Thread: To reload or not reload?

Again vasoline works great for case body.tiny plastic bottle of powdered graphite and a little bit of bird shot in a jars lid, squirt a bit of the powder on the bird shot and dip the neck of case in just before resizing.dead cheap n dead easy.

Lots of info here:

https://gundigest.com/tags/reloading-how-to

These videos look very good.

https://gundigest.com/more/how-to/gu...-reloading/amp

Originally Posted by Micky Duck

Again vasoline works great for case body.tiny plastic bottle of powdered graphite and a little bit of bird shot in a jars lid, squirt a bit of the powder on the bird shot and dip the neck of case in just before resizing.dead cheap n dead easy.

To be fair I always used graphite in the neck and redding case lube on a pad.
It has worked extremely well over the years.
I tried the hornady one shot spray case lube and I really think it is a major step forward in time saving and the cases and neck size extremely smoothly.
Not as cheap perhaps but now prefer this system.

Sent from my SM-A556E using Tapatalk

Gidday Team, it's been a while.

As an aside, has anyone come across any large rifle magnum primers? See a few different brands of LR's occasionally coming in but haven't seen any magnums for bloody ages.

Anyway, some bloody good posts on here, as one bloke mentioned if you have started thinking about it you are already buggered - the likeness to brewing your own beer is also accurate as with the parralells between rabbit holes. Both will quickly grow into very big monsters (as I look at my kegorator gathering dust in the corner...)

I load for 3 of my rifles .223, .308 and .300wm I think the interest came from peering over the edge of my Grandfather's loading bench as a young fulla, watching with fascination while he loaded for pistols, the bits going in one end and a loaded round falling out the other. That and I being an anally retentive OCD perfectionist love rabbit holes and over-thinking.
Anyway, it looked like you were making the jump so no doubt you are well down the hole by now. If you haven't already - and you don't mind a bit of reading, Nathan Foster published a guide on hand loading for rifles as part of a series. It's an excellent book and I still reference it. He's a top bloke as well, lord knows he had the patience of a saint emailing replies to my questions, I can't recommend he and his books enough. His website runs a great forum as well and is a huge wealth of knowledge.

Good luck!

How did this tale end? Have you gone down the rabbithole @nonvegan?

Can't hear you from down here...

Pleased to hearyou sold one kidney. Lucky you have 2 of them. My partner said they will buy your other kidney as they have others on the list ready and waiting for it. Then you can purchase some brass pills and powder and get triple the amount of shooting from it. Long story short reloading is cheaper once u got all the gear, kit you need. Comes down to how much shooting will u be doing

Originally Posted by nonvegan

Can't hear you from down here...

Welcome.
GPM.

Originally Posted by nonvegan

Can't hear you from down here...

Now I get it.

Have you bought yourself some reloading gear then?

I wouldn't recommend it. I bought the gear and life happened. Never ended up using any of it and haven't reloaded anything. I don't shoot enough to warrant the hassle. I just use factory ammo which works fine and isn't excessively expensive considering how little I shoot

When I move out of auckland I will probably shoot enough to use it.

Originally Posted by Russian 22.

I wouldn't recommend it. I bought the gear and life happened. Never ended up using any of it and haven't reloaded anything. I don't shoot enough to warrant the hassle. I just use factory ammo which works fine and isn't excessively expensive considering how little I shoot

When I move out of auckland I will probably shoot enough to use it.

In some regards I agree. Many hunters don't shoot enough to warrant it. I fall into that category. But,, never regretted starting. Eventually the gear will pay for its self and its an interesting add on to the sport.

Eventually you save money unless you start shooting a lot more.

Sorry for the lack of a decent answer, it's been a busy weekend :-)

So, I started off with buying dies, some brass + consumables and got help loading up some ammo. With it, I've shot tighter groups than ever before - probably the result of both better ammo and some much needed pointers for improving my shooting. All very much appreciated!

I quickly reached the conclusion that, in the grand scheme of things, the cost of a press isn't actually that much more (that's my excuse, and I'm sticking to it!), so I grabbed a Redding Big Boss II from Ammo Direct, and found a few bits second hand. This is obviously not a money saving exercise as such, but it just feels better to shoot a large number of hand loads than factory ammo. With enough shooting, the press etc will break even - or if I find that I'm really not that into it, I can store the stuff away for a rainy day, or sell it on and not lose too much. I've obviously spent more money than I would have if just using factory ammo, but I've also been shooting more, which was kind of the point.

Originally Posted by Oldbloke

In some regards I agree. Many hunters don't shoot enough to warrant it. I fall into that category. But,, never regretted starting. Eventually the gear will pay for its self and its an interesting add on to the sport.

Eventually you save money unless you start shooting a lot more.

Greg Duley made the telling comment many moons ago many NZ hunters chasing deer only use a box of ammo a year and most of it at the roar.