Reaching Master or Grand-master level with factory ammo

[pjb45]

Listen to Cha-Lee; his is ugly   but his advice is very good.

 

There are probably a lot of threads on the pro/con of reloading yourself.

Do the math.

 

Unlike Charlie's advice, I use the cheapest ammo available for Tuesday Night Steel and practice.  Accuracy is generally not an issue. 

In USPSA matches, better is better. Nothing sucks more than to be in an Area match and have ammo issues.  It happened to me twice, I won't go back to that brand even for practice.

 

.22 conversion units can be a huge benefit. 

Edited February 9, 2020 by pjb45
additional info

[swordfish]

On 1/27/2020 at 12:13 PM, B_RAD said:

$.15-.16

 

 

Are they gold plated?

I'm at like 9.3 cents with the heaviest bullets. It'd be around 7 cents if I used 115gr but I like the feel of the 147s.

[B_RAD]

8 hours ago, swordfish said:

Are they gold plated?

I'm at like 9.3 cents with the heaviest bullets. It'd be around 7 cents if I used 115gr but I like the feel of the 147s.

They were plated. Not gold though. That also includes buying brass. 

 

9.3 cents is pretty darn cheap. I'd love to hear your cost on everything. I doubt it's really that low when you consider stuff like brass cleaning media. Are you casting your own bullets?  Weight?

 

 

Edited February 10, 2020 by B_RAD

[swordfish]

On 2/10/2020 at 7:49 AM, B_RAD said:

They were plated. Not gold though. That also includes buying brass. 

 

9.3 cents is pretty darn cheap. I'd love to hear your cost on everything. I doubt it's really that low when you consider stuff like brass cleaning media. Are you casting your own bullets?  Weight?

 

 

Blue bullets with discount. Already have the brass or it's donated to me for free, and since I shoot revolver I get to keep all of it until it cracks.

3.20gr bullseye and the heavy 147gr Blue bullet, but I get a 10% discount on them because I put their logo on my shooting shirt. 12% if you buy 10k at a time, so I try to find a couple other dudes running the same bullets and get a group order.

I was getting dealer cost on Federal primers but my distributor got bought out by Brownells and they basically gutted the place and moved everything back to Iowa or wherever, so I bought as many primers as I could and then the price will go up when I finally run out.

Cleaning media gets reused, cleaned, whatever. Been using the same stuff for years, I add a little metal polish sometimes and leave it in an industrial sized tumbler for like 4 hours. No problems yet.

Edited February 11, 2020 by swordfish

[B_RAD]

3 hours ago, swordfish said:

Blue bullets with discount. Already have the brass or it's donated to me for free, and since I shoot revolver I get to keep all of it until it cracks.

3.20gr bullseye and the heavy 147gr Blue bullet, but I get a 10% discount on them because I put their logo on my shooting shirt. 12% if you buy 10k at a time, so I try to find a couple other dudes running the same bullets and get a group order.

I was getting dealer cost on Federal primers but my distributor got bought out by Brownells and they basically gutted the place and moved everything back to Iowa or wherever, so I bought as many primers as I could and then the price will go up when I finally run out.

Cleaning media gets reused, cleaned, whatever. Been using the same stuff for years, I add a little metal polish sometimes and leave it in an industrial sized tumbler for like 4 hours. No problems yet.

Apples to oranges my friend. 
 

you shoot revolver and get free brass. You got dealer cost on primers. 

[regor]

16 hours ago, B_RAD said:

Apples to oranges my friend. 
 

you shoot revolver and get free brass. You got dealer cost on primers. 

 

My cost for my 9mm minor loads is ~9.5cpr. The big thing is just planning ahead and watching for sales on primers/powder to get the costs down, although the biggest cost will always be the projectile. 

 

I shoot Gallant 125gr projectiles, $241/3600 and a 10% discount if you "subscribe", 6 cents per. 

Last batch of powder I bought $143 for 8lbs, and my load for the 125s is 4.2gr, which works out to ~1 cent per. 

Last batch of primers I bought was a 12k box of Fiocchi and was $296 shipped on sale, so ~2.5 cents per. 

 

I do get "free" brass from going to the range I am a member of and picking up brass in the action bays (which any member can do). If I didn't have that available there is one seller local(ish) to me who sells 5k for $120 shipped (2.5 cents per) online [https://sagesreloadingsupply.com/index.php?route=product/product&path=59_70&product_id=335], so my price would still be ~12 cents per. 

