the short answer.  

Reloading shotgun is like pistol and rifle, you can tailor the load and velocity for the task at hand, anywhere from 7/8th oz to 1 1/5 oz.  Just like other kinds of reloading getting set up is the expensive part.  However if you can buy factory stuff for 3.65 a box, I cannot load it that cheaply.  I stopped reloading when 7 of us locally formed a buying comsortium (sort of) and bought 10,000 dollars worth of shotgun shells from a manufacturer.  got them for 3.25 a box, with no shipping.  so there you have it, if you can afford to buy enough to get the price down, to be under what the components cost you, shoot factory stuff. If not, get a loader and get busy.

[BSeevers]

I don't reload shotgun because I use so little. There are maybe 10 matches a year and I can Walmart it so cheap. The only reason to reload is to make a custom light or heavy load. Unless you already own the reloader or shoot trap/sporting clays/etc.

[EricW]

You just can't load 12 ga. for what you can buy it commercially these days.  Once you amortize the cost of the press, you'd have to shoot thousands of rounds a year even to pay off a $200 MEC.  I get top quality PMC shells for $4 a box.  I'd get them for $3.65 if I was a member of the range.  

Either go to Wally World, or negotiate a deal to buy a year's worth of shells at one crack from someone.  Nothing else makes much sense anymore.  I still reload, but once my components are gone, I'm done.

If you're going to shoot sub-gauges, it's a different story.  You save serious bucks loading for 16 gauge and under.

E

[cardboardkiller]

I'm with Eric on this one, I've tried to rationalize buying another reloading machine to load shotgun shells on, but it would take me so long for it to pay for itself with the money I would save I couldn't bring myself to do it. The savings just aren't there compared to pistol and rifle ammo for the average shooter.

[Madmark]

All true, but you cant buy commercially loaded ROCK SALT rounds.....(oops, my hillbilly side is coming out)  ~Mark

[Ron Ankeny]

I have loaded 12 ga. for trap for over 20 years so I am already good to go. You can still load cheaper than you can buy loaded ammo if you purchase components through a trap club or in very large quantities. If I didn't already have the press, 50,000 wads, and half a ton of shot, I'd buy from Wal-Mart or the likes.

[Singlestack]

I can't understand buying cheap shotgun ammo. I would not consider it for my pistol or my rifle so why would I skimp on the shotgun??

I use only Winchester AA's. I can reload them cheaper than I can buy them. In fact , it works out to be about $2.50 per box.

[ErikW]

Maybe the reason some of us go for high-quality pistol and rifle ammo, but cheap shotgun ammo, is that we can see the results of the single projectiles on paper, but we can't see our shot patterns in the sky.

Maybe we could tell by fewer broken clays, but some of us <ahem> miss so much anyway we wouldn't know the difference.

[EricW]

The difference between a cheap shell and a "good" shell is typically just in the quality of the shot.  Quality shells pattern tighter.  The "cheap shells leave holes in the pattern" theory is bunk.  All shot patterns follow a Gaussian distribution regardless of the price on the box.  A $6 box of AA's will have just as many "holes" as Wally World specials.  The difference is in the diameter of the pattern at XX yards - which determines whether you consistently have enough density at the edges of the pattern to break the bird on marginal shots.  

For moderate ranges, you can probably just compensate for cheap shells by choking down.  At longer ranges, the quality of the lead is probably essential to maintaining a decent pattern.

My reloads come in just under $3 a box.  But by the time I mess with loading and scrounging for components (a B*TCH to find here in Berkely North) I think I'm actually losing money over just paying the extra buck to buy the things.

Will my score ever show a difference for buying foo foo shells?  Never.

E

[Patrick Sweeney]

If I didn't already have;

The reloading gear

half ton of shot

bale of wads

a load that is death on pins and poppers

a load that is also soft on the shoulder

a dumpster full of once-fired hulls

I'd buy sale ammo at the big box store.

[Singlestack]

For me, its also about how well they cycle my shotgun and how many I can shoot before the action starts to slow down due to fouling on my mag tube (11-87). I have had problems with cheap shells extracting, feeding, and fouling. Wanna screw up a stage due to a cheap shell not extracting? Not me.