 

 

[TrackCage]

I also don't think it's hard to get sub-10 cents per round of 9mm, so long as you aren't paying for brass.

 

I buy primers in bulk when I can get them sub-three cents.

I buy powder 16# at a time

I buy projectiles 10k+ at a time

 

I'm at 9.3 cpr for 124s and 9.7 cpr for 147s. 

I don't think it's fair to add the cost of cleaning media to the price.

[regor]

20 minutes ago, TrackCage said:

I don't think it's fair to add the cost of cleaning media to the price.

 

Is it even a meaningful number to add per round? I wet tumble without pins, so my cost is a couple gallons of tap water, a squirt of dish soap, a dash of Lemishine, and the electricity to run it all; pennies per batch of ~1500 9mm cases. Costs would need to be at least an order of magnitude higher, if not two, to even show up in the first decimal of the final cpr. 

[swordfish]

On 2/11/2020 at 8:43 PM, B_RAD said:

Apples to oranges my friend. 
 

you shoot revolver and get free brass. You got dealer cost on primers. 

Go to the range or stay after at a match and pick up brass. Dealer cost only saves me $3 or $4 per 1000. Not a ton, but it does help. And remember I'm using heavy bullets. Lighter bullets are cheaper.

[blindmarksman]

Sorry but I just don't get picking up 9mm brass. Sure you save money on reloads but think of how much time you need to invest picking it up, cleaning it, and processing it. Then you run the risk of cracked cases etc. Just not worth it in my opinion especially since I have so little time already that I can dedicate to practice itself. But I guess it is cool to brag on the internet about how much cheaper your ammo is.

[Xanatos903]

9 hours ago, blindmarksman said:

Sorry but I just don't get picking up 9mm brass. Sure you save money on reloads but think of how much time you need to invest picking it up, cleaning it, and processing it. Then you run the risk of cracked cases etc. Just not worth it in my opinion especially since I have so little time already that I can dedicate to practice itself. But I guess it is cool to brag on the internet about how much cheaper your ammo is.

 

Gotta do what you've gotta do to save money. Saving a few cents doesn't sound like much if you only shoot 1k rounds a year, but what about when you shoot 10k-15k? More? If you save $0.05 per round and shoot 10k per year, you're saving $500. If you buy brass for $0.03/ea, that's $300 gone that you could have saved by spending 15 minutes at the end of a range day. 

 

I'll gladly give myself something satisfying to do in my free time that actually saves me some money. 

[shred]

If it's all close and easy to grab you can make a pretty decent hourly wage equivalent picking up brass, even 9mm.  You can inspect it then versus some guy on the internet that says it's all once-fired brand new from the Old Ladies Sunday Church Shooters.

 

Or you can throw down some cash and drive on. Whatever you prefer.

 

[regor]

I typically only pick up brass after practice sessions when I can scoop up everything and pass it through a case sifter to get out most of the dirt and debris, but the one time I did pick up brass at a match I came away with ~2x as many cases as I shot in the match. I helped reset after every shooter and grabbed 5-10 cases on the way back each time. On stages that didn't use the whole length of the bay I picked up cases while people were making ready/shooting. With 10+ person squads that should easily net you more than you shot on the stage. 

[pig4bill]

Federal makes 150 gr just for action pistol.

[twodownzero]

I have been handloading since I lived in a 1 bedroom apartment.  Then I moved to a studio and continued to handload in college.  After that, I went to graduate school, and while I'd load on my breaks, I taught my roommates to load in the garage of our rented house. After that, I moved and rented a house where I set up my reloading room in a spare bedroom.  Now I have 900 square feet of garage and I can finally have a place to clean, build, and work on guns (and everything else) as well as handload all I want.  The moral of the story should be that you do NOT need anything but a closet to handload. 

 

As for making M/GM with factory ammo, ammo is the least of your worries.  If you're rich and have forklift pallets of 9mm laying around, you should have no problem making GM without a reloading press.  If not, then you should have had a press a long time ago.

[pskys2]

Unless you are sponsored or rolling in dough cost of ammo is the deal breaker.

 

To reach M/GM you need to shoot, reloading means you can shoot more.  There is no reasonable short cut, unless of course you are a "truly" gifted athlete.

Taking courses from good professional trainers will shorten the curve, but you will still need to shoot.

[stick]

You don't need to reload to make M/GM.  Ammo will cost you more though as many have stated.  Reloading ammo sames money and it allows you to cater the load to the gun.