Win AA's work every time for me. I'll pay 6 bucks anyday to know my shotgun is gonna work every time! Of course, I'm talking about 3-gunning. I'm not as picky (well, I really am. I hate the way cheap shells dirty up my shotgun) when shooting clays.

[EricW]

I'm totally hip to reloading to achieve a specific, desired result.  If I can find a source for #7 shot, that will be reason enough to keep the loader mounted to the bench.  

If folks aren't stuck on buying domestic, a couple brands to consider are Clever and PMC's Optima (in the gray box).  I think both are Itallian made.  They're quite popular locally.  Both retail for under $4 a box.  The scuttlebut is that the Clevers perform equivalently to AA's - not that I've bothered to go to the patterning board and count holes or anything...  

FWIW,

E

[Patrick Sweeney]

You want enervating, soul-eroding boredom?  Count shot in a pattern and keep track of the various loads perfromances.    You'll soon wish you could watch some TV instead.

[tightloop]

Eric

Without getting into a huge debate, what does 7's do that 7 1/2 won't do?  Isn't that kind of like all odd numbered shot sizes, like 1's, 3's and 5's.  They used to make them but not any longer.

Kind of like reading an article on the .375 H&H, great old cartridge, I've had one for years and took it to Africa in July, but the article I read was advocating the use of 350 gr bullets as the best thing since sliced bread.  My comments to that were, if 350 gr bullets was the cats a$$, they would be a factory loading by someone, right?  Same for 7's.

[Carlos]

The real savings will be onece you learn how to re- load accurate, low-recoil slug loads using Lyman's 12 Ga. slug- the one that looks like a big airgun pellet (of course, you will also have to cast these yourself if you want to save $$$). You can load these on standard presses with a NORMAL CRIMP (no, not the complicated roll-crimp that used to take an extra step) and they load into a regular WAA-12 or equivalent wad. Do a search on the reloading section fro more info - I tried this once with store-bought Lyman slugs ($8 for 12 slugs! Oy!) loaded over straight Clays powder and STS hulls but the test rounds got mixed in with another batch of mystery reloads so testing was not done -  However, they did work in both a SuperX2 and an 1187.  Accuracy will be the key - and with a slug it can be easily tested.

If you do decide to reload, get a MEC and avoid Lee's loader - hey, I like and use Lee's other products and endorse their dies, but some things they sell do not work well.

[EricW]

tl,

#7 is the best all around clays/bird shot size I've ever used.  It's small enough to give decent patterns on the clays range, heavy enough to give clean kills on pheasant.  7 1/2 simply will not do on upland birds.  It almost invariably causes cripples at any range beyond 20-25 yards.  I thought 7 1/2 would be an OK substitute until I crippled 6 birds with solid shots the day I tried it.  I used #7 all the time when I was in High School and used to bowl pheasants ass over tea kettle with it at 35-40+ yards.  They'd drop dead as doornails.

We also used #7's as a gamer load for shooting Annie Oakley's.  By the time the fourth or fifth turn came, you were sweeping the clays off the ground at 50-60 yards.  The extra energy really helped.

I think the real reason #7's have gone by the wayside is for manufacturing economy and range regulations which set the size limit at 7 1/2.  From what I understand 7 shot is still available in Europe.

Anyway, it sure worked for me.  Plus I really liked running only one shotgun shell.  I didn't have to worry about marking or segregating anything.  I know it seems like hokum, but it really worked.

Ahhhh.....those were the days.....

[Patrick Sweeney]

I load on a MEC.  When I load the Lyman slugs (we worked up some powderpuff loads for pin shooting) I use the Lee as a slug/wad seater only.  Yes, it looks a bit strange to have two presses clamped to the bench, but all I'm interested in are results.

[tightloop]

I haven't seen 7's in years where do you get them?

I used to load 1 1/4 oz of 10's for skeet when shooting for $$ with my buds, but they finally got wise.

[EricW]

I haven't seen #7 in over 15 years.  The guy that ran the sporting good section at our small-town hardware store bought it and would hold some for me.  It was never placed out for retail sale.  It was just a kind of "secret" that people let you in on.  

E

[EricW]

I did a little search, yippeeeee!!

http://www.gamaliel.com/reloading/shot/

Lawrence apparently still makes #7.  Now if I can just get someone to order it for me.  I practically pre-plucked the chukars I shot last month with 1 1/4 oz of #6's.  It wasn't pretty...